Tag: economic development

Dec 22

2014

Suppression of Buffalo Billion spending records

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Gov. Andrew Cuomo wants everyone to know he’s spending $1 billion to revitalize the Western New York economy. But the bureaucrats he’s charged with managing the Buffalo Billion are refusing to account for how they are spending $855 million earmarked for the program’s big-ticket projects. Three developers, all significant contributors to Cuomo’s gubernatorial campaign, have been selected to build and equip facilities that will house companies recruited to set up shop in Buffalo. But the state-affiliated non-profit corporation managing that work has refused to release contracts and other documents to Investigative Post that detail, among other things, how the contractors[...]

Posted 10 years ago

Dec 10

2014

Termini questions Outer Harbor housing

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Rocco Termini, one of the city’s preeminent residential developers, doubts there’s a significant market for housing at the Outer Harbor. “Everyone is talking about it but no one has produced a market study or any numbers,” Termini said Wednesday at a luncheon sponsored by Investigative Post on urban development. The Erie Canal Harbor Development Corp. has proposed building some 2,100 housing units, as well as retail, restaurants and some parkland, on a portion of the Outer Harbor’s northern 171 acres. That plan has proved controversial, with Rep. Brian Higgins and Assembly Member Sean Ryan, among others, contending it lacks public support.[...]

Posted 10 years ago

Nov 12

2014

Another round of tax breaks for Summit Mall

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Declaring “jobs are jobs,” Niagara County officials voted Wednesday to grant $700,000 in tax breaks to redevelop a shopping mall that’s failed to make good on two previous subsidies. The Niagara County Industrial Development Agency voted unanimously to approve property and sales tax breaks to Toronto developer Zoran Cocov to assist his $17.4 million plan to revitalize Summit Mall in Wheatfield. Cocov’s application promises “entertainment venues” – museums and theaters – as well as shops, restaurants, a regional wine tasting outlet, a farmers’ market and a small business incubator, as reported Tuesday by Investigative Post. They would be joined by[...]

Posted 10 years ago

Nov 11

2014

Subsidies proposed for shopping mall

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Should the Summit Mall in Wheatfield enjoy a third round of taxpayer subsidies? The Niagara County Industrial Development Agency will consider a proposal Wednesday from a Toronto developer that calls for about $700,000 in property and sales tax breaks. The subsidies would go towards a $17 million renovation of the mall, which now stands largely vacant. State law generally prohibits industrial development agencies from granting tax breaks to retail projects, but the developer is contending its proposed mix of tenants would attract visitors from outside the region. Previous mall developers received about $2 million in tax breaks. Jim Heaney and[...]

Posted 10 years ago

Oct 29

2014

Sabres score big subsidies at HarborCenter

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The Buffalo Sabres like to point out that HarborCenter, which opens later this week, is privately financed to the tune of $172.2 million. Left unsaid is that the complex is also publicly subsidized, enjoying an estimated $57 million in local and state tax breaks. That makes HarborCenter one of the most heavily subsidized downtown development projects in recent history. The project – which includes two ice rinks, a hotel, two restaurants, shops and a parking ramp – is projected to employ the equivalent of around 425 full-time workers. The $57 million in tax breaks works out to about $134,000 per[...]

Posted 11 years ago

Oct 9

2014

SolarCity’s shaky foundation

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Gov. Andrew Cuomo is investing $750 million of taxpayer funds and the hopes of a community desperate for an economic recovery in a company that is losing money, weathering two federal investigations and facing, by its own admission, an uncertain economic future. To hear Cuomo tell it, the construction of a solar panel manufacturing plant operated by SolarCity Corp. will be a “game changer,” a catalyst to reviving the Western New York economy. Indeed, the company is regarded as a leader in the burgeoning solar energy industry, has acquired promising technology to manufacture solar panels and has enjoyed soaring stock[...]

Posted 11 years ago

Oct 9

2014

Unfinished business for Buffalo’s Outer Harbor

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Buffalo, which has suffered over the years from a series of planning mistakes, is nearing a decision on how to develop its Outer Harbor even though the state agency managing the project hasn’t completed its homework on key legal, financial and environmental issues. These unresolved issues, particularly whether to build five-story condos, shops and restaurants near the environmentally sensitive Times Beach Nature Preserve, are at the core of a dispute that boiled over last week. Rep. Brian Higgins and Assembly Member Sean Ryan went public last Friday in their opposition to the Erie Canal Harbor Development Corporation’s development plan for[...]

Posted 11 years ago

Sep 23

2014

SolarCity deal is a rich subsidy package

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My first blush impressions of the SolarCity deal announced Tuesday by Gov. Andrew Cuomo: It’s a rich package. The state is committing $750 million – $350 million to build a manufacturing plant and $400 million in potentially forgivable loans to equip it – in exchange for creating 3,000 jobs, half of which would be employed by SolarCity, the other at firms in their supply chain. That works out to $250,000 to $500,000 per job, depending on how you do the math. By comparison, the subsidy package cobbled together to lure the Yahoo! data center in Lockport five years ago involved[...]

Posted 11 years ago
Investigative Post