Board of Directors
Our Board of Directors represents a broad range of professional, community, and personal interests. Each member embraces our goal of helping to create a world-class park for everyone, lends particular expertise and experience to governing Friends of Hudson River Park, and agrees not only to provide time and financial assistance, but also to advocate for our mission and broaden our sphere of influence and support.
Board of Directors
Michael E. Novogratz, Chair
President and Director
Fortress Investment Group LLC
Scott M. Lawin, Vice Chair
Chief Operating Officer
Moore Capital Management, LP
Justin Sadrian, Vice Chair
Partner and Managing Director
Warburg Pincus
Dick Dadey, Treasurer
Executive Director
Citizens Union of the City of New York
Susanna Aaron, Secretary
Citizen Advocate
Capt. John Doswell*, emeritus, Assistant Secretary
Executive Director
Working Harbor Committee
Cathy Blaney
Bloomberg Philanthropies
Anthony Borelli
Vice President for Planning & Real Estate
Edison Properties
Peter Braus
Executive Vice President, Principal
Lee & Associates, NYC
James Capalino
Chief Executive Officer
Capalino+Company
Connie Fishman
Senior Vice President Real Estate
YMCA of Greater NY
Ross Graham*, emeritus
Citizen Advocate
Suni Harford
Managing Director
Citigroup
Mark Hass
President & CEO
Edelman U.S.
Deborra-lee Jackman
Entertainer
Paula Madoff
Partner
Goldman Sachs & Co.
Samuel F. Martini
Partner
Omega Advisors
Joseph B. Rose
Partner
The Georgetown Company
Mitchell E. Rudin
President and CEO, U.S. Commercial Operations
Brookfield Office Properties
Peter A. Seccia
Managing Director & Partner
Goldman Sachs
Martha Stewart
Founder
Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia
Diana L. Taylor
Managing Director
Wolfensohn & Co. and Chair
Hudson River Park Trust Board of Directors
Paul A. Ullman
Principal
Asset Based Lending, LLC
Madelyn Wils, ex-officio
President and CEO
Hudson River Park Trust
*Founding Director
Biographies
Michael E. Novogratz, Chair
President and Director
Fortress Investment Group LLC
Michael E. Novogratz is a principal and a member of the board of directors of Fortress Investment Group LLC and Co-Chief Investment Officer of the Fortress Macro Fund and the Drawbridge Global Macro Fund. Mr. Novogratz joined Fortress in 2002 after spending 11 years at Goldman Sachs, where he was elected partner in 1998. Mr. Novogratz held the positions of President of Goldman Sachs Latin America, and the head of trading and risk management for fixed income, currencies and commodities and proprietary risk in Asia, where he lived from 1992
- to 1999. Mr. Novogratz founded and serves as the Chairman of Board for Beat The Streets, a non-profit organization which builds wrestling programs in New York City public schools. He also serves on the board of the Acumen Fund Organization, and NYU Medical School, and previously chaired the Board for the School for Strings in New York City. Mr. Novogratz received an AB from Princeton University in Economics, and served as a helicopter pilot in the US Army. He lives in Tribeca with his family and is an avid park user.
Mr. Novogratz was named to the Hudson River Park Trust by New York Governor David Paterson in April 2010, where he served until January 2013.
Scott M. Lawin, Vice Chair
Chief Operating Officer
Moore Capital Management, LP
Mr. Lawin is Chief Operating Officer of Moore Capital Management, a global alternative investment management company with approximately $13bn in assets under management. Moore was founded in 1989 by Louis Bacon, and manages global macro, multi-manager and emerging market hedge funds. Moore is headquartered in New York and has affiliates with offices in Hong Kong, London and Washington, DC.
Mr. Lawin oversees the portfolio management, risk management, and trading functions within Moore and helps to manage the 400 person staff globally. He is a member of the Senior Management Team, Capital Allocation Committee, Execution Committee, Risk Policy Committee, and Valuation Committee. He serves on the Board of Directors of the Moore Capital funds.
Prior to joining Moore in 2010, Mr. Lawin was Chief Operating Officer of the Liquid Markets business at Fortress Investment Group. He also spent 11 years at Goldman, Sachs & Co., serving as Global Head of the Credit Liability Management business, head of Global Strategy and Chief of Staff of the Fixed Income, Currency & Commodity Division, founding member and Chief Operating Officer of GS Ventures, and Head of the Energy & Power Capital Markets group.
Mr. Lawin earned his BS from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1993. He and his family reside in Tribeca in New York City.
