skip to main |
skip to sidebar
From the
Daily News:
A real estate firm that played a key role in the corruption charges against disgraced ex-legislative leaders Sheldon Silver and Dean Skelos must pay a $200,000 fine for violating New York lobbying laws.
Glenwood Management, which is owned by political powerbroker Leonard Litwin, agreed to the fine as part of a settlement with the Joint Commission on Public Ethics.
From
Gotham Gazette:
On Tuesday the state Assembly passed a bill to close the controversial LLC loophole at the center of the federal corruption cases against former Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and former Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos. Both men - a Democrat and a Republican, respectively - were recently arrested and subsequently stepped down from their powerful leadership posts. Later in the evening Tuesday, the Senate’s version of the bill to close the loophole that allows money to flow unfettered into campaign accounts appeared to be dispatched by Senate Republicans in a bit of behind-the-scenes maneuvering.
The LLC loophole that allows individuals and corporations to donate unlimited amounts of cash to legislators has been treated by many as a political hot potato all year. It gained attention when Glenwood Management and its principle, Leonard Litwin, were connected to the Silver indictment. Litwin is the state’s largest campaign donor thanks to the many LLCs he controls and his tendency to donate large sums to politicians at all levels of state government and in both major parties. The issue flared up again after Litwin and his company appeared in the federal complaint against Skelos.
According to a study by Common Cause NY, Glenwood Management has given $12.8 million in political donations from 2005 to 2014, but only 10 percent of those donations actually came directly from Litwin or his companies. The rest of the donations were made by LLCs registered to Glenwood or listed at its address.
In April, Sen. Daniel Squadron, a New York City Democrat, used a parliamentary maneuver called “Motion for Committee Consideration” to force the Elections Committee to consider the bill. In an apparent move designed to avoid controversy, Republican Senators voted to move the bill out of committee without recommendation. Instead of being sent to the floor for a vote it was sent to the Corporations Committee. Squadron told Gotham Gazette at the time it appeared the Republicans had “used a loophole to kill an attempt to stop a loophole” because the Corporations Committee rarely meets.
From the
NY Observer:
Leonard Litwin, whose company Glenwood Management is believed to be the unnamed Developer 1 in the complaint against Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, was on a list Mayor Bill de Blasio released today of members of his host committee seeking to bring the 2016 Democratic National Convention to New York City.
The 100-year-old Mr. Litwin—known for his massive donations to Mr. de Blasio and Gov. Andrew Cuomo, among many others—is one of 119 committee members hailing from the upper echelons of the worlds of finance, real estate, organized labor and politics. Last week, Crain’s New York noted that Glenwood Management, a luxury real estate firm, fits the description of “Developer 1″ in U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara‘s corruption complaint against Mr. Silver.
Mr. de Blasio’s office did not immediately respond to requests for comment. In his statement announcing the members of the host committee, Mr. de Blasio argued that his slate of organizers and fund-raisers represent a broad cross-section of New York’s best and brightest.
From the
NY Times:
Unlike many other New York developers, Leonard Litwin, a shy, soft-spoken, compact billionaire, has never sought the limelight.
Yet Mr. Litwin and his company, Glenwood Management, have always stood out, for the number of luxury residential towers they have added to Manhattan’s skyline and the exceptionally generous donations Glenwood has made to state lawmakers.
Now, in his 101st year, Mr. Litwin is embroiled in a very public corruption scandal that is rocking the real estate industry and the state’s political establishment.
When Sheldon Silver, the speaker of the New York State Assembly, was arrested on federal charges on Thursday, the criminal complaint against him included accusations that he used his powerful position to reap millions of dollars in graft by steering real estate developers, among others, to law firms that gave him a slice of their fees.
Glenwood is one of the two developers cited but not named in the complaint, according to people familiar with the matter.
At Mr. Silver’s request, the complaint says, Glenwood, which owns 26 buildings with 8,700 apartments in the city, including three in Mr. Silver’s district, and the second developer hired a small law firm, Goldberg & Iryami, to handle some of its property tax work.
