FEDERAL REAL PROPERTY ASSOCIATION |
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| Arthur Russell | FRPA Treasurer Art currently serves as Managing Director for the Jones Lang LaSalle Government Investor Services (GIS) Practice Group. His role is to serve as the GSA Strategic Advisor for the practice group. The 9-member team provides landlord brokerage services on a national platform that focuses on attracting federal and local government occupiers of commercial real estate to Institutional owned assets. Prior to joining JLL, Art served as a Senior Lease Contract Specialist for the General Services Administration (GSA), completing 1.5 million square feet of client-agency leases. Concurrently, he served as the managing partner for the Russell Advisory Group a Business Development Company (“BDC”)/Sovereign Fund that invested equity and debt in private and public companies. Previously as a co-founding principal of Capital CREAG, a corporate real estate advisory firm. His efforts were directly responsible for the completion of approximately 20 million square feet of federal lease transactions. He served as the lead in strategic partnerships with GSA, Guggenheim Partners, Starbucks, among others. In his earlier career, he served as a Senior Financial Analyst with Jones Lang LaSalle providing day-to-day investment management guidance for pension and commingled funds for office portfolios valued at over $1 billion. Finally, he was a senior financial analyst for Public Financial Management providing financial modeling for public arenas including, but not limited to: Camden Yards, Tampa Authority, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Jacobs Field and Quicken Loans Arena. |
| Sarah Burns Williams | FRPA Secretary Sarah Burns Williams is a Manager at Deloitte Consulting in the Real Estate Strategy & Sustainability offering with over 14 years of real estate experience. Throughout her career, Sarah has led a wide variety of public and private real estate strategy projects, managing teams both domestically and abroad. Her business acumen spans client service management, portfolio strategy, business process improvement, budgeting, market research, and data analysis. Committed to women’s initiatives in the industry, Ms. Burns Williams is a founding member of Deloitte’s Women in Infrastructure and Real Estate initiative. Sarah is also a former participant in the prestigious Deloitte Real Estate Fellowship Program, focused on development the next generation of leadership within the consulting industry. Sarah has been actively engaged with FRPA for over 5 years as the Lead of the Communications Team and is currently serving as the Association’s Secretary. Sarah received her Bachelors of Arts in Economics at Wofford College and her Masters of Real Estate from Georgetown University. |
| Keith Cunningham | FRPA Program Committee Chair Keith B. Cunningham is an Assistant Director of physical infrastructure issues at the United States Government Accountability Office (GAO), the investigative and audit arm of the U.S. Congress. Mr. Cunningham has developed a broad expertise in real property policy and management issues during his 25 years at GAO—having led the work for more than 40 GAO reports and testimony statements. Mr. Cunningham’s recent work on federal real property includes reports on various issues related to property ownership, realignment, leasing, disposal, and financing. Prior to government service, Mr. Cunningham directed research on worldwide military base closure and reuse efforts for the Bonn International Center for Conversion in Germany and Business Executives for National Security. Mr. Cunningham holds a Masters of Policy Studies from Johns Hopkins University and a BS in Social Science from Miami University, Ohio. |
| Dan Mathews | FRPA Policy Committee Chair After 25 years of federal service in Congress and the executive branch, Dan founded Mathews Associates LLC in 2021 as a strategic consulting and business development firm. He helps his clients navigate the highest levels of Washington and the complex world of federal real estate and government procurements to expand their revenue, identify new partners and enter new markets. Major federal projects and leases require approval from a variety of decision-makers within the General Services Administration (GSA), Office of Management and Budget, and Congress. Mathews Associates LLC helps guide its clients through this process and shape the decisions for their benefit. As the Head of Federal Sales at WeWork he secured a spot on the federal government’s Flexible Coworking Services contract and several other agency acquisitions. Mathews was Commissioner of GSA’s Public Buildings Service from August of 2017 to January of 2021. Prior to joining GSA, Mathews served as the staff director of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee’s Subcommittee on Economic Development, Public Buildings, and Emergency Management. |
 | Stuart Burns Stuart serves as Executive Vice President – Government Relations for Easterly Government Properties. He has over 35 years of government and private sector experience, with 19 years focused on federal government real estate management. Prior to joining the Company in February 2023, Mr. Burns was the Assistant Commissioner for Portfolio Management and Customer Engagement in the GSA’s Public Buildings Service (PBS). In this role, he was responsible for managing a portfolio of over 370 million square feet, including over 8,700 owned and leased assets and more than 560 historic properties. He also was responsible for customer relationship management for the 70+ government agencies that PBS served. From 2003 to 2015, Stuart worked for the Internal Revenue Service in increasing levels of responsibility. In his final position there, he served as the Acting Deputy Commissioner for Operations Support, overseeing the integration of real estate, technology, shared services, procurement, as well as all finance and human resource needs for the Internal Revenue Service. He earned his bachelor’s degree in environmental science from University of Virginia. |
| Melanie Gilbert In October 2022, Melanie Gilbert began her service at the General Services Administration, Public Buildings Service, as the Regional Commissioner for the National Capital Region. She is responsible for GSA’s largest and most challenging real estate portfolio of 93 million rentable square feet and inventory of over 600 government-owned and leased facilities with a revenue of $2.8 billion. With a staff of over 1,000 employees, Melanie’s immediate priority is the Executive Branch’s post-pandemic return to facilities and NCR’s future real estate portfolio strategy. Prior to joining GSA, Melanie spent 30 years at the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts and for the last 11 years was the Chief of the Facilities and Security Office. She was the senior executive responsible for the Federal Judiciary’s facilities, security, and emergency preparedness programs and portfolio. In that role she was the senior executive responsible for an almost $2 billion dollar budget for facilities and security throughout the United States in over 880 primary courthouses, federal buildings, and leases. She was Chair of the Judiciary’s COVID-19 Task Force that led the Federal Court’s operational response to the pandemic. She was also responsible for the multi-million dollar operation of the Thurgood Marshall Federal Judiciary Building in Washington, DC. during her tenure with the courts. Melanie is a cum laude graduate of New York Law School, and holds a B.A. from Indiana University in Political Science and Theater. |
