Developers of Tall Buildings Look to Sandy Lindenbaum
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Sandy Lindenbaum is a master of maximizing the possible.
“When I see a piece of property, the first thing that comes to mind is what that investment can achieve for the developer,” Mr. Lindenbaum said yesterday. “So when developers want big projects or tall buildings to go up in New York City, they call me.”
They call him because Mr. Lindenbaum is one of the most successful land-use, or zoning, lawyers in the city.
He is, in fact, a legend in the real estate industry. As examples of his work, he can point to scores of high-rise buildings in Midtown and such New York icons as the Museum of Modern Art and Lincoln Center.
He offers counsel to commercial and nonprofit organizations. They include Carnegie Hall, Columbia University, the Guggenheim Museum, the Archdiocese of New York, Yeshiva University, Weill Cornell Medical College, Bear Stearns, Tishman Speyer Properties, Vornado Realty Trust, Glenwood Management, Millennium Partners, and the Macklowe, Resnick, Silverstein, and Solow organizations.
Mr. Lindenbaum’s current projects include the expansion of the Pierpont Morgan Library and the Whitney Museum, a new tower atop the Hearst headquarters on Eighth Avenue, redevelopment of the former Alexander’s site into the Bloomberg building on Lexington Avenue and 59th Street, redevelopment of the ConEdison properties on First Avenue and 40th Street, and Sheldon Solow’s new residential towers on York Avenue and 60th Street.
Mr. Lindenbaum can also point to Donald Trump’s skyscrapers, including the 90-story residential tower near the United Nations.
His association with Mr. Trump was a payback of sorts because his father Abraham, a lawyer, used to work for Mr. Trump’s father, Fred.
“I could even say that Fred Trump’s fees for my father’s work helped pay my tuition through Harvard College and Harvard School of Law,” Mr. Lindenbaum said.
His demeanor belies the fact that he’s in a tough business. New York’s complex zoning codes, which were reorganized in 1961 by Mayor Wagner and the iconic Robert Moses, are contained in three thick books. In contrast, the original zoning code, written in 1916, took up 35 pages.
“I figure out how to obtain the necessary administrative approvals for maximizing the developer’s investment,” Mr. Lindenbaum said.
That means handling special permits, zoning changes, variances, land mark proceedings, air rights transfers, tax abatements, and economic development incentives. It also means advising clients on how best to take into account community views. Most of all, it means shepherding his client’s zoning application through the Planning Commission and City Council.
Success in every case is by no means assured for the half-dozen or so land use lawyers in the city.
“The easiest thing for a public servant is to do nothing,” Mr. Lindenbaum said. “It’s far easier to say no to a zoning application than to say yes. My job is to convince officials of the merits of my clients’ application.”
He has been convincing them successfully for more than four decades. But he didn’t start out as a real estate lawyer.
“I came from a middle-class Jewish family in Brooklyn’s Crown Heights section, where great emphasis was put on education by my father, who was always known as Bunny, and my mother, Belle,” Mr. Lindenbaum said. “I was an only child, and I had a fire in my belly. I had little doubt that I would follow in my father’s footsteps and practice law.”
His first job was on Wall Street as a taxation lawyer. He had scarcely started before he was asked to help in the firm’s real estate department because too many attorneys were on vacation.
He flourished. His father persuaded him to move his real estate practice to Brooklyn, where both the Lindenbaums befriended a number of important politicians. He began representing blue-chip New York names such as the Helmsleys and the Zeckendorfs.
And as often happens in New York’s interlinked worlds of politics, business, and culture, the young Mr. Lindenbaum was referred to heavyweight real estate figures by some of his heavyweight clients.
For example, Robert and Lawrence Tisch, for whom Mr. Lindenbaum had eased the way to expand their hotels, opened the door to New York’s hotel and hospitality industry. Kinney Parking opened the door to the parking industry. His friendship with the late Steven Ross won Mr. Lindenbaum steady assignments with Time Warner.
Some of those associations led to his involvement in philanthropic and cultural activities. Mr. Lindenbaum is a founder, director, and vice president of the Association for a Better New York. He’s an honorary trustee of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. He’s also chairman of the executive committee of the board of directors of the American Friends of the Israel Museum, a member of the board of overseers of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, and chairman of the executive committee of the Jewish Association for Services for the Aged. How does he maintain such a packed schedule?
“I work out, I pay attention to my diet – and I walk a lot,” Mr. Lindenbaum said.
What would it take for a young lawyer today to emulate Sandy Lindenbaum?
There was a long pause, a chuckle, then another long pause.
“You have to be smart,” he said. “You have to have integrity. Law tests your character as much as it does your skills.”
A significant test for Mr. Lindenbaum has not only been interpreting New York’s zoning laws, but also monitoring the predilections of various mayors, not all of whom were committed to encouraging planned growth.
His favorite mayors?
Another chuckle.
“I suppose Rudy Giuliani and Mike Bloomberg,” Mr. Lindenbaum said. “They showed serious interest in planned development of the city.”
Then he chuckled again.
“Mayors come and mayors go, but I’m still here,” he said.