McCormack Baron Salazar


McCormack Baron Salazar is a U.S. real estate development firm specializing in economically integrated urban neighborhoods with more than $4.23 billion invested in affordable and mixed-income housing projects. McCormack Baron Salazar provides development as well as ongoing property management services, development financing and tax credit services, and asset management services. Based in St. Louis, Missouri, McCormack Baron Salazar was ranked by Affordable Finance Magazine in 2011 among the top five affordable housing owners in the country.

History

McCormack Baron & Associates was founded in 1973 by Richard Baron, a public interest and civil rights attorney representing public housing tenants in St. Louis and Terrence "Terry" McCormack, former homebuilder and consultant to labor unions who were interested in developing elderly housing for union members. Baron was representing tenants in a public housing rent strike and McCormack was working with the local Teamsters as part of a coalition called in to help resolve the conflict.
McCormack and Baron saw the opportunity of redeveloping inner city neighborhoods. In contrast to large-scale urban renewal projects, early McCormack Baron developments focused on small, single site, mixed income rental properties with access to schools, services and local economic opportunities for residents.
Terry McCormack died in 1981 the same year his son Kevin, who was a vice president of a New York bank, joined the firm. In 1985 Tony Salazar joined the firm and in 2003, he became president of West Coast operations rebranding the firm McCormack Baron Salazar.
McCormack Baron Salazar developed a mixed finance, mixed income approach to urban revitalization and their early projects served as a model for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development HOPE VI program. McCormack Baron Salazar developed the first HUD Hope VI pilot project at Centennial Place in Atlanta, GA. Since that time, McCormack Baron Salazar has developed and manages more than 7,000 apartments in 29 HOPE VI developments.
In 2010 the Hope VI program was revamped as the "Choice Neighborhoods" program. McCormack Baron Salazar was awarded two of the first Choice Neighborhood implementation grants for the Eastern Bayview project in San Francisco and for the Iberville/Treme project in New Orleans.
In 2009 McCormack Baron Salazar created the Sunwheel Energy Partners subsidiary to provide solar energy programs linked to affordable housing and urban development. Sunwheel installs solar panels on public, affordable and mixed income housing developments to help lower energy costs. The firm uses the federal New Markets Tax Credit Program to bring renewable energy components to affordable housing communities in St. Louis, New Orleans, Memphis and various cities in California. According to the Journal of Tax Credits, 2600 solar panels installed by McCormack Baron saved the St. Louis Housing Authority $40,000 a year in energy savings.
In 2010, the Urban Investment Group of the bank Goldman Sachs purchased a stake in McCormack Baron Salazar adding two Goldman representatives to the company's board. Goldman Sachs had been an investment partner with McCormack Baron in the re-development of The C.J. Peete public housing site in New Orleans' which had been destroyed by Hurricane Katrina.

Developments

Between 1973 and 2018 McCormack Baron Salazar developed more than 21,000 homes and 1.4 million square feet of commercial space across 197 developments in 46 cities and 22 states, DC, Puerto Rico and the USVI. Community development projects include 37 HOPE VI and Choice Neighborhood developments creating more than 10,500 mixed-income homes. McCormack Baron Salazar has conducted historic rehabilitation of more than 2,000 housing units and nearly 1 millions square feet of historic commercial space.
In 2011 McCormack Baron Salazar became the first ever real estate developer to certify two completed LEED-Neighborhood Developments from the U.S. Green Building Council. McCormack Baron Salazar has a total of five certified LEED neighborhoods, 1 LEED Platinum certified school, 758 LEED certified homes, 26 Enterprise Green Community Criteria sites and 3 HUD Green Community Sites. McCormack Baron Salazar communities have been highlighted as examples of New Urbanism for integrating employment, services and other Urban Design components including transit oriented development and solar power energy programs. McCormack Baron Salazar has 28 solar installation sites providing clean power to communities with more than 3,300 homes.
The McCormack Baron Salazar development portfolio includes:

Real estate and community development

McCormack Baron Salazar provides all aspects of the development process including design, financing and project management for urban real estate projects. The community development group at McCormack Baron Salazar has closed on 197 development phases with some $3.94 billion invested.

Real estate management

McCormack Baron Management provides property management, compliance, training, maintenance and leasing services at more than 350 properties in 24 states, DC, PR and the USVI.

