Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg today announced the City’s two new appointments to the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation (LMDC) Board.  The LMDC is the joint State-City Corporation formed to oversee the revitalization of Lower Manhattan in the aftermath of the September 11th attacks.  The appointments are Edward Lewis, Chairman & Chief Executive Officer of Essence Communications Partners, and Publisher of Essence Magazine, and Stanley S. Shuman, Managing Director of Allen & Company LLC. 

“I am very excited to announce the appointments of two distinguished individuals, Edward Lewis and Stanley Shuman, who will energize their fellow LMDC board members as we enter the implementation phase of the Lower Manhattan rebuilding process,” said Mayor Bloomberg.  “This is a very exciting time for downtown. We recently announced a $25 million plan for short-term improvements to parks and open spaces below Canal Street, and there is consensus between the Governor and myself on plans to move forward with several transportation initiatives.  These actions will further our administration’s vision for Lower Manhattan announced just last December. The collaboration and willingness to work together to rebuild and memorialize those we lost is as strong as ever. Together, we will create a Lower Manhattan that will surpass everyone’s expectations.”

“These are excellent appointments by the Mayor,” said LMDC Chairman Whitehead. “These new members bring a great deal of expertise and experience to our state-city organization at a time when the Board has so much to do in rebuilding and revitalizing Lower Manhattan.”

Edward Lewis co-founded Essence magazine 36 years ago. In 2000, Mr. Lewis engineered a partnership with Time Warner, forming Essence Communications Partners of which he is CEO.  This year Lewis received the Henry Johnson Fisher Lifetime Achievement Award – the Oscars of publishing, was cited by Crain’s as one of the 10 most powerful minority business leaders, and received the Doctor of Science Honorary Degree from Polytechnic University.  A philanthropist dedicated to women’s economic empowerment and education, Lewis sits on the boards of numerous business and artistic organizations including the New York City Partnership; the Times Square Business Improvement District; the Central Park Conservancy; Girls, Inc; The Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Co., (A&P), and The Board of Jazz at

Lincoln Center.  Lewis is a native New Yorker and attended the DeWitt Clinton High School where he was a New York All City fullback. A football scholarship took him to the University of New Mexico where he received his BA and MA in political Science and international relations, and he then went on to attend Harvard University Business School.

Stanley S. Shuman is Managing Director of Allen & Company LLC, investment bankers, where he has been associated since 1961.  In 1995, he was appointed as a member of the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board (PFIAB).  From 1977 to 1997, he was the longest sitting private member of the (Emergency) Financial Control Board which is the monitoring agency born out of the City’s fiscal crisis in the 70’s. Shuman serves or has served as a director of numerous private and public companies including presently The News Corporation Limited, SESAC, Inc., and Six Flags, Inc.  He is a Trustee of Carnegie Hall, The Markle Foundation, The Museum of Television & Radio, The National Public Radio Foundation (Emeritus) and a Life Trustee of Thirteen/WNET.  He graduated from Harvard College, B.A. 1956; Harvard Law School, J.D. 1959; and Harvard Business School, M.B.A. in 1961.  He resides in Manhattan with his wife Sydney Roberts Gould.

The LMDC is a joint State-City corporation governed by a 16-member Board of Directors – eight appointed by the Governor, eight appointed by the Mayor – to oversee the rebuilding and revitalization of Lower Manhattan.  Mr. Lewis and Mr. Shuman join the City’s six other LMDC appointees who are Paul A. Crotty, Dick Grasso, Robert M. Harding, Sally Hernandez-Piñero, Billie Tsien, and Carl Weisbrod, and the State’s appointees who are John C. Whitehead (Chairman), Roland W. Betts, Lewis M. Eisenberg, Thomas S. Johnson, Edward J. Malloy, Madelyn Wils, Deborah C. Wright, and Frank G. Zarb.