Justin Sadrian, Vice Chair
Partner and Managing Director
Warburg Pincus
Justin Sadrian is a Partner and Managing Director of Warburg Pincus, a private equity firm in New York City, where he specializes in the technology sector. Prior to Warburg, Justin worked in JP Morgan’s Investment Banking Division and Private Equity Group. He is on the Board of Directors of The Cobalt Group, OnTargetJobs, Centrum.cz, Multiview, Service Repair Solutions, and CAMP Systems International.
He is on the advisory board of Incarnation School in Washington Height and is a sponsor for Student Sponsor Partners. He was formerly a junior committee member for the Hudson Guild, a Chelsea settlement house. He was also a student sponsor for the "I Have a Dream Foundation."
Sadrian received a B.A. from Dartmouth College and an M.B.A from the Harvard University School of Business.
Dick Dadey, Treasurer
Executive Director
Citizens Union of the City of New York
Dick Dadey is the Executive Director of the Citizens Union and Citizens Union Foundation, both interrelated organizations working in pursuit of good government and political reform in New York since 1897.
Dadey has an extensive background as a leader on and an advocate for civic-related issues. He has a long and varied history of being an issues advocate, lobbyist, political strategist, community organizer, and fundraiser, having spent twenty years of his professional life working for and with not-for-profit advocacy organizations. He understands the unique needs such organizations have operating in the public sector and has particular experience in managing issue-based advocacy campaigns and organizations.
Dadey served from 2002-2004 as the first Executive Director of City Parks Alliance, a national organization that works to strengthen city parks throughout the country. He also has served as the Executive Director of two other issue based advocacy organization, New Yorkers for Parks, formerly the Parks Council, and the Empire State Pride Agenda, New York’s statewide gay and lesbian political organization which he helped to found and built into one of the most powerful and effective organizations in New York’s political landscape. Dadey also directed government relations and client services for the New York City office of M&R Strategic Services, a national government affairs and public relations firm serving a diverse group of not-for-profit organizations.
Susanna Aaron, Secretary
Citizen Advocate
Susanna is a married mother of two young boys and has lived in Greenwich Village her entire life. Until about eight years ago she worked as a producer at NBC Nightly News. During her varied television career she earned two Emmys for work at ABC News and at NBC Sports.
A member of Community Board 2, Susanna has served on the board of Village Community School for over ten years She recently served as a volunteer research associate for the Center for an Urban Future, and has also done volunteer work with Wildcat Service Corporation, Donors Choose, and on Covenant House’s “9-Line” doing crisis intervention.
She graduated with Honors from Wesleyan University in 1981. She is married to Gary Ginsberg, Executive Vice President of Time Warner Inc.
Back to Top
Capt. John Doswell, Assistant Secretary
Executive Director
Working Harbor Committee
Capt. John Doswell was a pioneer in corporate multimedia presentations since the mid 1960’s when he developed many of the techniques that defined the industry. Since 1971, he has been the co-owner and President of Doswell Productions / PhotoShips, a full service production and software development company for corporate communications and business theater events. He is a writer, designer and computer systems designer/programmer.
Capt. Doswell is a member of Manhattan Community Board No. 4, as well as co-chair of the Waterfront & Parks Committee. In 1997/8, he worked for the passage of the Hudson River Park Act, which led to the formation of the Hudson River Park Trust, and was the founding chair of Friends of Hudson River Park. He serves on the boards of New York Windstar, North River Historic Ship Society, and Save Our Ships New York. He was also active in the quest to prevent Governor’s Island from being sold to a private developer and to reclaim it as public land. He is the author of a maritime glossary and Water Uses in Hudson River Park, a maritime survey of the Park and, for four years, was the designer and publisher of Hudson River Park VIEWS.
Capt. Doswell was the designer of a concept plan for Pier 84, and a contributing designer for Pier 76, elements of which have been adopted into the design for Hudson River Park. A United States Navy veteran, he holds a USCG Master’s License for the operation of vessels up to 100 tons under sail or power. He is part owner and occasional pilot of the retired historic fireboat John J. Harvey.
Capt. Doswell is currently the Executive Director of the Working Harbor Committee, which educates people about the history and importance of our working harbor via narrated Hidden Harbor Tours® and other events. He is also active as a professional maritime event producer and consultant for waterfront development. In 2006 he became the producer of the annual Great North River Tugboat Race & Festival, previously hosted by the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum each year on the Sunday before Labor Day, and is the port captain for the Metropolitan Waterfront Alliance’s annual City of Water Day as well as safety officer for the annual Liberty Cup Hawai’ian outrigger canoe race, and other on-water events.
