NIAGARA FALLS
Casino funds will advance HUD project
NIAGARA FALLS — The city will use an additional $2 million of its casino revenue to help pay for the cost of removing ash dumped years ago on land that later became a city park and is now slated for a low-income housing development.
The City Council will vote Wednesday to appropriate the money from slot machine revenue received this year and next to the Niagara Falls Housing Authority to be used to haul away ash believed to be from a municipal incinerator that operated in the North End in the 1930s.
The money will supplement $3 million of city casino revenue already committed to the housing project.
A letter dated May 2006 shows former Mayor Vince Anello already agreed to give the project another $2 million, despite having never asked the City Council to formally approve the funding promise.
City attorneys and Anello maintain that the letter was never legally binding, but the document was included in an application submitted to the U. S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to show that the funding had already been committed to the project.
Anello said the letter was necessary to complete a financing package that would qualify the project for a $20 million HUD grant through its HOPE VI program.
“Without that letter, there wouldn’t have been any funding,” Anello said Wednesday.
Anello and Council members previously referred publicly to the city’s contribution as $3 million, plus the transfer of city-owned land. Three City Council members said they don’t remember being told in 2006 that Anello had made a written promise for another $2 million — potentially to come from the city’s federal community development funds.
But Anello said there “was always an understanding” that the city might have to contribute more and that Council members were aware of that possibility.
Council Chairman Sam Fruscione said Council members are supportive of providing money now to haul away the ash.
“The mess is ours. We’ve got to clean it up,” Fruscione said. “We’re deep into this project. We’ve just got to keep on moving this forward and make sure it gets done.”
The Housing Authority plans to build 282 new housing units in the North End and in LaSalle to replace its Center Court housing complex. The project, described by HUD as estimated to cost $72 million, won a $20 million federal HOPE VI grant in 2006.
Construction on the first phase of the project has been stalled since August because of discussions over how to properly deal with a layer of ash found in a former city park where new homes are slated to be built.
Linda Goodman, executive director of Norstar Development USA, said the proposed city commitment to pay for the disposal of the ash would allow construction to begin again.
In a memorandum to the Council, Mayor Paul A. Dyster said the city’s total $5 million would fulfill all previous city promises to the project.
Councilman Charles A. Walker said several Council members are supportive of providing the additional funds so that construction can begin again.
“To go backwards now wouldn’t be a benefit to anybody,” Walker said.
