George Vallone
Smart Growth Award Category: Redevelopment Trailblazer Award
Recipient: George Vallone
Redeveloper with over four decades of commitment to repurposing sites and buildings and demonstrated industry leadership on green infrastructure, brownfield remediation, and mixed-used development bridging private, public, and nonprofit sectors.
The Redevelopment Trailblazer Award recognizes an individual or organization that has demonstrated leadership and innovation in the field of redevelopment by executing projects that showcase how redevelopment can improve communities, respect the environment, advance societal goals, and be economically viable.
In naming our inaugural Redevelopment Trailblazer, New Jersey Future was in search of an individual who demonstrated throughout their career the positive impact they’ve made through redevelopment projects that don’t shy away from challenges, instead embracing them, in turn leaving behind an inspirational example for others to follow.
After some deliberation, it became clear that George Vallone was deserving of this recognition, whose career has stretched from the 1980s through today and whose legacy can be found across metropolitan North Jersey. Vallone has been a visionary developer, restoring and rehabilitating brownstones in Hoboken and Jersey City as president of the Hoboken Brownstone Company. He has also redeveloped the former Maxwell House factory into Maxwell Place in Hoboken, adding housing units to the burgeoning and verdant Hudson River Promenade. His portfolio includes many more prominent buildings and projects throughout New Jersey, contributing to exceptional place-making and center-based town and city centers that foster walkability, connectivity, and community-building.
Vallone has not only been a successful businessman and developer, he’s also dedicated himself to advancing important smart growth and sustainability principles among his colleagues and the development community. Notably, Vallone has not shied away from redevelopment projects that have required extensive and costly remediation. In New Jersey, where so much of the land we view as desirable and well-placed for redevelopment carries a former industrial legacy, remediation of brownfields is a thorny but necessary step in converting land from disuse to new use. As co-chair of the Developers Green Infrastructure Task Force, a collaborative effort between the NJ Builders Association and New Jersey Future, Vallone has championed and led the creation of the “NJ Developers Green Infrastructure Guide”. This guide has received national attention and has been adopted by the NJ Department of Environmental Protection as their Best Management Practices guide on how to use Green Infrastructure for stormwater management.
“One of the important things about George, is that he’s been ahead of the curve at numerous steps of the way. He was early to accept the necessity of brownfield remediation in redevelopment. He was early to adopt LEED certifications for his buildings. He’s pushed mixed-use development for a long time, and has encouraged others in his profession to install and promote green infrastructure in his projects and among his peers. His immense impact in his own work and in his industry make us proud to honor George with our first-ever Redevelopment Trailblazer Award,” commented New Jersey Future Executive Director Peter Kasabach.
