Rochester Development News 4 [Archive] - Page 3

RochesterAddict

June 8th, 2006, 04:51 PM

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Inside the new Strong

Butterflies and books abound in the National Museum of Play
City Newspaper

The Dancing Wings Butterfly Garden is housed in an adjoining butterfly-shaped structure filled with tropical plants, a waterfall and approximately 800 live butterflies
Gary Ventura

On Friday, July 14, the StrongMuseum will reopen its doors after a seven-week hiatus. Much has changed since late May, including the name: the institution is now officially known as Strong --- National Museum of Play to better describe its new focus on the study of play and its role in human development.

Your kids won't notice that.

They'll be far too busy freaking out over what's inside. The old favorites are still there, from "Sesame Street" to the miniature Wegmans store to the branch of the Monroe County Public Library. But the $37 million expansion project has ballooned the museum to 282,000 square feet --- nearly double its previous size --- and the space is packed full of creative, hands-on activities that will keep kids busy for hours, if not days, to come.

Here are some highlights, based on our recent sneak peek of the in-construction exhibits.

Driving down Chestnut Street, you can't help but see the most noticeable element of the Strong expansion: a huge portal known as "The Caterpillar." Once you step inside, you understand the name. This is a three-story, 200-foot-long curved tube that serves as an atrium connecting the established museum to the expansion. If you climb to the top you'll find the relocated National Toy Hall of Fame, which can now spread out instead of being shoehorned in next to the Time Lab in the upper level of the museum.

At the foot of The Caterpillar, however, is something entirely new: Reading Adventureland. The 12,000-square-foot exhibit takes visitors through five exceedingly hands-on "literary landscapes" that bring to life children's storybook staples.

Enter through the archway and step on to the Yellow Brick Road. The first exit to your right is MysteryMansion, a spooky house that tests the skills of aspiring Hardy Boys or Nancy Drews. Are those eyes in the painting on the wall moving? Where are those strange, ghoulish moans coming from? Is something flashing in the fireplace?

Children will have to follow the clues and crack the case... or find the secret passageway, and make a little trouble themselves. (For every Sherlock Holmes, there's got to be a Dr. Moriarty.)

Next door to MysteryMansion is the perplexing Upside-Down Nonsense House. Painted in bright, trippy colors in random patterns, the nonconformist house would make Dr. Seuss proud. Rhymes and limericks are the language spoken here, and if you need help expanding your vocabulary, give the Tongue Twister Machine a spin. Also check out the kitchen for a joke-telling chicken, the hall for mirrors that change your shape, and other screwball ideas.

Off the coast of the Nonsense House, the dragon-fronted S.S. Courageous has crashed on AdventureIsland. Would-be swashbucklers have a chance to steer a pirate ship through some choppy waters, explore a hidden cove for buried treasure, charge over a suspension bridge, or play with makeshift tools and toys on a deserted island.

Harry Potter fans will want to wander through the Wizard Workshop. Be on the lookout for magic hats, cauldrons, and mystical creatures like unicorns and dragons. Next door is Fairy Tale Forest, with a gingerbread house and interactive displays that show how fairy tales have evolved over the years, from terrifying cautionary tales to sweet bedtime stories. The meek can take a peek inside the Jack 'n' Jill's well or sit in Cinderella's pumpkin coach, while the brave can climb Jack's beanstalk and encounter a massive animatronic giant or play a laser-stringed singing harp.

The next destination is the DancingWingsButterflyGarden. The natural offshoot of The Caterpillar, the garden is housed in an attached, butterfly-shaped building filled with tropical plants, a waterfall, and a minimum of 800 tropical and native butterflies that flap through the air, and even alight on visitors. The butterflies are shipped in while still in chrysalis, and then they emerge on-premises. In the waiting room, educational exhibits will explain the butterfly's life cycle.

The final major component of the expansion is Field of Play, housed in an adjoining building that looks as if it's constructed out of a pile of building blocks. Inside, kids will find a rock wall for climbing, an "undersea jellyfish garden" for exploring, a crooked house for balancing in, a walk-through kaleidoscope for making patterns, and mock race cars for driving. The activities demonstrate how important play time is to learning how to function as a human being.

