Mar 1
2021
Mark Scheer reported last week on the pandemic’s impact on downtown Buffalo. One-third of the workforce is working remotely, which has starved restaurants, bars and other retailers for business. Experts say downtowns, here and elsewhere, are likely to be less office-centric once the pandemic eases. Mark spoke Monday with Susan Rose and Brian Mazurowski on NewsRadio 930WBEN.
Feb 24
2021
Empty offices. Empty restaurants. Empty parking ramps. Empty downtown. “I’ve never seen downtown Buffalo so empty in all the years I’ve been here,” said Mike Schmand, executive director of Buffalo Place, who has worked for the organization since 1982. The numbers are bleak. Schmand estimates one-third of the downtown workforce is working remotely. Metro Rail trips have declined by 35 percent. Revenue at city parking facilities has dropped 39 percent over the final six months of 2020 and is expected to remain below pre-COVID levels through at least the first half of this year. Widespread vaccinations may offer a fresh[...]
Feb 12
2021
Mark Scheer reported this week that Samsung is unlikely to build a plant in Western New York and the proposed location is a remote industrial park in Genesee County that lacks basic infrastructure. Mark spoke Friday with Susan Rose on NewsRadio 930WBEN.
Feb 11
2021
Economic development officials in Genesee County have spent more than $26 million on a massive industrial park in an “if you build it, they will come” gambit. So far, no one has come. The Genesee County Center for Economic Development not only doesn’t have any business deals to show for its decade of work, the industrial park consists of little more than empty fields. There’s no infrastructure, aside from a six-tenths-of-a-mile road. No water service. No sewer lines. No electricity. No telecommunications. The agency has nevertheless managed to spend $26.8 million dollars, including some $13 million in Buffalo Billion funds.[...]
Feb 10
2021
Samsung has economic development officials — and Sen. Chuck Schumer — dreaming big. The semiconductor giant has plans to build a $17 billion plant that would employ 1,800 and says it is considering five locations in the United States, including an undeveloped industrial park in Genesee County. Schumer has spoken directly with Samsung officials and offered federal assistance to entice Samsung to Western New York. Economic officials in Buffalo and Rochester stand ready to make their case, if they haven’t already. It seems unlikely that Samsung is coming, however. In addition to Western New York, Samsung is weighing two sites[...]
Dec 17
2020
Nearly 19,000 businesses in Western New York received a federal loan to help them through the pandemic. Laythanette Shine’s firm wasn’t one of them. Shine’s business, USA Occupational Services on Jefferson Avenue, provides drug and DNA testing services and background checks for employers. There’s a memorial in the front window to the man who helped her set up the office, one the earliest victims of COVID-19 in Buffalo. Shine couldn’t access the Paycheck Protection Program because her business is a sole proprietorship with insufficient profitability. Those factors are common for new small businesses, but disqualified her from getting aid. She[...]
Dec 16
2020
Some 1,100 local nonprofits received federal aid to soften the pandemic’s economic blow, and the list of recipients reads like a who’s who of prominent cultural, medical, religious and educational institutions. The Chautauqua Institution and Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra. Mercy Flight and the Erie County Medical Center. The Diocese of Buffalo and The Chapel at Crosspoint. Nichols School and Nardin Academy. Even a sovereign state, the Seneca Nation of Indians, received a $1.5 million loan under the federal Paycheck Protection Program. Nonprofits with religious affiliations received the most number of loans, 406. That’s more than one-third of the 1,080 loans extended[...]
Dec 15
2020
A lot of businesses received forgivable loans from the federal government to help them through the pandemic. To be exact, 18,768 in the eight counties of Western New York. The loans were worth $2.2 billion, altogether. But a fraction of the companies — some 5 percent — received about half that sum. Two businesses got the maximum $10 million loan allowed under the Paycheck Protection Program: Ferguson Electric and the Buffalo Medical Group. New Era Cap, widely criticized by public officials earlier this year for taking PPP money then laying off 117 employees, received the third-largest loan, $8.4 million. Other[...]