Barretto Bay Strategies LLC
Barretto Bay Strategies provides strategic advising, planning services, and market entry assistance to community development organizations, anchor institutions, and start-ups in the clean energy, food manufacturing, housing, and transportation sectors. The firm specializes in projects positioned at the interface of public policy and market development in these spaces.
Barretto Bay’s recent clients have included a global automaker seeking to develop and deploy a zero-emission car share program in dense East Coast metros, a national developer of affordable housing pursuing a strategy of industrial job creation in a new mixed-use development, the owner of a 120 acre former shipyard in search of a repurposing strategy for a location that once employed over 50,000 workers, and an economic development organization looking to procurement localization as an approach to address poverty in an historically underserved area. Barretto Bay has advised three NYS Brownfield Opportunity Area studies as well as six NYS Energy Research and Development Authority projects
Consultant Bios
Paul Lipson,
Principal
Paul Lipson served for seven years as Chief of Staff to Congressman Jose E. Serrano (NY-16), an 11-term Democrat and senior appropriator from The Bronx, NY. In 2009, Lipson served as principal author of The American Electric Vehicle Manufacturing Act (HR 4399), a bill introduced with bi-partisan support aimed at scaling up the domestic electric truck industry and helping to address air quality deficits incurred by medium duty fleets based in places like the South Bronx.
Earlier in his career, Mr. Lipson founded and led The Point Community Development Corporation, a pioneering CDC based in the Hunts Point section of The Bronx and active in the sustainability sector. The organization launched the South Bronx Greenway, initiated the revitalization of 8 acres of scatter-site brownfields, redeveloped two significant industrial parcels, launched a creative sector business incubator in the historic American Banknote Building, and led local community consensus-building around land use and waterfront issues in the Hunts Point peninsula. Most recently, Mr. Lipson led the PennDesign-OLIN team’s consensus-building and engagement process for its successful Rebuild By Design application to address coastal vulnerabilities in and around the Hunts Point Food Distribution Center. In this role, Mr. Lipson’s firm worked intensively with organized labor locals, food wholesalers, small businesspeople, community advocates, and the non-profit community to elicit local solutions to longstanding resiliency challenges in Hunts Point.
Paul Lipson,
Principal
Paul Lipson served for seven years as Chief of Staff to Congressman Jose E. Serrano (NY-16), an 11-term Democrat and senior appropriator from The Bronx, NY. In 2009, Lipson served as principal author of The American Electric Vehicle Manufacturing Act (HR 4399), a bill introduced with bi-partisan support aimed at scaling up the domestic electric truck industry and helping to address air quality deficits incurred by medium duty fleets based in places like the South Bronx.
Earlier in his career, Mr. Lipson founded and led The Point Community Development Corporation, a pioneering CDC based in the Hunts Point section of The Bronx and active in the sustainability sector. The organization launched the South Bronx Greenway, initiated the revitalization of 8 acres of scatter-site brownfields, redeveloped two significant industrial parcels, launched a creative sector business incubator in the historic American Banknote Building, and led local community consensus-building around land use and waterfront issues in the Hunts Point peninsula.
Most recently, Mr. Lipson led the PennDesign-OLIN team’s consensus-building and engagement process for its successful Rebuild By Design application to address coastal vulnerabilities in and around the Hunts Point Food Distribution Center. In this role, Mr. Lipson’s firm worked intensively with organized labor locals, food wholesalers, small businesspeople, community advocates, and the non-profit community to elicit local solutions to longstanding resiliency challenges in Hunts Point.
Luis Torres,
Senior Consultant
Mr. Torres has spearheaded a number of local, state and regional studies and implementation projects in the clean energy, procurement, and transportation spheres. Beginning in 2013, Mr. Torres managed a multi-year procurement localization study for large institutions in Bronx County on behalf of the Greater New York Hospital Association and allied organizations in The Bronx.
From 2011-2014, Torres served as senior consultant on NYSERDA-funded studies of the East Coast’s EV charging station ecosystem as well as planning projects for EV Tourism initiatives and “Green Loading Zones” in the NY metro area. Torres also partnered with Coulomb Technologies to secure deployment sites for EV charging stations throughout New York State. In early 2011, Mr. Torres also served as a senior adviser to Navistar’s electric truck division as the stimulus-funded manufacturer sought markets for its medium duty electric truck.
From 2007 through 2010, Mr. Torres served as Associate Director for the City University of New York's Center for Sustainable Energy. In this role, he promoted renewable energy and energy efficiency in urban communities, brought together policymakers, manufacturers, and end-users for regular conferences and policy discussions, and helped to secure city, state, and federal subsidies for regional fleets seeking to acquire clean transportation technology.
From 2002-2006, Torres served as a Staff Attorney for the Legal Aid Society of Rockland County. From 1998 - 2002, Torres served as special counsel to Congressman Jose E. Serrano. His portfolio included environmental law, energy policy, and legislative redress for environmentally-beleaguered communities. He also served as a trial attorney in the Civil Rights Division of the US Department of Justice from 1994 - 1997.
In 2011 Mr. Torres established a solo law practice based in Rockland County. In 20011 he was appointed Acting Village Justice in the Village of Haverstraw Justice Court and currently serves in this capacity. Mr. Torres also serves as Vice President of Empire Clean Cities, a non-profit coalition dedicated to promoting clean energy technology and fuels and reducing pollutant emissions. He was selected to the ECC executive board in 2010
Josh Keller,
Associate Consultant
Josh Keller is the former Executive Director of the Southwest Brooklyn Industrial Development Corporation, a local economic development agency serving the over 2,000 industrial businesses of Sunset Park, Red Hook and Gowanus. He worked at SBIDC for nearly a decade helping companies access complex tax incentive and financing programs. He was deeply involved in various relocation and retention projects aimed at increasing jobs and investment in the local economy. He also started a privately funded workforce development program which places hundreds of residents into industrial jobs each year.
In addition to his role at SBIDC, Josh currently works as a consultant to various industrial concerns and has also consulted several nonprofit organizations on fundraising strategy, financial management and strategic planning. Josh earned an MPA from NYU's Wagner School of public service and a BA, in economics, from Queens College. He is currently pursuing a second masters in economics at NYU's Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. His research work includes a study of the risk and return of Industrial Development Bonds.