Cathy Blaney
Bloomberg Philanthropies
Cathy Blaney joined Bloomberg Philanthropies to head up their fundraising and partnership development in mid 2012. Additionally, Cathy serves as Executive Vice President of Development for the National September 11 Memorial & Museum at the World Trade Center.
Cathy is also the Founder of CBlaney Group (formerly Cathy Blaney & Associates), a nationally recognized fundraising firm in the political and not-for-profit world. She has been involved in both Republican and Democratic campaigns, including New York Governors Andrew Cuomo and George Pataki. She received her law degree from St. John’s University and a B.A. in Political Science and Sociology from Fordham University.
Anthony Borelli
Vice President for Planning & Real Estate
Edison Properties
Anthony Borelli is Edison Properties’ Vice President for Planning and Real Estate. Among his responsibilities, Anthony leads efforts to prepare high visibility sites in Manhattan for development and to create a master plan for 15 acres in downtown Newark, New Jersey. Anthony also has a key role in external affairs, engaging public officials, industry representatives and community members to advance zoning proposals, land use and transportation public policies, and other strategic projects.
Previously, Anthony served as Director of Land Use, Planning and Development for the Manhattan Borough President’s office. Under Mr. Borelli’s direction, the Borough President’s Planning Office developed positions on development proposals as part of the City’s Uniform Land Use Review Procedure, prepared land use policy reports and proposals for the growth and development of Manhattan, and provided technical assistance to community boards, among other planning activities. Mr. Borelli is the former District Manager of Manhattan Community Board 4, which represents the west side of Midtown. As District Manager, he advised the 50-member volunteer board on community needs, zoning and land use matters, municipal service delivery and the City budget.
Prior to his government service, Mr. Borelli served as Senior Project Manager at the Urban Technical Assistance Project, an urban planning and design extension program of Columbia University. During this time, he also served as Adjunct Assistant Professor at Columbia’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation. Mr. Borelli holds degrees from Syracuse University (B.A. in Policy Studies, 1992), and Columbia University (M.S. in Urban Planning, 1996). Formerly of Chelsea, Anthony has lived in the Hudson River Park Neighborhood of Hell’s Kitchen for the past nine years, and is also an avid Park user.
Peter Braus
Executive Vice President, Principal
Lee & Associates, NYC
Peter Braus has been involved in the ownership and brokerage of real estate for over a decade. Currently, he is the Executive Vice President of Sierra Realty Corp., where his clients include M&T Bank (Manhattan retail locations), Reprise Media, Union Square Hospitality Group and The Suarez Restaurant Group. Prior to Sierra, he worked for New Spectrum Realty Services and Newmark & Co. Real Estate. He has also represented such landlords as the Battery Park City Authority, Gotham, Goldman, Sachs & Company, C&K Properties and the ownership of Brown Harris Stevens.
Peter serves on the Boards of REBNY Retail Committee (Membership Chair); the Alliance for Downtown New York; the International Council of Shopping Centers; and The National Realty Club. He is a member of Community Board One and is Chair of its Planning and Community Development Committee. He is also on the World Trade Center Redevelopment, Tribeca, and Youth and Education Committees and was a member of the Pier 40 Working Group of the Advisory Council of the Hudson River Park Trust.
Peter received a B.B.A from Emory University and an M.B.A from the Columbia University School of Business.
James Capalino
Chief Executive Officer
Capalino+Company
Jim is recognized as one of New York’s premier urban problem-solving strategists. His background combines senior management roles in government, public relations, real estate, and construction management, with extensive public sector experience at senior levels of New York City government. Prior to establishing Capalino+Company he founded The Growth Strategy Group - helping senior corporate managers to refine growth strategy, manage change and increase returns – and served as COO of AJ Contracting, one of the nation’s largest minority owned contractors, increasing its revenues from $125 million to $400 million in three years. Jim’s government career began in 1972 when he joined the staff of Congressman Edward I. Koch. In 1977, he co-managed the mayoral campaign of Congressman Koch when he was elected the 105th Mayor of the City of New York. He was named Commissioner of General Services, a 2,000+ employee, $750 million agency, at the age of 29 (still, the youngest commissioner in City history). Jim managed the Mayor’s successful third term re-election, which he won by the largest margin in the City’s history.
