Categories for Outrages & Insights

May 23

2012

Making the case for more than a park

Published by

The Outer Harbor represents Buffalo’s opportunity to get something big right. And what an opportunity it presents. Lake Erie out front. Downtown out back. Just a few miles from a busy international crossing. Is there another city in the nation that has such a prime piece of undeveloped real estate? There’s a push on to redevelop 120 acres of the Outer Harbor into a park. What’s not to love about a park? Well, in this case, several things, if all that’s developed is a park. Consider: Our winters pretty much assure that a stand-alone waterfront park would go largely unused[...]

Posted 12 years ago

May 7

2012

Byron Brown’s bridge over troubled water

Published by

Momentum is building to do something with the Outer Harbor and just days after a group of  community activists called for developing its 120 acres into a park Mayor Byron Brown make a pitch for City Hall to play a role, perhaps a big one. The Outer Harbor is state land, controlled by the Niagara Frontier Transportation Authority. The NFTA wants to get out of the real estate business, which has begged the question, who would assume responsibility for developing the property? Some think the task should fall to the Erie Harbor Canal Development Corp., a subsidiary of Empire State[...]

Posted 12 years ago

May 2

2012

Notes on the news

Published by

My take on recent developments: There’s a movement afoot to redevelop the outer harbor into a park. Doing so would give Western New Yorkers a grand 120 acre playground in the summer – and a 120 acre wasteland in the winter, and a good part of the spring and fall, too. Should a good chunk of the 120 acres provide the public access to its waterfront? Absolutely. Can that be done while still accommodating development that could not only attract visitors year-round but add to the city’s tax base? Absolutely. Are the two objectives mutually exclusive? Absolutely not. Nearly everyone[...]

Posted 12 years ago

Apr 19

2012

IDA deals trigger backlash

Published by

The Erie County Industrial Development Agency has put a moratorium on granting tax breaks to hotels. The Lancaster IDA is having second thoughts about proposed tax breaks for a pizzeria. Labor unions are challenging the hiring practices at a Niagara Falls company that received property  in tax breaks in 2010. After years of “full steam ahead,” local IDAs are starting to have second thoughts about business as usual. That’s not to say they’ve necessarily changed their ways – questionable projects continue to get the green light more often than not – but there’s been an unmistakenable swing in momentum. “IDAs[...]

Posted 12 years ago

Apr 17

2012

Online journalism coming of age

Published by

The Pulitzer Prize is the measure by which excellence in journalism is measured. Until recently, newspapers won by default. There was no alternative (with apologies to the Emmy Awards). But in recent years, entrepreneurs have established online-only news publications. There are for profits, including Politico, Talking Points Memo and, of course, Huffington Post. There are even more non-profit investigative reporting centers, lead by ProPublica, the Center for Investigative Reporting and its affiliated California Watch, and regional centers including Voice of San Diego and MinnPost, headed by former Courier-Express editor Joel Kramer. These young pups are proving capable of going toe-to-toe[...]

Posted 12 years ago

Apr 15

2012

Taxing questions regarding the Bills

Published by

The key study isn’t done, and negotiations have yet to start in earnest, but it’s not too early to start posing questions about who should pay for what to keep the Bills in Buffalo. The teams’ lease on Ralph Wilson Stadium expires in July 2013 season and a story in The Buffalo News on Sunday reports that sources are saying the cost of renovating the facility will run north of $200 million. Given the cost of upgrading the home of the Green Bay Packers and Kansas City Chiefs ran $295 million and $400 million respectively, that seems like a safe,[...]

Posted 12 years ago

Apr 5

2012

Lessons for Buffalo from a boomtown

Published by

Buffalo is not Austin, Texas, and never will be. They bake. We freeze. They have Lance Armstrong. We had OJ. They don’t pay state income taxes. We do. Oh boy, do we. But I’ve come away from two visits to Austin since last summer thinking there are lessons to be learned. The Texas capital is booming. Austin proper added some 160,000 residents between 2001 and 2010, up 20 percent. Only one major metro area grew at a faster pace. The region also added jobs at a faster rate than any major metro area in the nation over the past eight[...]

Posted 12 years ago

Mar 27

2012

Hotel discounts that cost taxpayers

Published by

It seems local IDAs still haven’t come across a hotel subsidy deal they don’t like. The Amherst IDA in January approved $1.9 million in tax breaks for a hotel and retail shops on Main Street in Williamsville that Carl Paladino plans to develop on the former site of Stereo Advantage. On Monday, the Erie County Industrial Development Agency voted to grant $275,000 in tax breaks to  the Millennium Hotel adjacent to Walden Galleria in Cheektowaga. Benderson Development recently announced plans for a hotel in the former Donovan state office building it is redeveloping at Canalside. They’ll no doubt be asking[...]

Posted 12 years ago
Investigative Post

Get our newsletters delivered to your inbox * indicates required

Newsletters *