Friendship Heights, Brookdale community file lawsuit against developers seeking to redevelop former GEICO campus

Complaint argues new plans do not adhere to initial 1998 development requirements

June 2, 2026 8:00 a.m. | Updated: June 1, 2026 10:08 p.m.

Geico's 26-acre corporate campus in Friendship Heights, at 5260 Western Ave. Photo credit: Elia Griffin

The Village of Friendship Heights filed a lawsuit May 13 asking a Montgomery County Circuit Court judge to decide whether updated plans for the redevelopment of the 26.5-acre GEICO site on Western Avenue should still be subjected to 1998 county development requirements that applied to the early plans for the site.

The filing of the lawsuit does not halt the latest project plans, dubbed Friendship Commons, from moving through the county’s development process. But it does request the court to decide whether specific project elements, including taller heights of the proposed multifamily buildings and construction of a new sports field, should be changed to abide by previous requirements. Leadership of the Village of Friendship Heights has previously voiced opposition to the new plans and concerns about the plans’ proposed removal of mature trees and decision not to preserve or adaptively reuse the mid-century style GEICO building.

The requirements, or “binding elements,” approved by the county under a local map amendment for the area in 1998, address factors ranging from density, design specifications, building configuration, green areas to open space, recreation and traffic, according to the Village’s complaint. Their suit is asking for a declaratory judgment, a legal determination made by a court that rules on a legal dispute or uncertainty, on the matter.

“The Village residents will suffer significant injury in the form of lost light, air, open space and building compatibility, in the absence of declaratory relief from the Court” on the validity of binding elements outlined in 1998, the complaint said.

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Redevelopment plans

The proposed project at 5260 Western Ave. calls for demolishing and redeveloping GEICO’s mid-century style building and transforming the campus with two surface parking lots into an urban, transit-oriented development. The development would consist of up to 520 residential units and green space, according to a March press release from developer EYA.

Of the total proposed residences, 96 would be condominium units, up to 185 would be townhomes, and up to 250 would be apartments across three buildings. In addition, plans call for 17.5% of all units to be moderately priced dwelling units, according to planning documents.

In addition to residences, redevelopment plans also propose upgrades to the adjacent Brookdale Neighborhood Park and new types of green spaces around the site, including a garden.

Plans for redeveloping the GEICO site have been in the works since the 1990s. In 1999, the Planning Board approved a preliminary plan that outlined a large-scale redevelopment project similar to the plans proposed by Friendship Commons Partners. Those plans called for development of more than 800,000 square feet of office space in three buildings, 500 multifamily units in apartments along Willard Avenue, 200 townhouses, a sports field and park, according to planning documents.

The lawsuit

The May 13 lawsuit names the GEICO site contract purchaser, Friendship Commons Partners LLC (which consists of EYA and Bernstein Management Corp.), as well as the Montgomery County Council and Planning Board as defendants.

In a May 26 statement of justification for the project, the developers note that in 2014, nearly 10 acres of the site fronting Friendship Boulevard and Willard Avenue were rezoned to commercial residential zoning, allowing a maximum height of 100 feet for future development. Developers have proposed to develop that section with several multifamily buildings and argue that the 2014 rezoning “negated the continuing application of the Binding Elements to the Property,” the document states.

In statements emailed to the Bethesda Today last week, Montgomery Planning Director Jason Sartori and County Council President Natali Fani-González said they were aware of the village’s lawsuit but could not comment on the details of the suit.

An attorney representing Friendship Commons Partners did not respond to Bethesda Today’s repeated email and phone call requests for comment over the last week.

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On Thursday, an amended version of the suit was filed in county Circuit Court to add the Brookdale Citizens Association as the second plaintiff, according to Francine Kerner Klein, vice chair of the Council of the Village of Friendship Heights.

Brookdale is a small single-family community bordering the GEICO site, the Village of Friendship Heights and Washington, D.C. The Village of Friendship Heights is a census-designated special taxing district with about 5,000 residents.

“Those are two communities, the high-rise community and the single-family community, and they both decide that this is not what they signed up for and that there is no way that they can accept the change of that magnitude,” Klein told Bethesda Today on Friday.

Klein said she is also worried the proposed plans would negatively impact the area by removing mature trees, increasing traffic and changing the neighborhood’s character.

Geico's corporate campus in Friendship Heights — Geico’s corporate campus in Friendship Heights. Photo credit: Elia Griffin

According to Fani-González’s statement, council staff are reviewing the complaint with the Office of the County Attorney and look forward to a “just resolution” of the case.

Sartori noted in his statement that project applications for the Friendship Commons project are under review by the planning department. They include a site plan, sketch plan and forest conservation plan.

That process includes “review of how the proposed development complies with applicable laws, is substantially consistent with the currently adopted sector plan for the area, and addresses environmental impacts, design, and the availability of public facilities like transportation, schools, and water and sewer infrastructure,” Sartori said.

EYA President and CEO McLean Quinn said in the March release that the project is “one of the most meaningful redevelopment opportunities in the region.” Plans for the project can be viewed at this link.

According to the project’s website, developers anticipate demolition of the GEICO building to begin this summer. However, the start of demolition is dependent on the approval of the forest conservation plan and then securing a demolition permit from the county.

Developers anticipate construction on the project’s first phase to begin in the second quarter of 2027, according to the project website.

In early 2025, GEICO announced plans to move its corporate headquarters to downtown Bethesda in early 2026. It appears the company has moved into the new headquarters, which boasts a human-sized Lego GEICO Gecko statue, according to the company’s LinkedIn posts. GEICO’s announcement revitalized interest in the site’s future and the long-delayed plans for its redevelopment.

Binding elements

The binding elements in question in the lawsuit are outlined in a local map amendment, or zoning change for the property, approved by the County Council, sitting as the District Council, in 1998, according to Klein.

According to the complaint, the binding elements were developed with the Village of Friendship Heights and surrounding residential areas “to minimize the incompatibility of new development on the Property with existing surrounding residential uses.”

One binding element notes the height limit of multifamily buildings along Willard Avenue was set at four stories, and recent plans call for the buildings to be six to seven stories tall, according to the complaint.

Another binding element calls for the development of 1 acre of recreational open space north of and adjacent to Brookdale Park. Recent plans replace that open space with townhomes, the complaint said.

“There’s a lot of latitude within those binding elements to create something that can be profitable and house more residents and still give us what we need to enhance the community instead of detracting from it,” Klein said.

According to Klein, the 1998 local map amendment says the binding elements remain held in perpetuity unless the site is rezoned. Even if new binding elements were drafted, she said the communities probably would not want to see significant differences from the requirements drafted 26 years ago.

“The communities, if anything, have more concerns [now] than they did back then … in terms of environmental concerns,” Klein said.

It is unclear how soon a decision will be made on the suit.

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Originally published at Bethesdamagazine