Jim holds an M.A. in Management and Urban Affairs from the New School University, and a B.A. in Political Science, cum laude, from Colgate University. In addition to his position on the Friends’ Board of Directors, he also sits on the boards of Friends of the High Line and Safe Space.
Connie Fishman
Senior Vice President Real Estate
YMCA of Greater NY
Connie Fishman is the Senior Vice President for Real Estate at the YMCA of Greater New York and the immediate past president of the Hudson River Park Trust, having held that position since 2004 until February of 2011. From 1999 through 2003, Ms. Fishman served as Executive Vice President for the Trust, and during her eleven year tenure was responsible for guiding the building and development of the Park from its master planning to its current 80% completion state. She was a proactive leader in forging the new relationship between Friends and the Trust for private-sector fundraising, and was honored at the 2011 Friends annual Gala with our Public Service Award.
Prior to her work at the Trust, she was the Planning and Development Director for two New York City Deputy Mayors and the Deputy Director for Housing, Economic and Infrastructure Planning at the NYC Department of City Planning. Ms. Fishman received her M.A. (1984) from the University of California at Berkeley and her B.A. (1979) from UCLA. Connie has lived in Brooklyn since moving to New York in the mid-1980s.
Ross Graham
Citizen Advocate
From 1965 through 1985, Graham was on the staff of New York State Senator Manfred Ohrenstein, first serving as his only staff person and then, after 1975 when he became Minority Leader, as his Chief of Staff. Between 1949 and 1965 she was a newspaper/magazine reporter/writer and spent two years traveling and working in Europe.
Graham is a member of the State Commission on the Restoration of the Capitol, originally appointed in 1988 and re-appointed in 2008 by Senate Minority Leader Malcolm Smith.
From 1986 through 1997, she was a member of Community Board 4 in Chelsea and Clinton (Chair of the Board in 1993 and 1994). Prior to the creation of the Hudson River Park Trust, she was Borough President Ruth Messinger's appointee to the Hudson River Park Conservancy.
She received a B.A. from Tufts University.
Paula Madoff
Partner
Goldman Sachs & Co.
Paula Madoff is a Partner at Goldman, Sachs and Co., where she is Head of Interest Rate Products Sales for North America. She is a member of the Securities Division Operating Committee, Firmwide New Activity Committee, Securities Division Counterparty Risk Committee, GS Bank USA Client and Business Standards Committee, an advisor to the Securities Division Women's Steering Committee, and is co-chair of the firm’s US Retirement Investment Committee.
Before joining Goldman, she worked in Corporate and Real Estate Finance at Bankers Trust and in Mergers and Acquisitions at Wasserstein Perella & Co. Paula received a BA in Economics from Lafayette College and an MBA from Harvard Business School. Paula serves on the Board of Trustees of Grace Church School in New York City and the Advisory Board of the NYU Child Study Center. She has lived in Greenwich Village for over 15 years. Her children participate in sports programs at Pier 40, and her family enjoys biking and running in Hudson River Park.
Samuel F. Martini
Partner
Omega Advisors
Sam works at Omega Advisors as Partner and Co-Director of Research with specific focus on the Consumer, Energy, Financial, High Yield debt and Structured Products arenas.
Sam is also a co-founder of Success Academy Bed-Stuy 1, a public charter school opened in 2011 in the Bedford Stuyvesant neighborhood in Brooklyn, NY. The school seeks to offer an exceptional public educational experience to the children of New York City, free of charge to the attending students and families. Sam received his B.A. from Middlebury College where he focused on Political Science and Classical Literature and is a designated Chartered Financial Analyst.
Sam lives in New York City with his wife and three beautiful children.
Mitchell E. Rudin
President and CEO of U.S. Commercial Operations
Brookfield Office Properties
Mitch Rudin, President and CEO of U.S. Commercial Operations, Brookfield Office Properties, provides executive oversight for the day-to-day operations and asset management of Brookfield’s 50 million square feet of premier office space across the company’s eight U.S. markets: New York City, Washington, DC, Houston, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Denver, Boston, and Seattle. Prior to joining Brookfield in 2011, Mr. Rudin was President and CEO of CB Richard Ellis’s New York Tri-State Region, New York’s largest real estate service company, overseeing all of the business and operating functions for CBRE’s nine offices located throughout the region, and was intimately involved in setting the firm’s strategic direction. During his career, Mr. Rudin has been involved in some of New York’s largest transactions. He is also generally recognized as a leader in numerous not-for-profit activities.
