2016 Big Apple Innovation Awards

Front row: the 2016 Big Apple Innovation Award honorees Laura Jervis, Founder and former Executive Director, West Side Federation for Senior and Supportive Housing; Michelle de la Uz, Executive Director, Fifth Avenue Committee; Vicki Been, commissioner, NYC Dept. of Housing Preservation and Development; Back row: award presenters Jamie Torres Springer, Senior Principal, HR&A Advisors, Inc; Colvin Grannum, President and CEO, Bedford Stuyvesant Restoration Corporation; Michael Rubinger, President and CEO, LISC; and Sam Marks, Executive Director, LISC NYC

LISC NYC kicked off the new year with its 2016 Big Apple Innovation Awards on January 26, recognizing outstanding achievement in the community development field from three inspiring women who embodied the event’s theme, “Pathways to Shared Prosperity.” The award presentation included short videos celebrating their work in community development. 

Laura Jervis, Founder & former Executive Director of West Side Federation for Senior & Supportive Housing (WSFSSH) accepted the Leah Schneider Lifetime Achievement Award for her decades-long career innovating the field of supportive housing. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BkkLf6S6IVA&list=PLGnvQI2vhLKZVc5_8fJ9T2tovEKVW3Izp&index=2

“For neighborhoods to be healthy, there has to be shared prosperity.  Economic equality…that’s the strength of a neighborhood.”

Michelle De La Uz, Executive Director of Fifth Avenue Committee (FAC) accepted the Lisa & Dick Cashin Champion of Community Development Award, for outstanding leadership in expanding FAC’s housing and community development work throughout South Brooklyn, community organizing, and innovations in linking FAC and partners’ workforce development and financial coaching programs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=STioZDVmg5Q&list=PLGnvQI2vhLKZVc5_8fJ9T2tovEKVW3Izp&index=1

“It’s no mistake that New York City has been a real area for progressive ideas and progressive policies.  A lot of that, honestly, comes out of the contributions that [Community Development Corporations (CDCs)] have made, and the social justice movements which have informed CDCs.”

Vicki Been, Commissioner of the NYC Department of Housing Preservation & Development (HPD) accepted the Public Partner Award, in recognition of her important role in tackling critical affordable housing issues facing New Yorkers and her knowledge of housing policy tools that can move New York City toward shared prosperity.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bu13oQWrwJA&index=3&list=PLGnvQI2vhLKZVc5_8fJ9T2tovEKVW3Izp

“Nonprofit community development organizations are absolutely critical to ensuring shared prosperity…They bring a knowledge about what will make the community better that’s really priceless.”

LISC NYC Executive Director Sam Marks presided over the festivities, which attracted over 400 guests.  “What the staff at LISC NYC and our honorees share,” Marks said, “is that we get up every morning, and go to work motivated by the belief that we can work together to align resources, to shape policies, to implement, to develop, to connect, to make our neighborhoods places where people can thrive.”

See more photos from the 2016 Big Apple!

Thank You to our Supporters!

Silver: 

Federated Title Services
FG-PH Corporation
Goldstein Hall
M&T Bank
Morgan Stanley
The Richman Group

Bronze: 

Forsyth Street
Mizuho
West Side Federation for Senior and Supportive Housing (WSFSSH)

Supporter: 

BNY Mellon
CDT
JP Morgan Chase
Goldman Sachs
Hirschen Singer & Epstein LLP
Kiumarz Geula
Lemle & Wolff Companies
MDG Design and Construction
Monadnock Development LLC
MUFG Bank
New York Community Bank
Notias Construction
New York City Housing Development Corporation (NYC HDC)
TD Bank
Winn Companies

Sustainer:

Leader: 

CD Futures