Goldman Nears Deal for N.Y. Headquarters

New York officials have completed details of an agreement with Goldman Sachs Group Inc. to subsidize its planned 40-story headquarters building in Lower Manhattan within 100 yards of the World Trade Center site, John Cahill, chief of staff to Gov. George Pataki, said Monday.

The deal includes as much as $115 million of New York City and state tax breaks and $1.6 billion of tax-exempt Liberty Bond financing. Pataki assigned Cahill, who led negotiations the last two weeks, the task of getting downtown rebuilding plans moving again after proposals for Goldman’s building and the 1,776-foot Freedom Tower got snarled in security issues in April.

The last piece of the Goldman plan is expected to fall into place today when the Battery Park City Authority, a state agency that owns the headquarters site, is scheduled to vote to approve a lease to the third-biggest U.S. securities firm, Cahill said.

“Frankly, I don’t see anything that would impede them from actually putting the shovel into the ground,” Cahill said.

Cahill said he expected that a groundbreaking could occur “in the next couple of weeks.”

A Goldman spokeswoman declined to comment.

Goldman’s lease agreement is to include at least $320 million in payments to the authority over the next 64 years, said Leticia Remauro, an authority spokeswoman. These include $161 million to lease the land and a $155-million so-called civic facilities fee to support and maintain Battery Park open spaces.

Also included are $5.5 million for a neighborhood library and a community center, and an undetermined amount will go toward an atrium walkway to connect the building, a nearby movie theater and a hotel.