The NJBIZ Commercial Real Estate Power 50

Sills Cummis & Gross Members Ted Zangari and Jerry Zaro are included in the NJBIZ “Commercial Real Estate Power 50” ranking of the most influential people in commercial real estate in New Jersey.

NJBIZ had this to say about Zangari and Zaro:

Ted Zangari
“Ask scholars, ask politicians, ask anyone who knows about commercial real estate in New Jersey: Ted Zangari is a lawyer to talk to. The Sills Cummis & Gross member and chair of its real estate department is also a founding member of the Rutgers University Center for Real Estate, where he serves on the executive committee, and a member of the board of trustees at George Washington University’s Center for Real Estate and Urban Analysis. Zangari founded the Smart Growth Economic Development Coalition, a group of statewide business, industry and urban renewal organizations, with the purpose of finding solutions for the state’s outmigration problem and to address New Jersey’s need for smart growth and development. When Gov. Phil Murphy took office, the coalition handed him a framework of proposals geared to improve incentive programs, standardize local land use procedures, and create new sites for industrial projects. At Sills Cummis, Zangari leads a team on large-scale mixed use projects including land assemblage, redeveloper designations and agreements, tax increment financing and other public incentives; and is generally seen as the go-to guy to talk to about investing in Opportunity Zones.”

Jerry Zaro
“Zaro is the chairman of the banking and real estate services at law firm Sills Cummis & Gross and the chairman of the Gateway Program Development Corp. In that capacity, he will have a lot to say about how New Jerseyans get around – or don’t get around. New analysis issued in July 2019 during a meeting of the Gateway board meeting found significant delays along the Northeast Corridor rail line caused by failures at the North River Tunnel and Portal Bridge, both of which are 109 years old. According to the Gateway board, the analysis is based on five years of data provided by New Jersey Transit and Amtrak. In total, the incidents caused 112,800 minutes of train delays over 85 days, or almost 2,000 lost hours in extra transit time. “Regular delays are unacceptable for any amount of time, but these 85 major delay days are particularly bad, adding up to more than one day a month of major delays,” Zaro said. “Commuters are rightly frustrated at being forced to arrive very late to work and parents dismayed over lost time otherwise spent with family and children. It’s past time to build Gateway and give passengers the reliability they pay for and deserve.” Gateway is leading the planning of the $14.3 billion-plus infrastructure project to replace the rail tunnels and the Portal Bridge, which spans the Hackensack River between Secaucus and Kearny and opens to allow ships to pass on the river. For now, the project is stalled due to intransigence in Washington. Zaro and his colleagues have to find a way to shake federal dollars loose.”