The Local Law 97 Advisory Board’s goals under the law were to provide recommendations for consideration to the Buildings Department and the Mayor’s Office on reducing greenhouse gas emissions from buildings and improving energy and emissions performance requirements for buildings covered under the law.
After hundreds of hours of work by the Advisory Board, Working Groups, and city staff, a report was submitted to the Mayor and the Speaker of the City Council in December, 2022, that addressed: calculating and reporting greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions; treatment of different property types; maximizing emissions reductions; assisting owners with compliance; communications and outreach; achieving consistency with LL97 across other regulations; and additional analysis needed to support implementation. Read the report.
The Advisory Board, chaired by DOB’s Chief Sustainability Officer was comprised of 16 appointees, with eight appointments made by the mayor, and eight appointments made by the speaker of the City Council. The Board members were architects, engineers, property owners, representatives from the business sector and public utilities, environmental justice advocates, and tenant advocates.
Jill Lerner is Managing Principal at Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates, where she leads award-winning projects in both the public and private sectors in New York City, across the United States and around the world. With a background of over 40 years of practice, Jill focuses, in particular, on complex infrastructure and institutional work, for which she is responsible for all aspects of project management and design, and serves the primary client contact during all phases, from initial programming, planning, and conceptual design through construction and project close-out. Jill is also on the Board of Urban Green and Regional Plan Association.
Fiona Cousins is an Arup Fellow and a member of Arup’s Americas Region Board. She helps lead the sustainability, building engineering and data strategies teams in Arup’s New York office. She is a mechanical engineer by profession and has spent much of her career engaged in HVAC design, with an area of specialization in thermal comfort and energy efficiency. She has extensive project experience, including the design of museums, archives, trading floors, laboratories, libraries and performing art centers. She was one of the founding members of Urban Green Council and also served as chair of the USGBC. She is the co-author of ‘Two Degrees, Climate change and our built environment’.
Anthony E. Malkin is Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer of Empire State Realty Trust, Inc. He joined its predecessor entities in 1989. Mr. Malkin has been a leader in existing building energy efficiency retrofits through coordinating the team of Clinton Climate Initiative, Johnson Controls, JLL, and Rocky Mountain Institute in a groundbreaking project at the Empire State Building. Mr. Malkin led the development of standards for energy efficient office tenant installations which is now known as the Tenant Energy Optimization Program at the Urban Land Institute. Mr. Malkin is a board member of APi Group Corporation, the Real Estate Roundtable and Chair of its Sustainability Policy Advisory Committee, a member of the Climate Mobilization Advisory Board of the New York City Department of Buildings, a member of the Urban Land Institute, member of the Board of Governors of the Real Estate Board of New York, member of the Partnership for New York City’s Innovation Council, and a member of the Building Committee of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Mr. Malkin received a bachelor’s degree cum laude from Harvard College.
Kyle Kimball is a Vice President at Consolidated Edison of New York. In his role, he directs the company’s government and community relations activities in New York City, Albany, and Washington, D.C. He manages the company’s relationships with stakeholders at all levels of government and in communities, and guides energy policy and political strategy development and execution for the company. Prior to joining Con Edison, Kyle was the President of the NYC Economic Development Corporation under Mayors Michael Bloomberg and Bill de Blasio. He also serves on the boards of the NYC Housing Development Corporation, the NYC Manufacturing and Industrial Innovation Council, the Center for an Urban Future, the Regional Plan Association and New Yorkers for Parks.
Jasmine Graham is the New York Senior Campaign & Policy Manager at Building Decarbonization Coalition, where she is responsible for advancing equitable energy policy to decarbonize New York's built environment. Prior to joining BDC, Jasmine served as the Energy Justice Policy Manager at WE ACT for Environmental Justice, where she led energy justice advocacy at multiple levels of government. She joined WE ACT from Sustainable Westchester, where she managed the Westchester Power Program, New York's first and largest Community Choice Aggregation program, while developing initiatives to create and promote local renewable generation and community-scale efficiency.
Angela Pinsky is a dedicated public servant who is committed to the promotion of civic dialogue in New York City. Most recently, Ms. Pinsky served as Executive Director of Associate for a Better New York (ABNY). Prior to joining ABNY, Angela served as Senior Vice President for Management Services and Government Affairs at the Real Estate Board of New York (REBNY) where she was responsible for REBNY’s commercial and residential Management Divisions, and was the lead on building code, sustainability and energy, and federal issues that impact New York City real estate. Ms. Pinsky also previously served as Deputy Chief of Staff at the Office of the Deputy Mayor for Economic Development and Rebuilding during the Bloomberg administration. While at the Deputy Mayor’s office, she designed and created the Mayor’s Office of Environmental Remediation, an innovative office dedicated to remediation of contaminated land in economically-disadvantaged areas of New York City. M.A. New York University; B.A. Johns Hopkins University.
