SCHNEIDER, IRVING

SCHNEIDER, IRVING (1917– ), U.S. real estate owner, philanthropist. Schneider graduated from the City College of New York in 1939 and spent all his professional career in real estate. For 50 years, Schneider was with Helmsley-Spear, rising to executive vice president and longtime partner of Harry Helmsley, the real estate magnate, in New York City. When Helmsley died in 1997, Schneider and Alvin Schwartz, who was married to Dorothy Spear, became co-chairman of the firm, which had its heyday in the 1960s and 1970s. But in the early years of the 21st century, the firm still managed 86 buildings, including the Empire State Building. Schneider, with Schwartz and Helmsley, owned a great deal of property in Manhattan's garment district and numerous office buildings. In May 1996 Helmsley-Spear was managing about 28 million square feet in 107 buildings in New York. After her husband's death, Leona Helmsley, who succeeded him, agreed to sell Helmsley-Spear to Schneider and Schwartz, ending a lawsuit they had brought against her, charging that she had tried to strip the company of assets, lowering its potential value to them. Helmsley-Spear's interests included stakes in the Helmsley Park Lane Hotel, the St. Moritz, the Starrett-Lehigh Building, and the Lincoln Building. Schneider and his wife were noted for their philanthropic support of two medical facilities for children, the Schneider Children's Medical Center of Israel in Petaḥ Tikvah, the most advanced pediatric hospital in the Middle East, and the Schneider Children's Hospital in New Hyde Park, N.Y. Schneider was vice chairman of the Association for a Better New York, vice president of the Realty Foundation of New York, an honorary trustee of the City College Fund, a life trustee of the UJA-Federation of New York, a member of the United Hospital Fund's President's Council and a board member of Tel Aviv University. He was a member of the board of governors of the Jewish Agency, a trustee of the Health Insurance Plan and vice chairman of National UJA. In 2004 Schneider gave $15 million to Brandeis University for its Heller School for Social Policy and Management to provide space for the Schneider Institute for Health Policy to expand its education and research agenda. (Stewart Kampel (2nd ed.)