Brooklyn, NY Helen Keller Services (HKS) will culminate its 125th Anniversary activities with a gala on September 13, 2018. The event will be held at the Liberty Warehouse in the borough’s Red Hook neighborhood. This year’s honorees will be CB Richard Ellis (CBRE) chairman, New York City Capital Markets, Darcy Stacom, and former National Grid chairman Robert Catell according to HKS president and CEO Joseph Bruno.

“We’re pleased and excited that two of New York’s most respected and influential professionals will be honorees at our gala, which will highlight our 125th anniversary,” said Bruno. “Darcy Stacom led the extraordinary CBRE team responsible for the successful sale of our Willoughby St. headquarters building, which allows us to move to new and enhanced headquarters in Brooklyn later this year. She is a leading figure in New York City’s real estate community and a true friend of Helen Keller Services. Bob Catell is someone I’ve known personally and professionally for many years, going back to his Brooklyn Union Gas and Keyspan Energy days. By serving as honorees, Darcy and Bob each bring considerable support to Helen Keller Services and its mission to enable individuals who are blind, visually-impaired, deaf-blind or have combined hearing-vision loss to live, work and thrive in the communities of their choice.”

Stacom, crowned “Queen of the Skyscrapers” by the Wall Street Journal, has completed more than $84 billion in sales, financing, joint venture, lease-hold and development transactions, including Peter Cooper Stuyvesant Town ($5.4 billion), Trinity Portfolio ($3.55 billion), General Motors Building ($2.8 billion) 11 Madison Ave. ($2.55 billion), and the multi-state Kushner Residential Portfolio ($1.9 billion). In the last four years, she has three times been the #1 capital markets professional at CBRE globally. With more than 30 years of real estate experience, Ms. Stacom is a frequent speaker before industry and educational organizations and a strong supporter of educational and non-profit organizations.

Catell, whose career with Brooklyn Union Gas began in 1958, currently serves as chairman of the board of the Advanced Energy Research and Technology Center (AERTC) at Stony Brook University, New York State Smart Grid Consortium, Cristo Rey Brooklyn High School, and Futures in Education Endowment Fund. He also serves on the board of the following not for profit organizations: Colin Powell School for Civic and Global Leadership, Department of Education; Diocese of Rockville Centre, Feinstein Institute for Medical Research, St. Francis Hospital Foundation, and the New York City Police Foundation.

Bruno anticipates that the move to new headquarters for Helen Keller Services will coincide closely with the September GALA. Located at 180 Livingston St. in Downtown Brooklyn, the new 44,000 s/f space will meet the needs of clients and staff alike.

“This is a very exciting time for Helen Keller Services,” said Bruno. “We are honoring our 125-year-old Brooklyn roots with the GALA and the move to new space in Brooklyn. While our scope of services has expanded, allowing us to touch the lives of countless blind and visually impaired men, women, and children, what hasn’t changed in our long history is our commitment to the surrounding community which has been made possible by organizations like CB Richard Ellis and National Grid that generously support our goals and dreams.”

More information on the gala is available by visiting www.helenkeller.org/hks/events or contacting Deborah Rodriguez at [email protected] or 718-522-2122, ext. 2204.