MaryAnne Gilmartin isn’t the only person leaving Forest City New York.
The company has laid off 20 staffers from its Brooklyn office, according to the Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park Report. Some workers will be let go effective at the end of the week, while others will leave at later dates.
The layoffs come on the heels of joint-venture partner Greenland USA taking a 95 percent stake in the Pacific Park megaproject, reducing Forest City’s interest to just 5 percent.
It’s also the third round of layoffs at the real estate firm’s Cleveland-based parent company Forest City Realty Trust in recent years. Forest City reportedly pink-slipped 50 employees in June, and also laid off employees amid a corporate restructuring in early 2016. It also sold its modular division in 2016.
Jeff Linton, a senior vice president at Forest City, said in a statement to Atlantic Yards that the Brooklyn office still has the company’s second-largest concentration of employees outside of its Cleveland headquarters, and that in total the firm employs about 1,500 people.
Gilmartin, who spent four years as CEO of Forest City’s New York division, left the company earlier this month, telling The Real Deal that “it’s time.” Since transitioning into a real estate investment trust, Forest City has pivoted away from ground-up developments — part of the reason Gilmartin chose to leave.
She will head up L&L MAG, a new development firm she is launching with David Levinson and Robert Lapidus of L&L Holding. She’s taking Forest City’s Jeffrey Rosen, Ashley Cotton, Susi Yu and Adam Greene with her.
Her new company will consult on the Pacific Park megaproject, which has faced several hurdles throughout its development. [Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park Report] — Eddie Small