COVID-19 Pandemic

6 Months Ended

Jun. 30, 2020

Unusual or Infrequent Items, or Both [Abstract]

In December 2019, a novel strain of coronavirus (“COVID-19”) was identified in Wuhan, China and by March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization had declared it a global pandemic. Many states in the U.S., including New York, New Jersey, Illinois and California implemented stay-at-home orders for all "non-essential" business and activity in an aggressive effort to curb the spread of the virus. In May 2020, certain states implemented phased re-opening plans for businesses and activities that were previously ordered to close, with limitations on occupancy and certain other restrictions. It is uncertain as to how long these restrictions will continue or if additional restrictions or closures will be imposed. As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, the U.S. economy has suffered and there has been significant volatility in the financial markets. Many U.S. industries and businesses have been negatively affected and millions of people have filed for unemployment.

Our properties, which are concentrated in New York City, and in Chicago and San Francisco, have been adversely affected as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and the preventive measures taken to curb the spread of the virus. Some of the effects on us include the following:


•	With the exception of grocery stores and other "essential" businesses, many of our retail tenants closed their stores in March 2020 and began reopening when New York City entered phase two of its state-mandated reopening plan on June 22, 2020.


•	While our buildings remain open, many of our office tenants are working remotely.


•	We have temporarily closed the Hotel Pennsylvania.


•	We have cancelled trade shows at theMART for the remainder of 2020.


•	Because certain of our development projects were deemed "non-essential," they were temporarily paused in March 2020 due to New York State executive orders and resumed once New York City entered phase one of its state mandated reopening plan on June 8, 2020.

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As of April 30, 2020, we placed 1,803 employees on temporary furlough, which included 1,293 employees of Building Maintenance Services LLC ("BMS"), a wholly owned subsidiary, which provides cleaning, security and engineering services primarily to our New York properties, 414 employees at the Hotel Pennsylvania and 96 corporate staff employees. As of July 31, 2020, 542 employees have been taken off furlough and returned to work, which included 503 employees of BMS and 39 corporate staff employees.


•	Effective April 1, 2020, our executive officers waived portions of their annual base salary for the remainder of 2020.


•	Effective April 1, 2020, each non-management member of our Board of Trustees agreed to forgo his or her $75,000 annual cash retainer for the remainder of 2020.

While we believe our tenants are required to pay rent under their leases, in limited circumstances, we have agreed to and may continue to agree to rent deferrals and rent abatements for certain of our tenants. We have made a policy election in accordance with the Financial Accounting Standards Board (“FASB”) Staff Q&A which provides relief in accounting for leases during the COVID-19 pandemic, allowing us to continue recognizing rental revenue on a straight-line basis for rent deferrals, with no impact to revenue recognition, and to recognize rent abatements as a reduction to rental revenue in the period granted. See Note 4 - Recently Issued Accounting Literature for additional information.

For the quarter ended June 30, 2020, we collected 88% (94% including rent deferrals) of rent due from our tenants, comprised of 93% (98% including rent deferrals) from our office tenants and 72% (78% including rent deferrals) from our retail tenants. Rent deferrals generally require repayment in monthly installments over a period not to exceed twelve months.

Based on our assessment of the probability of rent collection of our lease receivables, we have written off $36,297,000 of receivables arising from the straight-lining of rents, primarily for the JCPenney lease at Manhattan Mall and the New York & Company, Inc. lease at 330 West 34th Street, both tenants have filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, and $8,822,000 of tenant receivables deemed uncollectible, resulting in a reduction of lease revenues and our share of income from partially owned entities for the three and six months ended June 30, 2020. Prospectively, revenue recognition for these tenants will be based on actual amounts received. See Note 5 - Revenue Recognition and Note 8 - Investment in Partially Owned Entities for additional information.