Builder of Heinz Field, science center embraced ‘green’ construction
The contributions of Jack Mascaro to the Pittsburgh landscape — and its deeper social consciousness — will be felt for generations.
Mascaro Construction, the company he started with a second home mortgage and ran from a pingpong table in his Upper St. Clair basement, built Heinz Field, the Pennsylvania State Archives Building in Harrisburg, the Carnegie Science Center and countless other landmarks in the mid-Atlantic region.
Mr. Mascaro, also an award-winning employer and founder of the Mascaro Center for Sustainable Innovation at the University of Pittsburgh, died July 19 after a series of recent health setbacks. He was 75.
The son of an Italian immigrant who owned a small construction company, John C. “Jack” Mascaro grew up as the youngest of five children in Mt. Lebanon.
After graduating from South Catholic High School in 1962, he enrolled at Pitt, where he earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in civil engineering.
It was also where he met fellow Mt. Lebanon native Darlene DelBianco through mutual friends. The couple married in 1967.
After college, Mr. Mascaro started working as a civil engineer for a drafting engineering company but soon found himself seeking greener pastures.
“He decided this wasn’t his passion,” said his son Michael Mascaro, of Upper St. Clair. “He wanted to be an engineer, but he didn’t want to design. He wanted to build.”
From there, Mr. Mascaro went to work for Mellon-Stuart, where he rose through the construction ranks as an estimator and project manager to eventually become executive vice president in charge of the company’s heavy highway division.
By 1988, Mr. Mascaro decided the time was ripe to stake his own claim in the construction industry.
“He wanted to be his own boss,” his son said. “He wanted to do things his way and combine some of what he learned and saw.”
With an additional phone line and Mrs. Mascaro keeping the company books, Mr. Mascaro and his wife took out a second mortgage on their home and started Mascaro Construction with a pingpong table serving as a makeshift desk and drafting table.
“He wanted to do maybe $30 million a year with $1 million in overhead,” Michael Mascaro said of his father’s initial goals for the company. “Within 10 years he tripled that.”
The company, now based on the North Side, grew to become one of the largest general contracting, design builders and construction management companies in the region, with about $375 million worth of projects per year and 160 employees.
“His growth came through the people he brought on board,” his son said. “He grew by leveraging their talents. We were fortunate enough to hire some good people who have stayed with us.”
Mr. Mascaro’s interest in sustainable construction was sparked in 1993, when he worked on construction of the Heinz Family Foundation offices on Liberty Avenue in Downtown — one of the first so-called “green” projects in the city.
“He got to know Teresa Heinz and the concept of sustainability, and it was just something he believed in,” his son said. “When he had an idea or a passion, he tried everything to make it happen. The concept of sustainability was the right thing to do, and it changed the face of construction.”
“Teresa Heinz forged a close friendship with Jack in the 1990s after she hired him to create the Heinz Family Offices in Pittsburgh and to make the project as environmentally progressive as possible,” said Grant Oliphant, president of The Heinz Endowments. “Jack went on to become a leading and persuasive advocate for the green building movement and sustainable construction practices in our region.”
“Jack was on the forefront of green construction and sustainability. He was practicing green construction before it was even a thing, before it was a word that everybody said,” said Gena Kovalcik,
co-director for administration and external relations for the Mascaro Center, established in 2003 through the generosity of Mr. Mascaro, Ms. Heinz and others.
“He realized it was the future and he came to the [Swanson School of Engineering at Pitt] and encouraged them to teach it. Jack was always like that — he always saw ahead of everyone else and did something about it.”
For his work with the center, along with a bevy of other programs and initiatives established at his alma mater, Mr. Mascaro was recognized in 2013 by then-Chancellor Mark Nordenberg with the Chancellor’s Medallion. The medallion is the most prestigious honor given by the university and one that hadn’t been awarded in more than 30 years.
“Jack truly was a one-of-akind, wonderful person who always was thinking about how to make things better,” Mr. Nordenberg said. “Jack was a leader who helped us develop high-tech classrooms before they were common; he was a driving force behind the creation of the construction management program in our school of engineering; and his signature legacy at the school is the [Mascaro Center].
“Jack was a very generous person and that included, of course, funding, but with Jack you really got the complete package. He also invested his time, he shared his ideas, and his enthusiasm was contagious.”
Mr. Mascaro remained as chairman, but handed over daily control of his company in 2007 to his three sons:
Michael, who serves as executive vice president along with his brother Jeffrey, of Peters, and John C. Mascaro Jr., of Bethel Park, who serves as president and CEO.
Even after Jack Mascaro had mostly retired from the company that he founded, his commitment to doing the right thing in business continued to go beyond the theoretical. In recent years, he continued leading an ethics class for all new employees that focused on trust over greed as a means of achieving success in business. For that and other examples, the company was recognized with several awards, including the American Business Ethics Award in 2012 by the Foundation for Financial Service Professionals.
Routinely ranked among the Top Workplaces in Pittsburgh by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette — an annual list based solely on employee surveys — Mascaro Construction was singled out last year as the No. 1 employer among midsize companies.
He raised his children with the same philosophy, his son Michael said, and always made time for their after-school activities and sports, even coaching baseball and wrestling.
“My dad’s pride was his integrity,” Michael Mascaro said. “He would always do the right thing, even when no one was watching. And he always made more time for his family than his career — that’s truly amazing when you consider how busy he was.”
Along with his wife and sons, Mr. Mascaro is survived by his brothers Vince and Peter; his sister Polly Martin; and nine grandchildren. He was preceded in death by his sister Irma Riehl.
In lieu of flowers, the family suggests donations to St. Paul of the Cross, 148 Monastery St., Pittsburgh, PA 15203.