Sandra Garz, BA '72

Connecting pieces of the puzzle

If Sandra Garz (BA, ’72) believes she has spent her professional life connecting the parts of a great puzzle, her time at UB surely shaped her understanding how all sectors of a community merge to create its vibrant identity.  Today executive vice president of Philadelphia’s Gershman Y, she has pieced together a career from time spent in disparate sectors with some common worldviews.

As part of UB’s first class of environmental design majors, Garz took advantage of a “confluence of an exciting time and dynamic personalities.”  The program’s merging of various disciplines—architecture, urban planning and more—helped students like Garz think broadly about their chosen field.  UB, she says, “taught me how to view the world, to understand the process of solving problems.  The experience was “invaluable,” she insists, “because it helped me become adept at operating in the 21st century.”

Garz worked for a Buffalo architect for a year before she and her future husband, also a UB graduate, moved to Philadelphia to get master’s degrees, Garz’s in city planning, at the University of Pennsylvania.  The first piece of her professional jigsaw came at the Philadelphia City Planning Commission. During 12 years there she became expert in housing, neighborhood development and historic preservation.

Coming into her own

Because she wanted to avoid being “pigeonholed as a public servant," Garz’s next move was into the private sector with a real-estate development company--until the real-estate market went sour.  Then, Garz had an opportunity for non-profit experience.  She served for three years as director of civic affairs for the not-for-profit Foundation for Architecture, whose mission was promoting good design and appreciation for quality civic environments.  She next spent a couple of years as manager of economic development research for PECo Energy, trying to help existing businesses grow and to attract new business to the region.

Garz feels she came into her own, career-wise, when she became executive director of Philadelphia’s chapter of the American Institute of Architects, the nation’s second oldest AIA chapter.  While promoting architects and what they provide to the community, she helped to support and empower a recent spin off complementary organization, the volunteer, Community Design Collaborative, which provides pro bono assistance to groups unable to pay professionals.  She also points with pride to Philadelphia’s hosting of AIA’s national convention in 2000, the largest ever to that date with 19,000 attendees as well as restoring the AIA Bookstore and Design Center to health, when threatened with closure. 

Arguably Garz’s most meaningful work during her tenure with AIA was the "legacy project” she initiated with several AIA members—the Charter High School for Architecture and Design, the only such school in the country.  After submitting a business plan to the Philadelphia city school district in 1998, the group ultimately had just nine months to prepare the school for its first classes in September 1999.  “We couldn’t fail because we were committed to it,” Garz recalls.  “We had a very rocky road initially.”  Today, just a block away from Independence Hall, the thriving school enrolls 500 inner-city students and boasts a 95 percent attendance rate.  “Also, 85 percent of our kids go on to college in some form,” Garz says. “That’s impressive because lots of them need remediation when they enter and come from the inner city where statistics like this are unheard of.”

Finding her niche 

Garz continued in her “journey to figure out what my real niche in the world is,” joining a civil engineering firm as vice president and director of strategic operations.  One of the firm’s goals was to diversify into working with architects on mechanical and electrical engineering projects.  Among other business development efforts, Garz helped her firm acquire another firm to do just that.   

At that point, Garz had been working for 30 years and raised two children.  The time was right, she thought, “to take some time off.”   Yet she wondered where she would go next, thoughts percolating of a move back to the public sector.

Serendipitously, Philadelphia’s Gershman Y (part of the Jewish Community Centers of Greater Philadelphia) reached out to Garz.  The organization, which had hit difficult times, sold their building and eliminated services, wanted someone outside its typical circle to help revitalize it.  Though the Y currently is an arts and cultural venue, Garz is working on restoring its full menu of services. 

“We’d like to be something closer to the 92nd Street Y in New York City,” she explains, “maintaining a presence as a community center for Jewish life while reaching out to a more diverse audience. The explosion of empty nesters and the growth of young singles and families calling Center City Philadelphia home have created a vacuum for services and programming. So a new, vibrant state-of-the art building with expanded services and constant programming has become my goal.”  Garz’s expertise in city planning, design, and economic development will surely help guide the fate of this changing institution.  Her new mantra is, “Make no small plans.”

Garz reflects that her career has been all about connection, solving problems, developing relationships, understanding all community sectors.  “I wanted and got a taste of everything, so now I understand how it all works, whether it’s real estate, retail, fundraising or revitalizing communities.  I see how the pieces of the puzzle fit.”

Written by Grace Lazzara
November 2007

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