Peter A. Seccia
Managing Director & Partner
Goldman Sachs
Peter is responsible for running the North American Derivative Sales business for the Equities Division. He started his career in the J. Aron Division in 1989 as an analyst in Foreign Exchange Derivative trading in New York and moved to Tokyo in 1992. He relocated to London to assume a senior role in FX options trading in 1995. In 2000, Peter joined the Equities Division to run Swiss Equity volatility trading. In 2002, he assumed responsibility for the flow derivatives and futures businesses, and then more broadly for Hedge Fund Sales in 2006. Peter was named managing director in 2003 and partner in 2008.
Peter serves on the Board of Governors at Xavier High School in New York City, and is on the board of Play Rugby USA, a national nonprofit organization that pioneers the development of youth through rugby. Additionally, he serves on the board of the United States Rugby Union, the national governing board of Rugby in the US.
Peter earned a BA in Political Science from the State University of New York at Stony Brook in 1989. He and his wife, Lisa, have two children, Jack and Rose.
Diana L. Taylor
Managing Director
Wolfensohn & Co. and Chair
Hudson River Park Trust Board of Directors
Diana Taylor joined Wolfensohn & Co., an investment banking firm, as a Managing Director in April, 2007. She has more than 20 years of experience serving in both the public and private sectors. She started her career as an investment banker, working for Smith Barney, then Lehman Brothers, then Donaldson Lufkin & Jenrette. She then held various positions in the State government, including Chief Financial Officer of the Long Island Power Authority, and Deputy Secretary to the Governor for Housing and Finance. From 2003 to 2007 she held the position of Superintendent of Banks for the State of New York, a post to which she was nominated by Governor George Pataki and confirmed by the State Senate.
Ms. Taylor serves on the Board of Directors of Sotheby’s and Brookfield Properties. In addition, she serves on several not for profit boards, including Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University, the New York Women’s Foundation, the International Women’s Health Coalition, and ACCION International, and she chairs a commission for the Federal Depository Insurance Corporation concentrating on financially underserved communities. Ms. Taylor is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.
Ms. Taylor was named to the Trust Board by the NYS Governor in 1999. She has served as Chair since August 2007.
Paul A. Ullman
Principal
Asset Based Lending, LLC
Paul A. Ullman is a member of the Highland Financial Holdings Group’s Board of Directors and serves as Chairman of the investment committee. He oversees all portfolio management duties firmwide and is Senior Portfolio Manager on the firm’s flagship fund.
Prior to founding HFH Group, Mr. Ullman was co-founder of the MBS specialty investment management group at Alliance Capital Management where, as senior portfolio manager, he was responsible for the management of an investment business that grew during his tenure from $500 million in a single fund to $5 billion in multiple on-shore and off-shore investment vehicles and separate accounts. His management responsibilities included day-to-day decision making regarding sector and security selection, hedging and duration, credit and prepayment estimates used for the various Mortgage Assets in the portfolios, as well as the most cost-effective methodology to deploy leverage.
Prior to Alliance, Mr. Ullman was a director and portfolio manager at Hyperion Capital Management where he had substantially similar duties to those at Alliance. Mr. Ullman helped create the short duration investment product that became one of the more successful investment products over the succeeding years.
Mr. Ullman began his career at Salomon Brothers in 1982, where he had sales and trading responsibilities in New York and London. Mr. Ullman established Salomon’s mortgage trading capacity in London in 1987 and was a member of the team that brought the first series of securities backed by Sterling mortgages to the marketplace. Mr. Ullman received a BS/BA degree from Washington University.
Mr. Ullman was named to the Trust Board by the NYS Governor in December 2007.
Madelyn Wils, ex-officio
President and CEO
Hudson River Park Trust
Madelyn Wils began her tenure as the Trust’s President and Chief Executive Officer in June 2011. She previously served as the Executive Vice President of the Planning, Development and Maritime Division of the NYC Economic Development Corporation (EDC), where her portfolio included over 100 complex projects such as the redevelopment of Willlets Point, Coney Island, East River Esplanade and Hunters Point South. Prior to joining EDC, she served as the President of the Tribeca Film Institute, managing the expansion of the organization from a 10-day festival into a diverse institution offering year-round cultural programming. From 2001 to 2005, she served as Chair of Community Board 1 in Lower Manhattan, where she played an integral role in the rebuilding of Lower Manhattan following the events of September 11, 2001. She was a founding member of both the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation and the Hudson River Park Trust.
