New York City Economic Development Corporation

New York City Economic Development Corporation

Predecessor	Public Development Corporation (PDC) Financial Services Corporation (FSC)
Formation	1991 (1991)
Type	non-profit economic development corporation
President	James Patchett (2017-present)
Website	www.nycedc.com

New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC) is a not-for-profit corporation that promotes economic growth across New York City's five boroughs. It is the City's official economic development corporation, charged with using the City's assets to drive growth, create jobs, and improve quality of life. The agency has its headquarters in Lower Manhattan.^[1]

Governance

As of November 2014, NYCEDC’s Board of Directors has 21 members.^{[2][note 1]} The Mayor directly appoints seven members, including the Chairperson. Ten additional members are appointed by the Mayor from nominees of the Borough Presidents and the Speaker of the City Council. Each Borough President nominates one member and the Speaker of the City Council nominates five. Ten members are appointed by the Chairperson from a list of persons approved by the Mayor. NYCEDC is not a City Agency.

NYCEDC Presidents

• Seth Pinsky was appointed President by Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg in February 2008. Prior to joining EDC, Pinsky was an associate at the law firm of Cleary Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton in the Real Estate practice and a financial analyst at James D. Wolfensohn Inc. He is a graduate of Columbia College, where he majored in Ancient History, and of Harvard Law School, and is an Adjunct Senior Research Scholar at Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs.
• Kyle Kimball was appointed President by Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg in August 2013. Prior to joining NYCEDC, Kimball worked at Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan as a Vice President. Kimball received his master's degree in Public Policy from Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government.
• Maria Torres-Springer was appointed President and CEO by Mayor Bill de Blasio in July 2015. Prior to her appointment to NYCEDC, Torres-Springer served as Commissioner of the New York City Department of Small Business Services (SBS). Before joining SBS, Torres-Springer served as Executive Vice President and Chief of Staff at NYCEDC, a Senior Policy Advisor at the Office of the Deputy Mayor for Economic Development & Rebuilding and the Chief Operating Officer of Friends of the Highline. She received her bachelor's degree in ethics, politics, and economics from Yale University and a master's in public policy from Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government.
• In February 2017, James Patchett was named President and CEO by Mayor DeBlasio, after previously serving as Chief of Staff to Deputy Mayor for Housing and Economic Development Alicia Glen.

Roles

Through annual contracts with the City of New York, NYCEDC is a nonprofit organization that serves as the City’s primary entity for promoting and implementing economic development by leveraging the City’s assets to drive growth, create jobs, and improve quality of life.^[3]

As of 2007, the NYCEDC had a role in setting rates of business taxation, an alternative to the passing of tax legislation.^[4]:33 Specifically, the Corporation was charged with negotiating firm-specific tax incentives with businesses as encouragement to either relocate to, or remain in, New York City.^[4]:33

The NYCEDC also:

• Develops real estate, using partnerships between the public and private sectors to stimulate the economy.
• Provides business, economic, and policy advice to the City, not-for-profit, and for-profit private sectors to help attract and retain world-class companies and professionals.
• Manages City properties and assets, including manufacturing and distribution hubs and other infrastructure.
• Invests in and provides financial tools that allow businesses and not-for-profits to grow and generate new jobs and revenue.
• Conducts research, collects input from stakeholders, and launches initiatives designed to spur and sustain growth in strategic sectors of the economy.

History

NYCEDC was formed in 1991 as the result of a merger of two major not-for-profit and a handful of minor corporations which performed economic development services for the City.^[5] One of the major merger partners was the Public Development Corporation (PDC), which was formed in 1966 to rescue the City from its deteriorating economy by selling City property and leasing industrial space.^[5] PDC was responsible for construction of the Nassau Street Mall, the Brooklyn Army Terminal, Jamaica Center, and the South Street Seaport, among other activities. The second major merger partner was the Financial Services Corporation (FSC) which had been formed in 1980 to administer government financing programs that promote business expansion in New York City.^[5] Formation of the NYCEDC followed recommendations from the consulting firm McKinsey & Company, who had been engaged in mid-1990 to "advise on the reorganisation of the NYC development system.^[5]

Carl Weisbrod, formerly of PDC prior to its merger with FSC, was the first president of NYCEDC under the Dinkins administration. Weisbrod was succeeded by Charles Millard and Michael G. Carey under the Giuliani administration, followed by Andrew Alper, the first president appointed to the position during the Bloomberg administration. Robert C. Lieber was appointed in January 2007 and served until Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg appointed him as Deputy Mayor for Economic Development & Rebuilding in December 2007. Seth Pinsky served as President from February 2008 to August 2013.

