Board of Commissioners

David Samson, Chairman

Photo of David Samson David Samson was nominated to the Board of Commissioners by Governor Chris Christie. He was confirmed by the New Jersey State Senate on January 25, 2011 and was elected as the agency’s Chairman on February 3, 2011. Mr. Samson is a Partner and founding member of the law firm Wolff & Samson. His 40-year career in private practice includes extensive experience in complex business and corporate litigation, administrative proceedings, and governmental and regulatory affairs.

During 2002-2003, Mr. Samson served as New Jersey Attorney General, the chief law enforcement officer for New Jersey. In this role, he supervised the statewide Divisions of Criminal Justice, New Jersey State Police, Civil Rights, Consumer Affairs and Gaming Enforcement, as well as the Division of Law, which represents all executive departments in New Jersey State government. As Chairman of the New Jersey Domestic Security Preparedness Task Force, he worked hand-in-hand with federal agencies in organizing and directing counter-terrorism efforts throughout the New Jersey-New York area.

In 2009, Mr. Samson was counsel to the gubernatorial election campaign of Christopher J. Christie and thereafter served as the Chairman of the Transition Committee for Governor Christie. Mr. Samson has also acted as a court-appointed labor union trustee, a civil litigation discovery master and as a federal monitor pursuant to a United States Department of Justice deferred prosecution agreement.

Among his public positions, Mr. Samson was appointed by Governor James Florio as a member of the Governor’s Commission on Health Care Costs and by Governor Thomas Kean as the Chairman of the Governor’s Task Force on the Laws Governing the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey. He also served from 1982-1990 as General Counsel to the New Jersey Turnpike Authority.

Mr. Samson was appointed by the Supreme Court of New Jersey to serve on its Ethics Committee and was a member of the New Jersey Supreme Court Committee on Reporting of Court Decisions. He was also the legal consultant to the Advisory Committee to the Attorney General on Governmental Immunity. In addition, Mr. Samson served on the New Jersey Bar Association Committee on Judicial and Prosecutorial Appointments.

Mr. Samson served a judicial clerkship with Associated Justice Nathan L. Jacobs of the New Jersey Supreme Court. Committee Assignments: Operations (Chair), Security (Chair).

Scott H. Rechler, Vice-Chairman

Photo of Raymond Pocino Scott Rechler was appointed to the Board of Commissioners in June 2011 by Governor Cuomo. Mr. Rechler is the Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of RXR Realty LLC (“RXR”), a multi-billion dollar private real estate company which was formed subsequent to the sale of Reckson Associates Realty Corp (“Reckson”) to SL Green in January 2007, one of the largest public Real Estate management buyouts in REIT history.

Mr. Rechler’s vision and leadership guided Reckson where he served as Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of the Board during its years of dynamic growth throughout New York City, Long Island, New Jersey, Westchester and Connecticut, overseeing in excess of $6 billion in acquisitions and developments and managing over 20 million square feet of commercial property in New York’s Tri-State Area. Mr. Rechler’s real estate acumen and entrepreneurial spirit delivered stellar returns to investors including a 715% total return to the Reckson shareholders.

Mr. Rechler was at Reckson from 1989 until January 2007 and during his tenure served as President, Chief Executive Officer, and member of Reckson’s Board of Directors since its formation, as well as the Chairman of the Board’s Executive Committee. Mr. Rechler was the architect of Reckson’s successful IPO in 1995.

Since its formation in January 2007, Mr. Rechler has led RXR in becoming one of the New York Tri-State area’s leading real estate companies with approximately $3.5 billion of assets under management invested in a portfolio of 105 operating properties encompassing 15.0 million square feet.

Mr. Rechler is actively involved with the Real Estate Roundtable, for which he is a member of the Board of Directors and Co-Chair of its Political Action Committee.

Mr. Rechler prides himself on enhancing the communities where RXR operates. As such, Mr. Rechler serves as a Board member of the Association for a Better Long Island, Board member of the Association for a Better New York, member of the Hofstra Honors College Advisory Committee, as well as the NYU Real Estate Institute Advisory Committee. In addition, Mr. Rechler serves as the Co-President of the Board of Trustees for Friends Academy and serves on the Board of many of the regions top cultural institutions such as the Tribeca Film Institute and the Long Island Children’s Museum where he serves as its co-Chairman of the Board.

Mr. Rechler is a graduate of Clark University. He also earned a Masters of Science degree in Real Estate at the New York University Schack Institute.