New markets tax credits

McCormack Baron Salazar's MBS Urban Initiatives CDE is an allocatee of the Treasury's CDFI fund's New Markets Tax Credit program. MBS UI uses NMTC to help fund commercial, retail, mixed-use and for-sale developments to enhance McCormack Baron's development efforts in distressed communities across the country.

Asset management

McCormack Baron Salazar created its McCormack Baron Asset Management program in 2003 as part of the company's overall growth strategy. MBAM provides a variety of asset management services, including: Portfolio Performance Management, Substitute General Partner Services: and Acquisitions.

Founders

Richard Baron

Richard Baron is co-founder and chairman of McCormack Baron Salazar. A native of Detroit, Baron graduated from Oberlin College in the 1960s and worked as a student teacher in an impoverished east-side neighborhood of Cleveland volunteering in newly formed Freedom Schools serving poor African American neighborhoods. He later earned a master's degree in political science from Berkeley and a JD from University of Michigan Law School.
After law school Baron received a Reginald Heber Smith Fellowship and joined the St. Louis Legal Aid Society to work on housing and civil rights issues. During this time he also served as general counsel for the ACLU of Eastern Missouri and as an attorney for the Tenant Affairs Board of St. Louis. Baron represented public housing tenants during a series of St. Louis rent strikes where he met labor consultant Terry McCormack, with whom he co-founded McCormack Baron.
During his tenure at McCormack Baron, Richard Baron has been credited with helping redefine public and low-income housing programs and financing throughout the United States. Baron is considered a champion of urban development and rekindling investment interest in economically disadvantaged inner city neighborhoods. In 2004 the Urban Land Institute called him the "most successful developer of inner city mixed-income communities" in the country. Baron serves on the executive committee of the Regional Chamber and Growth Association, and on the Boards of St. Louis Downtown Partnership, Downtown Now!, and The Center of Contemporary Arts. He is also on the board of trustees at St. Louis University. He is a past board member of John Burroughs School and a past-member of Washington University's George Warren Brown School of Social Work National Council. He also served on the Advisory Board for the Center on Urban and Metropolitan Policy of The Brookings Institution, and is an emeritus member of the board of trustees for the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

Terence K. "Terry" McCormack

Terry McCormack was co-founder of McCormack Baron Salazar. He graduated with a master's degree in engineering from NYU and ran a homebuilding company in the Northeast prior to moving to St. Louis. In 1968 he began working with the local Teamsters union helping to resolve rent strike protests at St. Louis area housing projects. McCormack helped lead the grassroots organization of African American trade union members who were public housing residents to become more active participants in the housing development planning and structure. McCormack then directed an association of trade unions, civic leaders and social service groups created to address public housing problems in the area known as the St. Louis Civic Alliance for Housing which led to the eventual demolition of the Pruitt Igoe projects and a rethinking of public housing development in America. McCormack died in 1981 and was remembered as a civic leader who helped transform the face of public housing in America through public private partnerships. His work is continued through the Terence K. McCormack memorial lecture series at St. Louis University School of Law.

Key employees

McCormack Baron Salazar mixed financing projects are listed among HUD "success stories" for their public private partnership approach to public housing revitalization, and in 2004 Richard Baron was awarded the Urban Land Institute, J.C. Nichols Prize for Visionaries in Urban Development. In 2006 McCormack Baron won the Urban Land Institute's Gerald D. Hines competition for urban design.
McCormack Baron Salazar received the National Award for Program Excellence from the National Council of State Housing Agencies, the Westside Prize from the Urban Forum, Stewart B. McKinney Award from the National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty, Housing Developer of the Year from the City of Phoenix, St. Louis Developer of the Year from the Missouri-Kansas Construction Assistance Center.
McCormack Baron Salazar properties have received numerous national recognitions including: Renovation Project of the Year from the Association of General Contractors of America, Best Multi-Housing Renovation from :en:Multi-Housing News|Multi-Housing News, Enterprise Green Community Award from Enterprise Community Partners, Governor's Award for Excellence in Affordable Housing, State of Missouri, Outstanding Achievement Award from Energy Star, and the John Clancy Award for Socially Responsible Housing from the Governors' Council on Disability. And, in 2011 McCormack Baron Salazar won the Top Award of Merit and Circle of Excellence from the Green Business Challenge.