Hotels benefit from those real estate sectors that preceded it down the path of sustainability, says Hotel Engineers Association of New York general counsel Jack Osborn, whom we snapped in his John E. Osborn P.C. law practice’s 841 Broadway office. The rest of the industry has the infrastructure to research best practices for property-level issues like benchmarking and retrocommissioning, he says. Hence the association’s event last month to intro its 200 members to such issues. Jack tells us HEANY members (the chief engineer at each major NYC hotel is automatically a member) each operates in his or her own silo of a hotel, and the association's events give these engineers/capital planners a chance to convene.

Jack also is legal counsel for the Greater New York Construction User Council, the local chapter of the Construction Users Roundtable (above is Jack with the org's board of directors at the 2013 Chairman's Reception: vice chair Marcelo Velez of Columbia University, past chair Jonathan Resnick of Jack Resnick & Sons, and co-chairs Bernadette Vero of Metro-North and Christopher Jaskiewicz of Gotham Org). NY’s chapter was born in 1971 with 12 execs from corporations and institutions that thought there must be a more efficient and cost-effective way to bid and deliver projects (current members include the Port Authority, Thornton Tomasetti, and Columbia University). Their areas of concern have included analysis of construction costs, site safety, legal issues, and tech. Coming up June 17 is the 2014 Chairman’s Reception honoring nine developments and Tishman Construction's Jay Badame.