• By Nicholas Bonard
• June 25, 2018

The International Chancery Center – the First Foreign Mission Enclave

The U.S. Department of State is preparing a master plan for the Foreign Missions Center on a 32-acre portion of the former Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Northwest, Washington, DC. It will be an enclave of 11-15 embassies, but it is not the first foreign mission enclave in the capital. That distinction belongs to the International Chancery Center (ICC). This post will describe how the ICC came about and why it is a successful way to host foreign missions in the city.

Background
As the capital of the United States, Washington, DC has the privilege of hosting foreign nations’ embassies. While other cities in the United States may host consulates, Washington is the only American city where you can find embassy buildings (the term chancery can be used interchangeably) that house the principal offices of a country’s foreign mission. In the 1900s, old mansions on 16th Street, NW and those along Massachusetts Avenue, NW, were the preferred locations for foreign states to establish their embassies. The trend to locate embassies along Embassy Row on Massachusetts Avenue continued into the 1970s even as potential properties for embassies grew scarce. A 1977 NCPC report, Foreign Missions and International Agencies, confirmed this trend and noted that finding property for new or expanding chanceries was becoming increasingly difficult, as new missions tended to “look for property in areas that enjoy established popularity with the diplomatic community,” like Dupont Circle, along Embassy Row, and areas near the Department of State.

Additionally, embassies increasingly required more space and had more stringent security requirements, leading to foreign governments seeking larger facilities on spacious lots. In the 1960s, restrictive zoning practices also made it difficult to find suitable locations on private property for embassies in the city. Foreign governments’ challenges in identifying properties within Washington, DC affected the Department of State’s ability to reciprocally acquire properties in other countries.

ICC – The first of its kind
To address the growing space needs of foreign missions and international organizations after World War II, the Secretary of State named a special committee, which advocated for the creation of a center for embassies. The idea was that with federal control of the land, foreign missions could avoid the lengthy site selection process required when embassies attempted to locate on private property. Working with this concept, NCPC first proposed the development of a center in the West End between Washington and Dupont Circles, New Hampshire Avenue, and Rock Creek Park. Congress, however, was concerned with the cost and potential for displacement of existing property owners and asked for an alternative.

In response, NCPC, together with the General Services Administration (GSA) and the Department of State, developed an alternative proposal for an International Center on land owned by the National Bureau of Standards (now the National Institute of Standards and Technology) on Connecticut Avenue, NW in the city’s Van Ness neighborhood. The site was the agency’s former headquarters, since vacated with the development of a new campus in Gaithersburg, Maryland.

In 1968, Congress passed Public Law 90-553 authorizing the Secretary of State to sell or lease space on this tract of land, now known as the International Chancery Center, to foreign governments. In 1971, NCPC approved the master plan for the area prepared by the Department of State in cooperation with GSA. At the time, the plan consisted of 11 acres for a center for new embassies and eight acres for the new Organization of American States headquarters. The plan also identified acreage north of Van Ness Street as a potential site for future expansion.

Today, the center has 47 acres and consists of 19 separate lots. With the impending opening of the new Embassy of the Kingdom of Morocco, there is now only one parcel available to build a new embassy at the International Chancery Center. In addition to foreign missions, there is also a Department of State federal office building, and the headquarters for the uniformed branch of the Secret Service that serves the Center’s occupants. At one time, INTELSAT, an international organization, also had its headquarters in the ICC at 4000 Connecticut Avenue NW. INTELSAT relocated to Tysons Corner in 2014 and its former building will become a private school scheduled to open in 2019.

A Resounding Success
The ICC’s popularity among foreign governments looking for land to build their chancery is apparent in the Center’s almost complete build out. The development has also been a success for the Department of State: In addition to easing the process of finding land in Washington, DC for foreign missions, the Department of State has “successfully linked the land at the International Center with [their] negotiations abroad.” (Department of State) An additional benefit of clustering embassies together is that the Department of State can more easily provide a secure environment for them. Though this wasn’t a primary reason for creating an enclave in the 1960s, the need for security has taken on even more importance in recent decades. The most telling measure of success, however, is that the Department of State is developing another foreign missions enclave at the former Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Northwest Washington called the Foreign Missions Center (FMC). You can read more about the proposed new enclave, and about NCPC’s role in developing foreign missions, through the links below.

Embassy Topic Page
Map of Foreign Missions
NCPC Review of FMC
Department of State ICC Page