| Gordon Griffin Gordon Griffin is a federal real estate attorney in Holland & Knight's Washington, D.C., office. Gordon represents building owners, real estate developers, real estate investment trusts (REITs) and asset managers nationwide in all aspects of General Services Administration (GSA) lease procurement and negotiation, lease administration and litigation of lease disputes. Gordon is the co-author of the 2016 Federal Government Real Estate Leasing guide published by LexisNexis. Gordon's work covers a variety of aspects of federal real estate, including: Counseling real estate clients through the federal procurement process, including bid protests of overly restrictive or unfair RLP provisions at the Government Accountability Office (GAO) and the U.S. Court of Federal Claims; assisting clients in the federal claims process, and litigating federal lease disputes under the Contract Disputes Act at the U.S. Court of Federal Claims, as well as the Armed Services Board of Contract Appeals and Civilian Board of Contract Appeals; and counseling real estate clients through the purchase and sale of properties with government tenants. |
| Lisle Hannah Lisle Hannah is the Vice President, Facilities, Construction and Real Estate for Events DC. In this role, she manages the Walter E. Washington Convention Center and sports venues within the District of Columbia. She previously served as Facilities Director at the U.S. Department of Commerce, overseeing real property, energy and sustainability, and the Commerce headquarters building. She is a strategic leader with over 25 years of experience advising on facilities and real property issues, asset management, administrative services and environmental issues. Ms. Hannah was the Director of Facilities for the Corporation for National and Community Service (AmeriCorps) and served as the Director of the Office of Administrative Services at the United States Patent and Trademark Office. |
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Julia Tritz
Julia Tritz is the Director of the Business Operations Center at the U.S. Department of Labor where her portfolio includes real and personal property, fleet management, facilities operations and maintenance, worker safety and health, and environment and sustainability. She is a tenacious and flexible leader with over a decade of experience in formulating and executing strategic and operational planning. She has been with the Department of Labor for over 25 years, working in various program areas before joining the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Administration and Management in 2019. Worker protections and work environments are a thread throughout her career and she has dedicated her professional life to creating workplaces that are safe, mission focused and worker-centered. She is a graduate of Boston University where she received her BA magna cum laude in Art History and she complete the Senior Executive Fellows program at the Harvard Kennedy School. |
Elliot Doomes Elliot Doomes served as the Commissioner of the Public Buildings Service (PBS) at the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) from October 2023 to January 2025. As PBS Commissioner, Elliot managed the nationwide asset management, design, construction, leasing, building management and disposal of approximately 360 million square feet of government-owned and leased space across the United States and six territories. Elliot joined GSA as Regional Administrator for the National Capital Region in January 2023. Prior to GSA, Elliot served as Professional Staff on the Financial Services and General Government Subcommittee of the Appropriations Committee in the House of Representatives. He also served as Counsel for the Subcommittee on Economic Development, Public Buildings, and Emergency Management on the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee in the House of Representatives for over a decade. His principal responsibility was to advise Committee Members on GSA’s Real Property activities. Doomes began his career as a Legislative Assistant in the office of Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) where his primary focus was on economic development in the District of Columbia. His signature staff work included passage of the Federal and District of Columbia Real Property Act of 2006, which executed a complicated land exchange between the District of Columbia, GSA, the National Park Service, and the Architect of the Capitol that has enabled hundreds of millions of dollars of economic development within the District of Columbia. Victoria Abbasi Victoria Abbasi is a Vice President at Colliers. As a senior member of the Government Solutions national practice group, Victoria has over a decade of federal government real estate experience. Victoria and her team represent institutional owners across the United States in a variety of complex real estate transactions and consulting assignments largely involving the General Services Administration (GSA). The Government Solutions team has completed over 24 million square feet of federal lease transactions. Victoria specializes in advising clients throughout the Federal Government lease procurement process and has distinguished herself as an expert and thought leader in the federal real estate sector. She was a recipient of Colliers Service Excellence Award, which recognizes individuals who consistently create memorable outcomes for their clients and colleagues. In 2023, Victoria received the global CREW Network Rising Star Impact Award. She is heavily involved in the commercial real estate industry, including mentoring young professionals. Tom Shen Tom is a member of Gensler's Management Committee, SE Regional Executives Council and Region Practice Area Community Leader. As an architect and real estate consultant, he works closely with clients to compile and organize data for clear, concise communication to key stakeholders. Tom's specialization in government-leased real estate portfolio optimization modeling, corporate strategic planning, and facilities management indicates his focus on long-term strategic issues related to facilities and their associated real estate costs. His successful consultations with both public and private sector clients involving millions of square feet of space show his capacity to handle large-scale projects. Furthermore, Tom's work with numerous federal agencies such as the GSA, DOD, DHS, DOC, DOE, DOT, HHS, DOL, DOS, USPTO, CBP, TSA, and FAA has resulted in significant cost savings by identifying redundancies during large consolidations and relocations. His experience and expertise make him a valuable asset to both Gensler and his clients. |