Though not named, Leonard Litwin's company, Glenwood Management, is cited as one of the real estate firms in the case against Sheldon Silver.
In exchange, prosecutors say, Mr. Silver got a portion of the fees that Glenwood and the second developer, whose identity remains unknown, paid the firm — a total of $700,000.
Glenwood was unaware of the arrangement until 2012, the complaint says. And Mr. Silver, a Manhattan Democrat, never reported the income as required on his annual financial disclosure forms, even as he continued to deal with legislation of interest to Glenwood and other developers, including rent regulations and real estate tax breaks.
While neither of the developers is accused of wrongdoing, Glenwood’s part in the case has stunned Mr. Litwin’s colleagues in the real estate industry, where he is a revered figure who, friends say, has always sought to avoid controversy. He and the company declined to comment for this article.
From
Capital New York:
Leonard Litwin, who appears to be the developer at the center of a criminal complaint against Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, gave nearly $3.6 million to candidates and state-level political parties in the last election cycle, more than any other donor, according to a Capital analysis of campaign finance filings.
Litwin was followed on the list of top donors by the health care union 1199 SEIU, hedge fund manager James Simons, New York State United Teachers (which also managed an independent expenditure committee that spent millions of dollars on Senate races) and the New York State Trial Lawyers Association.
Litwin and 26 limited liability companies owned by Glenwood Management gave $2.07 million to statewide candidates and parties in the four years preceding December 2014 and $1.52 million to state legislative candidates in the two years preceding that month, the analysis by Capital showed.
These donations included $1 million to Governor Andrew Cuomo, $450,000 to the New York State Democratic Committee and $19,700 to Lieutenant Governor Kathy Hochul. This makes Litwin the largest donor to Cuomo. He was also the largest donor to Attorney General Eric Schneiderman ($240,000) and Comptroller Tom DiNapoli ($180,000).
He gave to each of Albany’s five legislative conferences: Senate Republicans ($1.01 million), the Independent Democratic Conference ($195,300), Assembly Democrats ($179,500), Senate Democrats ($133,000) and Assembly Republicans ($3,150). Senator Jeff Klein received $80,000 from Litwin’s holdings, more than any other individual legislator. In all, 89 state-level campaign committees received money from an LLC owned by Glenwood.
The total does not include amounts Litwin sent to other groups’ political action committees or independent expenditure committees. Glenwood’s LLCs gave $162,200 to Jobs for New York and $100,000 to the New York League of Conservation Voters, both of which supported Senate Republicans. This also does not include donations to local candidates. Litwin was notably the largest donor to Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino in the last year of his 2013 re-election campaign.
1199 SEIU gave the second most money to candidates and parties, contributing $2.43 million. The Working Families Party received $801,350 from 1199, the largest share of its donations. Seven Senate Republicans received money from the union, which pledged last June to give no money to Senate Republicans.
From
The New York World:
Companies associated with luxury real estate mogul Leonard Litwin have funneled more than $900,000 into races for the New York State Senate so far this election cycle — mostly to Republicans, who are fighting this fall to hold on to majority control.
These contributions have come through limited liability companies (LLCs) connected to Litwin’s real estate firm, Glenwood Management. Routing contributions through LLCs allows donors to legally circumvent the state’s $150,000 annual political donation limit for individuals and $5,000 cap for corporations.
All it takes to register a limited liability corporation in New York is a three-question form and $200.
The use of LLCs to evade campaign contribution limits has special significance this election year, in which voters will decide who fills every seat in the state Senate and Assembly. Gov. Andrew Cuomo stated during his 2010 campaign that he would be in favor of limiting donations from LLCs, and in his January State of the State address — which called contribution limits “riddled with loopholes” — vowed to enact campaign finance reform this year.
Cuomo himself has been a beneficiary of the LLC loophole: his 2014 campaign has received a quarter million dollars from the holdings of Leonard Litwin, the New York Public Interest Group (NYPIRG) calculated in July.
In total, more than 20 LLCs associated with Litwin have funneled about $1.8 million to more than 60 state-level candidates, as well a a few local officials and more than a dozen political committees, since the beginning of 2011.
