Our guest speaker will be Seth Pinsky, Executive Vice President, RXR, who will give a presentation on "Back to the Future: Investing in Our Suburban Downtowns". Mr. Pinsky is an Executive Vice President at RXR Realty, where he is leading RXR’s efforts to invest in “emerging opportunities” in the NY region. He focuses on areas with significant growth potential, particularly in the Outer Boroughs and suburban downtowns.
Prior to RXR, Mr. Pinsky was Director of Mayor Bloomberg’s Special Initiative for Rebuilding and Resiliency, which developed a $20 billion plan to protect the City from climate change impacts. Mr. Pinsky also served at the NYC Economic Development Corporation, where he was President from 2008 to 2013.
While at NYCEDC, Pinsky was lead negotiator for projects such as Yankee Stadium, Citifield, the World Trade Center, and the acquisition of Hunters Point South in Queens. Other initiatives advanced under Pinsky’s leadership were developments in Willets Point, Coney Island, Homeport in Staten Island, Kingsbridge Armory in the Bronx, and the Alexandria Center for Life Sciences. Under Pinsky, NYCEDC also managed the construction of the High Line, launched the East River Ferry and announced plans for the world’s largest observation wheel in Staten Island.
In the area of economic modernization, under Pinsky, NYCEDC launched business incubators across the City and oversaw the international Applied Sciences NYC competition, which will result in a new Carnegie-Mellon program in the Navy Yard, a significant expansion of Columbia’s engineering school, and the creation of a new engineering institute in Downtown Brooklyn led by NYU. It will also result in a $2 billion engineering campus on Roosevelt Island launched by Cornell and the Technion of Israel.
Prior to NYCEDC, Pinsky was an associate at Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton and a financial analyst at James D. Wolfensohn Inc. He is a graduate of Columbia College and Harvard Law School, and is an Adjunct Senior Research Scholar at Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs.
