TOBYs!

Before the long weekend, we dropped in on both the BOMA Suburban Chicago TOBY Awards (short for The Office Building of the Year, but you knew that) and the Chicago Youth Programs' anniversary, which also drew some familiar real estate faces.

BOMA's lunch included a panel on making your property more marketable: CBRE's George Kohl,  Studley's Steve LaKind,  Lincoln Property's Deb Pyznarski,  and Cushman and Wakefield's Doug Sheehan. Deb advises, while office space is struggling, you can gain market share by making sure your building is well-kept and checking out your competitors. Steve tells his tenant-clients to check out a building at a time other than a showing. "You clean up your house when people come over; it's the same for offices," he says.

Transwestern's Maria Pacilio, Bonnie Calame  and Colette Menolascino, who just received those dozen roses (from Bonnie) to celebrate finishing her RPA designation. Perhaps inspired by this moment,  Maria starts a bachelor's degree at Argosy Univ.  this year.

Facility Managements' Ken Orms, flanked by CBRE's Steven Hrbek  and George Kohl, helped present awards. Winners included: CBRE, for Office Park and 100-250k-SF; Keystone Property Group, under 100k-SF; and,Prime Group Realty, 500k-1m-SF.

At Chicago Youth Programs' 25th anniversary at Carnivale Thursday night, we found The Private Bank's Geoff Koss, Magellan Development Group's David Carlins, and Golub and Co's Lee Golub. It raised more than $100k through ticket sales and auctions, to help mentor kids through inner city schools. After the celebration, it was Blackhawks talk for Lee, who says a victory will mean he can keep lighting up his buildings with their colors.

Virchow Krause and Co.'s Anne Fisher, Amanda Schwartz,  and Katy Barz sifted through the silent auction vacation packages. The three property tax accountants said they needed a vacation after what has been a particularly rough tax season for commercial real estate. "Everyone is looking to get as much benefit as possible from taxes, trying to find ways to get exemptions," Anne says. 

And we had another appearance from Chicago real estate band Doctor Bombay.  Trinity Life Settlement's Russ Steinberg, Cari Alexander-Koss, and Private Bank's Geoff Koss  and Mike Thomas added a set of covers in between auctions. They tell us rehearsing gives them something to do while financial markets are down.