Last Night at DCBIA
The stars of DC politics and real estate packed the Washington Hilton for the annual DCBIA awards dinner last night. It's one of our favorite annual events, mainly because we can ask Doug Firstenberg "who are you wearing" in the hopes he'll say Diane von Furstenberg. We're easily amused.
Outside the Hilton's grand ballroom, we snapped new DCBIA chief Lisa Mallory (whom we profiled last month) with one of the night's honorees: DC police chief Cathy Lanier. She was given the night's community partnership award for her work over the past seven years in bringing down DC's once-staggering homicide rate and engaging with city residents like no chief has before.
The Gray administration (repped here by city administrator Allan Lew, left) was also honored for keeping city finances in check while also spearheading a development boom in the District, to the tune of 70-something ribbon cuttings and $6.8B in investment over the past four years. (Police Chief Lanier was unable to prevent those vicious attacks on ribbons.) Allan's joined by DCBIA prez Sean Cahill of Property Group Partners.
We couldn't pass up the chance to snap one of the most famous pair of brothers in DC real estate: Chris and Doug Donatelli. (Dad Lou, who started the firm Chris now heads up and Doug once worked at, was also on hand last night.) Chris won the private sector development award last night for his work revitalizing DC neighborhoods with new mixed-use projects—check out our inside look at his most recent property on Minnesota Avenue.
Here are Hines local head Bill Alsup, Gelberg Signs' Luc Brami, Design Products' Alisa Lange, and Skidmore Owings & Merrill's Mark Regulinski.
Chiaramonte Construction's Tom Bizzarri (second from left) tells us the firm is hard at work on the Ballou High School reconstruction in Ward 8. It's a $140M LEED Gold project including a new fitness center, pool, and basketball court that'll be available to Ward 8 residents. It finishes this January; Tom's joined by colleague Kyle Rindone, CohnReznick's Roseanne Serels, and colleagues Steven Groth and Walid Zaineldeen.