Entities

Center for Economic Transformation

The Center for Economic Transformation (CET) at NYCEDC develops the City’s major business sectors by addressing current challenges faced by industries through analysis of current economic trends, developing strategies and solutions, and implementing programs that help businesses expand and succeed.^[6] CET pilots nearly 100 initiatives that support entrepreneurship across all sectors. It provides access to capital, incubators, and affordable workspaces, and helps legacy industries like media, fashion, and manufacturing transition to new business models. Steven Strauss created CET as a Managing Director of NYCEDC.^[7]

The Center for Economic Transformation also publishes research reports on the future of key NYC industries and related topics. Some examples include:

• Fashion.NYC.2020: Fashion.NYC.2020’s industry chairs included Richard Darling, CEO of LF USA; Diane von Fürstenberg, Chairman and Founder of Diane von Furstenberg Studio L.P. and President of the Council of Fashion Designers of America; Terry Lundgren, Chairman, President and CEO of Macy’s, Inc.; Andrew Rosen, CEO of Theory; and Kevin Ryan, CEO of Gilt Groupe.^{[publication 1]}
• Media.NYC.2020 industry chairs included Tim Armstrong, CEO & Chairman of AOL; Jeffrey L. Bewkes, Chairman & CEO of Time Warner; Peter O. Price, CEO of Premiere Previews; and Sir Martin Sorrell, CEO of WPP Group. The management-consulting firm Oliver Wyman, represented by Martin Kon, was the knowledge partner for this research.^{[publication 2]}
• Edutech.NYC.2020: The knowledge partner for this research was the Bridgespan Group.^{[publication 3]}
• NYC Innovation Index: The chairs for the NYCEDC Innovation index report were: John Borthwick, CEO and Co-Founder, Betaworks; Esther Dyson, investor and entrepreneur; Tom Glocer, CEO, Thomson Reuters; and Alan Patricof, Founder and Managing Director, Greycroft Partners.^{[publication 4]}
• Strengthening NYC's Fashion Wholesale Market^{[publication 5]}

Applied Sciences NYC

One of NYCEDC’s largest initiatives to date is Applied Sciences NYC, an competition to create a new world-class engineering campus in NYC.^{[info 1]} In December 2011, Mayor Bloomberg announced the selection of a historic partnership with Cornell University and the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology to create a groundbreaking, two-million-square foot applied science and engineering campus on Roosevelt Island, to be called Cornell Tech.^[8] Applied Sciences NYC is expected to more than double the number of both full-time graduate engineering students and faculty in New York City. Over the next three decades the Applied Sciences NYC initiative is expected to generate more than $33 billion in overall nominal economic impact, add over 48,000 jobs, and launch nearly 1,000 spin-off companies. The Applied Sciences NYC initiatives also includes the establishment of a campus in Downtown Brooklyn developed by a consortium led by NYU that focuses on the challenges facing cities, and a new institute for data sciences at Columbia University.^{[publication 6]}

Other entities

New York City Industrial Development Agency (NYCIDA) is a public benefit corporation under New York State law that provides companies with access to tax-exempt bond financing or tax benefits to strengthen and diversify the City’s tax and employment base, helps businesses locate and expand their operations within New York City, and encourages economic development by retaining jobs and creating new ones. NYCIDA is administered by NYCEDC.

New York City Capital Resource Corporation (NYCCRC), also administered by NYCEDC, is a local development corporation that provides lower-cost financing programs for eligible capital projects to qualified not-for-profit institutions and manufacturing, industrial, and other businesses.

Public projects

NYCEDC drives the physical transformation of New York City, completes major infrastructure upgrades, and encourages the creation of new residential and commercial districts. NYCEDC implements capital projects that facilitate the use of strategic and/or underutilized property for economic development purposes. It also conducts real estate planning and feasibility studies, works with other City agencies to develop area-wide development plans; guides development plans and projects through necessary public approvals; negotiates public-private partnerships; and performs financial analyses.

Gotham Center

NYCEDC is currently working with the City on a number of projects and initiatives, including:

• Hunts Point, Bronx
• Coney Island, Brooklyn
• Sunset Park Waterfront, Brooklyn^{[info 2]}
• 125th Street, Manhattan
• Essex Crossing, Manhattan
• High Line, Manhattan
• The Hub, Bronx
• Downtown Jamaica Initiatives, Queens^{[info 3]}
• Gotham Center, Queens^{[info 4]}
• Hunter's Point South, Queens
• Willets Point, Queens
• East River Ferry Service^{[info 5]}
• New Stapleton Waterfront, Staten Island^{[info 6]}
• St. George Terminal, Staten Island
• Kingsbridge Armory, Bronx^{[info 7]}
• New York Wheel, Staten Island
• Empire Outlets, Staten Island
• Seward Park, Manhattan
• Brooklyn Army Terminal, Brooklyn

In the past, NYCEDC has successfully implemented a variety of development initiatives throughout New York City, including the revitalization of East New York Industrial Business Zone, the Bronx reconstruction of Pepsi-Cola Bottling Company of New York, the Yankee Area Stadium Redevelopment, and the completion of capital improvements on the Staten Island Ferry Whitehall Terminal, to name a few. In April 2014, NYCEDC and Capital Business Credit launched together the NYC Fashion Production Fund, a $2 million public-private fund providing financing to up-and-coming New York City-based designers for production at below-market rates.^[9]

Waterfront rehabilitation

NYCEDC also works to reactivate miles of the City’s working waterfront and expand maritime and manufacturing employment to stimulate the local economy. The Sunset Park Vision Plan, for example, is a comprehensive framework that presents strategies to maximize the efficient movement of goods, protect and grow industrial employment, promote green practices, and balance neighborhood and industrial development goals in an environmentally sustainable manner. NYCEDC helps improve public access to waterfronts through projects such as the construction of the East River Waterfront Esplanade along a two-mile shorefront of Lower Manhattan.^{[info 8]} The agency also manages the inspection and rehabilitation of approximately 75 miles of structures supporting waterfront esplanades throughout the five boroughs

References

Notes

Publications

Project information

External links

• Official website
• NYCEDC: Transforming New York City (video)