Committee Assignments: Construction (Vice-Chair), Capital Programs/Agency Planning.

Virginia S. Bauer

Photo of Virginia S. Bauer Virginia S. Bauer was appointed to the Board of Commissioners in June 2007 by Governor Corzine. Ms. Bauer is currently the Chief Executive Officer of Gold-Type Business Machines, Inc. (GTBM) a security technologies firm. Previously, Ms. Bauer was the Senior Vice President of Development at the Covenant House in New York City, the nation’s largest adolescent care agency serving homeless, runaway and at-risk youth. Ms. Bauer served as CEO and Secretary of the New Jersey Commerce, Economic Growth & Tourism Commission from December 2004 to July 2007. She also served from 2005-2008 as Vice Chairperson of the Fort Monmouth Economic Redevelopment Authority, leading the state’s effort to develop a revitalization plan for the 1,600-acre military facility. Ms. Bauer is the former Director of the New Jersey Lottery, where under her leadership, the agency achieved a $2.2 billion sales year in Fiscal 2004, the Lottery’s best sales year ever. Ms. Bauer is a former financial planning and account management executive with Merrill Lynch from 1979-1985.

Ms. Bauer, a widow of a New Jersey victim of the September 11, 2001 attack on the World Trade Center, has been a key activist on behalf of the families of the 9/11 victims, after her husband David, a Cantor Fitzgerald employee, was killed in the World Trade Center.

Committee Assignments: Capital Programs/Agency Planning (Vice-Chair) Governance and Ethics (Vice-Chair), Operations.

H. Sidney Holmes III

Photo of H. Sidney Holmes III H. Sidney Holmes III was appointed to the Board of Commissioners in May 2008 by Governor Paterson. Mr. Holmes is a Corporate Partner of Winston & Strawn LLP and works in the area of public finance. Mr. Holmes has served as bond counsel, underwriter’s counsel, and bank counsel in virtually every type of municipal bond financing throughout the United States and its territories. He has extensive experience in industrial and economic development revenue bond financing. He has served as counsel on hospital facilities financings, solid waste disposal facilities financings, electric generating facilities financings, cogeneration facilities financings, transportation facilities financings, and sports facilities financings. Mr. Holmes also has represented a number of foreign and domestic banks as credit and liquidity providers of municipal debt. His representative clients include state and local governmental agencies and major financial institutions.

Mr. Holmes is a Vietnam-era veteran and served in the U.S. Army Finance Corps.

Prior to attending law school, Mr. Holmes co-founded a chain of health and beauty aid discount stores. Mr. Holmes is a Commissioner of the New York State Insurance Fund and is a board member of the Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corporation.

Mr. Holmes received a B.A. from Columbia University and a J.D. from Hofstra University School of Law.

Committee Assignments: Capital Programs/Agency Planning (Chair), Operations, Security.

Jeffrey H. Lynford

Photo of Jeffrey A. Moerdler Jeffrey H. Lynford was appointed to the Board of Commissioners in June 2011 by Governor Cuomo. Mr. Lynford, currently Co-Managing Member of Wellsford Strategic Partners LLC, is the co-founder of the Wellsford group of public and private real estate companies. Over an 18 year period he has served as the Chairman of three exchange-listed corporations: Wellsford Residential Property Trust (NYSE: an investment grade multi-family REIT from 1992 to 1997), Wellsford Real Properties, Inc. (AMEX: a real estate merchant banking and development firm from 1997 to 2007), and Reis, Inc. (NASDAQ: real estate analytics and information firm from 2007 to 2010). Previously, he held senior investment banking positions on Wall Street.

Mr. Lynford has served as a trustee/director on the boards of S.E.C. reporting corporations and mutual funds as well as non-profit organizations. He is an expert on capital formation, corporate governance “best practices,” and has extensive experience serving on many audit, finance, investment and executive board committees.

Mr. Lynford holds two additional gubernatorial appointments (the New York State Council on the Arts and the Trust for Governors Island) and serves on the board of two institutions of higher education (NYU and Polytechnic Institute). Additionally, he is Vice Chairman of the Global Heritage Fund and the grantor of the Lynford Family Charitable Trust, which supports many eleemosynary organizations with domestic and international missions. He is a trustee emeritus of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, the Citizens Budget Commission, Caramoor International Center for Music and the Arts, and a former ex officio trustee of the Lower Eastside Tenement Museum.

