Director of resilient design and regenerative strategies
+LAB Architect PLLC
Brooklyn, New York
Mr. Azaroff, FAIA founding principal of +LAB architect PLLC, is a leader in disaster mitigation, resilient planning and regenerative design strategies. Currently, he is working on the New York State Climate Impact Assessment, as well on the 2024 Hazard Mitigation Plan for NYC. He is working with ICC/ANRC piloting community resilience benchmarks, and the US State Department has engaged him to work with foreign governments exchanging resilient strategies, most recently in the Kyrgyz Republic. His studio is advancing community resilience hubs in Hawaii, and building resilient capacity in long-term care facilities in North Carolina. He is a COP-27 Delegate for the American Institute of Architects (AIA), and leading the COP-28 delegation in Dubai. Previously, he served as a Technical Advisor to the ASPR - Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response in Washington, developing the National Disaster Recovery Framework. Mr. Azaroff is a Professor at the NYC College of Technology (CUNY).
Mr. Azaroff is a contributor and editor of many publications including HUD Housing and Urban Development’s Designing for Natural Hazards Series Vol 1-5 (2023), NYC Department of City Planning’s Retrofitting Buildings for Flood Risk, and the Federal Alliance for Safe Homes (FLASH) Resilient Housing Guidelines. He worked with Enterprise Community Partners on Keep Safe Puerto Rico (2019) Ready to Respond: Strategies for Multi-Family Building Resilience (2015). In 2022, he contributed to Climate Adaptation and Resilience Across Scales: From Buildings to Cities, Routledge. Other written works include the AIA’s Reframing Resilience publication (2016) and the AIA Disaster Assistance Handbook in 2021.
He served as a subject matter expert with the Rockefeller Foundation’s 100 Resilient Cities, and founding Co-chair of the AIANY Design for Risk and Reconstruction (DfRR) committee (2011-21). The DfRR produces programs surrounding the wicked problems of pur time, generating the Post-Sandy Initiative: Designing a Resilient New York and Extreme Heat reports.
With NDPTC - National Disaster Preparedness Training Center, he taught Hurriplan: Building Resilient Coastal Communities, and is a certified trainer of SAP-Safety Assessment Program through CalEMA. Since 2013 he has trained more than 4,000 design professionals and community leaders. He is the founder of the AIA Unified Task Force City and State responding to the pandemic as well as the founder the AIA Regional Recovery Working Group, a four-state coalition that worked across sectors including HUD, DHS, Army Corps, MTA, NYSERDA, and government authorities. He is honored to be serving on the AIA National Board of Directors 2023-2025.
Disclosure information not submitted.
Wednesday, September 27, 2023
12:30pm – 1:30pm US EDT