Forest City Ratner Companies Announces New Chief Financial Officer Michael Lonsway

NEW YORK, Nov. 24, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Forest City Ratner Companies (FCRC), today announced that Michael E. Lonsway, a seasoned and dynamic financial executive, will join the company's executive management team as Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, effective today.

Lonsway joined Forest City in 2004 and has served in a variety of progressively more senior financial roles, most recently as Senior Vice President, Capital Markets with Forest City Enterprises, Inc., FCRC's parent company. In that role, Lonsway was responsible for investor, bondholder and rating agency relations, capital market transactions, and financial planning and forecasting.

"We are thrilled to have Mike join our leadership team," said FCRC Chairman and CEO Bruce Ratner. "He brings tremendous depth of experience in finance as well as proven leadership skill. He also has deep knowledge of our business model and our goals for future growth. Mike has a genuine ability to connect with people and to synthesize and communicate complex financial information with ease."

As incoming CFO of Forest City Ratner Companies, Lonsway will be responsible for building and maintaining relationships with investors, stockholders and equity partners, as well as directing FCRC's financial planning, forecasting, reporting and accounting. Areas under his direction will include budgeting, taxation, forecasting and compliance. With significant expertise in financial management and capital markets financing, Lonsway's immediate priority will be Forest City Ratner's largest project—the Atlantic Yards $4.9 billion residential complex in Brooklyn.  He will also assist in evaluating new growth opportunities.

"I'm inspired and energized by this outstanding opportunity," said Lonsway. "With each project—from architectural icons to popular, job-producing retail outlets, to the transformative sports and entertainment arena that is the Barclays Center—Forest City Ratner has proven time and time again that it is an innovative, 'game-changing' company. I'm thrilled to be joining Bruce Ratner and his experienced and creative executive team."

Prior to joining Forest City, Lonsway's career included serving as a divisional comptroller for the global sports management and marketing company, IMG Worldwide.  Before that, he was CFO for automotive supply distributor Wurth USA (a division of Germany's Wurth Group). He began his career with international paint and coatings maker, The Sherwin-Williams Company, where he served as a field auditor and international accounting manager.

Over the last four years, Forest City Ratner Companies has celebrated the successful openings of properties such as the Renzo Piano-designed New York Times headquarters in Midtown Manhattan; the Frank Gehry-designed luxury rental tower New York by Gehry at Eight Spruce Street in Lower Manhattan; Westchester's Ridge Hill, a thriving regional shopping center in Yonkers, New York; and the 18,000-seat Barclays Center in Brooklyn. The company's pioneering MetroTech Center complex in Downtown Brooklyn has been in the spotlight as a key hub for startup businesses in the emergent Brooklyn Tech Triangle, and on December 18^th, 2012, the company will break ground on B2 BKLYN, the first residential building planned for Brooklyn's Atlantic Yards.

Lonsway, a Miami University graduate and Certified Public Accountant, is married with two children. He serves as Vice President of the Board of Directors of the nonprofit job-training organization Towards Employment and also serves on the Board of St. Joseph Academy, a college preparatory high school providing education for young women of diverse backgrounds.

About Forest City Ratner Companies

FCRC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Forest City Enterprises, Inc., owns and operates 32 properties in the New York metropolitan area. Forest City Enterprises, Inc. is an NYSE-listed national real estate company with $10.7 billion in total assets. The Company is principally engaged in the ownership, development, management and acquisition of commercial and residential real estate and land throughout the United States. For more information, visit www.forestcity.net.

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SOURCE Forest City Ratner Companies