Mr. Lynford holds three university degrees, including a BA in history from SUNY at Buffalo, a Masters in Public Affairs (MPA) from the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton University, and a JD from Fordham University School of Law.

Committee Assignments: Audit, Finance.

Jeffrey A. Moerdler

Photo of Jeffrey A. Moerdler Jeffrey A. Moerdler was appointed to the Board of Commissioners in April 2010 by Governor Paterson. Mr. Moerdler is a Member of Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo, P.C. where he is the New York office Section Head for the Real Estate and Communications Sections and is a member of the Environmental Section. His real estate practice is both national and local and includes representation of landlords and tenants in all types of leases, counseling owners and developers in the acquisition, sale, development and renovation of property, advising lenders and borrowers in commercial loans, and the representation of all parties in real estate litigation.

Mr. Moerdler has been a general commercial real estate attorney for almost thirty years. He has represented large national companies, particularly in the high-tech, telecommunications, financial services, health care, supermarket and oil and gas sectors, as well representing numerous smaller local clients. During the past twenty years, he has developed a unique specialty practice in the intersection of real estate and communications issues.

Mr. Moerdler is a member of the Executive Committee of the Real Property Section of the New York State Bar Association. Previously, he has served in numerous governmental positions, including representative of the President Pro Tem of the New York State Senate on the New York State Financial Control Board; Member of the New York State Banking Board; Member of the Departmental Disciplinary Committee of the Appellate Division, First Department, of the New York State Supreme Court; Assistant to the First Deputy Mayor of the City of New York; and Assistant to the Deputy Borough President of the Borough of Manhattan.

Mr. Moerdler is admitted to practice in the States of New York, Florida and Massachusetts, in the District of Columbia, and before the United States District Courts for the Southern and Eastern Districts of New York. He attended the Horace Mann School and was awarded his B.A. by Columbia College of Columbia University and his J.D. by the New York University School of Law.

Mr. Moerdler has written numerous articles on communications and real estate subjects. He is regularly quoted in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Commercial Property News, Real Estate Weekly and other publications. In recognition of his professional achievement, in 2002 he was elected as a Fellow of the American College of Real Estate Lawyers (ACREL) and every year commencing with 2006 he has been a New York Super Lawyer in The New York Times.

Committee Assignments: Audit (Vice-Chair), Security (Vice-Chair), Construction, Finance.

Raymond M. Pocino

Photo of Raymond Pocino Raymond Pocino was appointed to the Board of Commissioners in June 2002 by Governor McGreevey. For more than 50 years, Mr. Pocino has been a member of the Laborers’ International Union of North America (LIUNA). He was appointed regional manager of LIUNA’s Eastern Region Office in April 1995 and later won election as a LIUNA Vice President in September 1996. He was re-elected to additional five-year terms in 2001 and again in 2006. In his dual positions as Vice President and Eastern Regional Manager, Mr. Pocino directs and oversees activities that affect the working lives of some 40,000 laborers in the New Jersey, Delaware, New York City and Long Island geographical area. He is also President Emeritus of Construction & General Laborers Local 172 in Trenton, NJ. Mr. Pocino is serving his fifth term as a commissioner of the New Jersey Turnpike Authority, one term as chairman. Mr. Pocino also serves as Vice Present of the NJ State AFL-CIO, Vice Chair of Choose New Jersey, and serves as a trustee of both the NJ Alliance for Action and New Jersey SEED.

Committee Assignments: Construction (Chair), Finance.

Anthony J. Sartor, Ph.D., P.E., P.P.

Photo of Anthony J. Sartor Anthony J. Sartor was appointed to the Board of Commissioners in March 1999. His most recent reappointment to the Board was in January 2008 by Governor Corzine. Dr. Sartor is currently the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Paulus, Sokolowski & Sartor, located in Warren, New Jersey. His experience includes serving as Senior Vice President of National Grid, President and Chief Operating Officer of National Grid Energy Services and President of KeySpan Business Solutions. Prior to his appointment to The Port Authority Board, he served from 1992 to 1999 as a Commissioner of The New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority. A pioneer in the environmental engineering field since the 1960’s, Dr. Sartor received his Ph.D. and Masters degree from the University of Michigan in Chemical Engineering and his Bachelors degree from Manhattan College. He is listed in Who’s Who in America, Who’s Who in American Science and Engineering, American Men and Women of Science, as well as many other national and international directories.