Donna Chiu is a Managing Attorney for Housing Administration in MFJ’s growing housing unit. Aside from helping to manage administrative tasks, she supervises attorneys practicing landlord-tenant law in New York. Ms. Chiu returned to MFJ where she started her legal career as a housing attorney. Prior to returning to MFJ, she was the Director of Housing and Community Services at Asian Americans for Equality (AAFE), a non-profit, community-based organization. At AAFE, Ms. Chiu led a team comprised of attorney, organizer and housing advocate to provide legal representation, organize and empower non-English speaking immigrants in Queens and Chinatown to stand up to their predatory equity landlords and fight back against tenant harassment.
Scott Frank serves as a Managing Partner at Jaros, Baum & Bolles. Since joining the firm in 1987, Mr. Frank has led the firm’s team of experienced professionals in the areas of HVAC design. Mr. Frank also leads the Sustainable Design practice area at JB&B, including conducting rigorous feasibility studies to maximize energy conservation in buildings. He has also been actively involved with supporting the Mayor’s One City Built to Last plan for reducing city-wide carbon emissions in order to achieve net zero status by 2050.
Donna De Costanzo is the Eastern Regional Director for the Climate and Clean Energy Program at the NRDC, where she advocates for the adoption of policies and initiatives that tackle climate pollution and increase energy efficiency, renewable energy deployment and clean transportation in the Eastern U.S.. Prior to NRDC, Donna was counsel to the New York City Council’s Committee on Environmental Protection, where she advised the speaker and council members on environmental policy and crafted legislation on various issues, including sustainability planning, climate change, clean energy, air and water quality, endangered species, and green procurement. Before joining the New York City Council, Donna was an Assistant Regional Counsel in the Waste & Toxic Substances branch of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Region II. She holds a bachelor’s degree in biological sciences from Cornell University and a JD from New York University School of Law. She is based in New York City.
David Pollock is the associate executive director and director, public policy and Jewish security of the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York (JCRC), the central coordinating and resource body for over 60 major Jewish organizations in the metropolitan New York area. He has authored multiple books and is a Research Investigator at John Jay College for Criminal Justice.
Pete Sikora is the Climate and Inequality Campaigns Director for New York Communities for Change, where he creates and implements policy and corporate campaigns against climate change and inequality, including leading a campaign to win fossil fuel divestment commitment by New York City.
Howard Styles is the Training Director for Local 94, where he implements, promotes and oversees various courses for the training program. Howard is constantly reshaping the program to meet the needs of the membership and their employers. Howard is a member of the I.U.O.E. training advisory committee. Howard is currently on BOMA’s preparedness and sustainability committees. He is a member of ASHRAE, the USGBC and the ICC and serves on Murphy Institute’s (CUNY) Labor Advisory Committee. Howard has also volunteered with organizations such as DOB and CWE and the Mayor’s Office of Sustainability.
Candis Tall is the Political Director for Service Employees International Union Local 32BJ, focused on developing and overseeing the union’s multi-state political programs. She has previously worked as the Assistant Advocacy Director for Organizing for the New York Civil Liberties Union and as the Public Affairs Coordinator for Planned Parenthood of Nassau County.
Stas Zakrzewski is a principal at ZH Architects located in NYC. ZH’s work focuses on integrating sustainable practices into its current body of modern and design driven work. ZH has completed a number of high performance/passive house projects ranging from twenty-four story residential high-rises to mid rise retrofits, as well as smaller scale single family homes and townhouses. This range of work has been informative in understanding the hurdles and opportunities available in the current code and regulatory climate. Stas is a member of the AIA’s Committee for the Environment, and is currently the President of New York Passive House (NYPH) and has contributed to the NYC DOB’s Energy Code Advisory Committees in 2016 and 2020.
Michael Yee is the Director for the Joint Industry Board (JIB) of the Electrical Industry’s Education and Cultural Trust Fund. This fund is tasked with the administration of the continuing education benefits for Local 3, IBEW members. Michael serves on the JIB Green Committee and has represented the industry at many conferences in that role. He is a 34 year member of Local 3, IBEW and for 20 of those years he worked at a 16megawatt Cogen facility.
Shravanthi Kanekal is an urban planner and researcher working to address social inequities and fight for climate justice. She is currently the Resiliency Planner at the NYC Environmental Justice Alliance, where she participates and leads state and city-wide coalitions that advance policy solutions to address climate justice issues. Her professional experience spans across geographic scales in issues related to air pollution and health disparities, energy and water systems, informal housing, and climate mitigation and adaptation planning. Her prior work experience includes hazard mitigation planning, architectural design, and historic preservation. Shravanthi received a Masters of City Planning with a concentration in Land Use and Environmental Planning from the University of Pennsylvania and her Bachelor of Architecture from R.V. College of Engineering.