A 16-year veteran of commercial real estate communications, Mr. Russo is the Founding Partner of MetaProp Advisors and Chief Communications Strategist for all MetaProp NYC businesses.
Prior to joining MetaProp, Mr. Russo was at CBRE Group, Inc., in New York City, where he was Senior Director, Communications and Marketing, for the New York Tri-State Region. In that role he oversaw media relations and was responsible for integrating Research with Communications to leverage those resources in enhancing and growing the firm’s external and internal communications.
Mr. Russo, who has designed and implemented strategic communications programs in the public and private sectors, came to CBRE in January 2008 from Cushman & Wakefield, where he was Senior Managing Director of Media & Corporate Affairs. He was responsible for coordinating global internal and external messaging, media relations, speech writing and for producing a host of comprehensive corporate communications on behalf of the firm’s executive leadership. He was previously Managing Director of the Media Relations Unit at Cushman & Wakefield, and prior to that, he served as Director of New York Metropolitan Area Public Relations for the firm, which he joined in April 2000.
In the 1990s, Mr. Russo’s extensive experience in the public sector included serving as Director of the Office of Special Projects & Publications in the Public Affairs Division of the then New York City Board of Education and as the Assistant Commissioner for Public Affairs for the NYC Department of Housing Preservation and Development.
A former journalist with the Staten Island Advance and other publications, Mr. Russo covered news, sports and the arts, including some of the nation’s biggest criminal trials in Brooklyn and Manhattan federal and state courts.
He is a graduate of Fordham University and is a longtime resident of Brooklyn.