Committee Assignments: WTC Redevelopment Subcommittee (Chair), Audit, Construction, Capital Programs/Agency Planning, Governance and Ethics, Security.

William “Pat” Schuber, Esq., BA, JD

Photo of William “Pat” Schuber, Esq., BA, JD William “Pat” Schuber joined the Board in July 2011. He was appointed to the Board by Governor Christie. Mr. Schuber served as The County Executive of Bergen County for 12 years, 9 years as a member of the New Jersey State Assembly and Mayor of the Borough of Bogota for 4 years. He is currently an Associate Professor at the School of Administrative Science, Petrocelli College, Fairleigh Dickinson University. He is a faculty member in the Master of Administrative Science (MAS), Master of Science in Homeland Security (MSHS), Master of Sports Administration (MSA) and Bachelor of Arts in Individualized Studies (BAIS). His courses include Leadership, Government, Homeland Security, Law, Ethics and Communication. He is a past Adjunct Professor in Business Law at Montclair University and Seton Hall University. He is an Instructor in the Certified Public Manager Course of Studies (CPM) and the Police Executive Leadership Course sponsored by the New Jersey Association Chiefs of Police and the New Jersey State Police (NJSP).

Mr. Schuber has conducted Leadership Staff Ride Seminars at the Battlefields of Gettysburg, Antietam, Trenton, Princeton, Monmouth Courthouse, Brandywine and Normandy, France. He lectures frequently on military history, historical leadership, homeland security, ethics, communication and conflict resolution to numerous civic groups. He is the Seminar Director for the Bergen Leads Program sponsored by the Volunteer Center of Bergen County. This program trains future leaders in business, non-profit and government. He has written several scholarly articles and co-authored books on topics of History, Leadership and Homeland Security. Mr. Schuber served as a Captain in the US Army Reserve (Retired).

Mr. Schuber is a graduate of Fordham University with a BA and received his JD at Fordham University School of Law. He is currently serving Of Counsel to the law firm of DeCotiis, Fitzpatrick & Cole, LLP in Teaneck, New Jersey.

Committee Assignments: Finance (Vice-Chair), Construction, Governance and Ethics, Security.

Henry R. Silverman

Photo of Henry R. Silverman Henry R. Silverman was appointed to the Board of Commissioners in June 2002 by Governor Pataki. He served as Vice-Chairman of the agency from May 24, 2007 to May 18, 2010. Currently, Mr. Silverman is Vice Chairman of Apollo Global Management, a leading alternative asset manager, which he joined in 2007.

Prior to Apollo, for 17 years Mr. Silverman served as Chairman and CEO of Cendant Corporation and its predecessor and successor. Cendant was a “Fortune 100” company and the largest global provider of consumer and business services within the travel and residential real estate sectors prior to its separation into several new companies in late 2006. He continues to serve as Chairman of Realogy Corporation, formerly Cendant’s real estate division.

Mr. Silverman is a trustee of New York University School of Medicine and Medical Center. Mr. Silverman has long been involved with numerous philanthropic, public service and social policy initiatives. He is a former trustee of the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Dance Theatre of Harlem, the University of Pennsylvania, Penn Medicine, New York University and the NYU Child Study Center. He is also a former member of the Business Roundtable and the G-100.

Mr. Silverman's philanthropy includes Silverman Hall, the Silverman-Rodin scholars and the Silverman Professor of Law at Penn Law School, and the Silverman Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology at NYU School of Medicine.

Mr. Silverman is a graduate of Williams College and the University of Pennsylvania Law School.

Committee Assignments: Finance (Chair), Governance and Ethics.

David S. Steiner

Photo of David S. Steiner David S. Steiner was appointed to the Board of Commissioners by Governor McGreevey in January 2003. Mr. Steiner is currently the Chairman of Steiner Equities Group, LLC a real estate development firm specializing in industrial office parks and commercial facilities in New Jersey and 14 other states and based in Roseland, New Jersey. Mr. Steiner recently built Steiner Studios, an unprecedented 280,000 square foot, $118 million state-of-the-art film and television production facility, situated on a 15-acre site at the historic Brooklyn Navy Yard. Mr. Steiner has worked with federal agencies such as the EPA and with Congressional committees and organized lobbying programs relating to land use regulation and industrial development. He is highly active in public service. Previously he served as vice president of the Washington Institute for Far East Policy. Mr. Steiner graduated from Carnegie Institute of Technology with a degree in Civil Engineering.