BOMA honors office park pioneers

Accepting Westchester BOMA lifetime achievement awards as office-park developers were, from left, Robert Weinberg of Robert Martin Co.; Jon Halpern of Halpern Enterprises, accepting for his late father, Joel Halpern; Martin Berger of Robert Martin Co.; and Lowell Schulman of Schulman Realty.

Four towering pioneers of office-park development in Westchester County recently were honored by the county chapter of the Building Owners and Managers Association.

Receiving lifetime achievement awards at BOMA”™s 20th annual Hall of Honor awards dinner at Abigail Kirsch at Tappan Hill were the late Joel Halpern of Halpern Enterprises, partners Martin Berger and Robert Weinberg of the Robert Martin Co. and Lowell Schulman of Schulman Realty. Jon and Jason Halpern, who have carried on the family real estate business, accepted the award for their father.

“We didn”™t know each other,” Schulman, the original developer of the Platinum Mile on I-287, said of the honored pioneers, who carved out separate territories in the county for their respective companies in which the others did not compete. “We just happened on the same time in the ”˜60s”¦There was no plan, there were no arrangements. It just happened.”

“We all had the same vision” of the county”™s potential as a prime location for corporate offices in campus settings, Schulman said. “”˜Office park”™ was not a word that was even in the dictionary.”

The BOMA chapter presented its Hall of Honor award to Beacon Capital Partners L.L.C., the Boston-based real estate investment company that in 2006 bought the county”™s oldest office tower, Westchester One at 44 S. Broadway  in White Plains.

Since investing $13 million in capital improvements, Beacon has leased space to several relocating companies ”“ including Disney Publishing, APS Healthcare, Reader”™s Digest Association, Malcolm Pirnie and Towers Watson ”“ that have raised the occupancy rate at Westchester One from 56 percent in late 2009 to 80 percent and have brought more than 1,000 jobs to downtown White Plains.

Also welcomed to the BOMA Hall of Honor was Heineken USA Inc., with corporate headquarters at 360 Hamilton Ave. in White Plains. The company was cited for improving the quality of life here by supporting diverse local community organizations and programs.

A Mack-Cali Realty Corp. property, 1 Executive Blvd. in Yonkers, was named the BOMA Office Building of the Year. The four-story, 112,000-sqaure-foot building is in Mack-Cali”™s South Westchester Executive Park.

Best of BOMA 2011 awards and recipients are:

  • Best Green Initiative: 10 Bank St., White Plains; owner, Malkin Properties.
  • Best Suburban Park Setting: 1100 King St., Rye Brook; owner, Reckson Division of SL Green Realty Corp.
  • Comeback Building of the Year: 11 Martine Ave., White Plains; owner, Mack-Cali Realty Corp.
  • Best Lobby: 200 Summit Lake Drive, Valhalla; owner, Reckson/SL Green.