STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- Rich Marin, co-founder of the New York Wheel, will no longer lead the organization, the Advance has learned.

According to multiple sources, Marin will take a lesser role in the organization, as other investors take control of the NY Wheel's destiny.

The timing of the leadership change was not immediately clear.

In addition, Marin suddenly resigned from the Staten Island Economic Development Corporation (SIEDC) board about a week ago, confirmed Cesar Claro, president and CEO of the SIEDC.

Marin didn't respond to an Advance call for comment.

While the reasoning behind the Wheel's new corporate structure is unclear, the project has faced challenges since May, when the main contractor, the Holland-based Mammoet-Starneth, walked off the job. The company was subsequently fired by the Wheel.

The project to build a 630-foot observation wheel on the St. George waterfront was further complicated after Mammoet-Starneth filed for for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in Delaware in December.

Soon after, Mammoet-Starneth asked for a lawsuit brought against it by the Wheel to be dismissed, according to court documents.

This high-stakes feud over project delays and work payments between the Wheel's developer and Mammoet-Starneth has been playing out in federal court for eight months.

Both sides allege the other party breached the contract.

Mammoet-Starneth had suspended work on May 26 and threatened to terminate the contract. The company alleged the NY Wheel failed to make required payments, the complaint said. The Wheel said it paid the company $70 million, according to court papers.

MARIN'S JOURNEY



Marin's journey to become the man behind the most iconic project planned for Staten Island since the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge is a long and complicated one. He grew up "all over the world," as he put it to the Advance in a 2014 interview. His mother was a United Nations diplomat, whose job took them to Latin America and then Rome, Italy, where Marin went to high school.

He moved to New York City after he graduated from Cornell University. Like many young people who land here, he said he thought he'd stay until he figured out where he really wanted to live -- but he never left.

Marin spent most of his career in investment banking. In June 2007, he was overseeing a collapsing hedge fund at Bear Stearns when the New York Times happened upon a blog he kept of movie reviews and other musings. After the publicity that came with a story about him reviewing movies while the firm struggled, Marin was out of a job at Bear Stearns, which would later fall victim to the widespread financial collapse.

By the end of 2008, Marin left investment banking, taking over a distressed real estate company called Africa Israel, resolving $3 billion worth of "distressed trophy properties that were, quite frankly, overpaid for and over-leveraged."

Two years later, he kept all 22 properties out of foreclosure, and as he was leaving the company in December 2010, he was approached by an investor he'd met along the way about the idea for a giant observation wheel.

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