The new exhibits are only the most visual part of the Strong expansion. Strong is also starting its own preschool this fall (as of late last week, only four of the 56 slots remain open). And there are plans to launch a scholarly magazine called the American Journal of Play next year. It's all part of CEO G. Rollie Adams' vision for the museum, which first opened in 1982 to display the prodigious collections of Margaret Woodbury Strong. Margaret Strong's eclectic collections included dolls and dollhouses, stamps, buttons, and furniture, and when the museum first opened it focused on Victorian styles and culture. Adams came aboard in September 1987, and 10 years later he shifted Strong's focus specifically to children. With its new expansion, Strong will be the second-largest children's museum in the country, right behind the Children's Museum of Indianapolis.

The expansion, and the rebranding as the National Museum of Play, is "an outgrowth of the response to our previous expansion [in 1997] and a consequence of market research that indicated a demand for expanded facilities and programs," Adams says. He cites attendance figures that swelled from 142,500 in 1995 to 345,000 in 2005, and says that the goal for the current expansion is to net 650,000 visitors after a full year.

Ed Hall, CEO of the Greater Rochester Visitor's Association, thinks those numbers are totally doable. "If anything, I think they may be a little on the conservative side," he says. "There's an excitement, a repositioning of the museum as a national institution." Hall is specifically looking to the ButterflyGarden as a big draw; he previously worked Houston, which had two nearby butterfly gardens that did a huge business across a variety of demographics.

More than 600,000 visitors sounds like a tall order. After all, MonroeCounty has a population of just more than 733,000, according to 2005 Census Bureau estimates. Adams says that the museum is doing some national marketing, specifically courting travel writers and regularly scoring buzz for the annual Toy Hall of Fame inductions each fall. But most of the focus will remain in the upstate New York area, with the hopes of pulling visitors from Syracuse, Buffalo, and the Southern Tier, and a subsequent push for billboards, TV, and radio commercials is planned for those areas this summer.

In the meantime, Rochester children can get the first crack at what's behind that big Caterpillar eye at the revamped Strong --- National Museum of Play July 14-16 with the grand reopening weekend, during which the museum will be open 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. daily. As of July 17, the museum's summer hours will be Mondays through Thursdays, 10 a.m.-6 p.m.; Fridays 10 a.m.-8 p.m.; Saturdays 10 a.m.-6 p.m.; and Sundays noon-6 p.m. Admission will cost $9 for adults, $8 for students/seniors, $7 children 6-12, and free for kids 2 and younger; the Butterfly Garden requires an additional $3 ticket. Two-day passes are also available for $11-$14.50. For more information check out www.strongmuseum.org or call 263-2700.

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WORTH SAVING?
City Newspaper

What will become of a late-19th-century Queen Anne-style house near the Little Theatre is unclear. Neighboring 2 Vine Restaurant owners bought the house a few months ago to get rid of problem tenants there. "The building itself was basically a slum," says 2 Vine co-owner Jerry Serafine. "There were so many complaints, so many fines levied against the building."

Serafine says he initially researched converting the building into an apartment or office space, but decided that those projects would be too expensive. "To be honest with you, economically, demolishing the building is really the only way to go," says Serafine, who estimates that it would cost between $250,000 to $300,000 to gut and renovate the house. It was so badly neglected, says Serafine, that there was a sign in one of the kitchenettes that read: "This is a sink, not a toilet." Ideally, Serafine would like to tear down the house and create a green space for special 2 Vine events.

But city officials are reluctant to let 2 Vine's owners demolish the house without exploring all possibilities. "We need to pause before we lose a building of importance," says the city's zoning director, Art Ientilucci.

The owners, who met with Ientilucci Friday morning, agreed to halt talk of demolition --- at least for the time being. "To make a compromise, we're offering this building up for sale," Serafine said on Monday. The sale, though, comes with a few stipulations: the building can't be converted into a restaurant, café, or rooming house.

Serafine says the building will be on the market for 30 to 60 days, and if it's bought, developers will have one year after the sale to convert it. Interested parties can also buy the house and move it within the area of the city bounded by the Inner Loop.

Another example of Rochester halting progress. If the house is unsalvageable, just let it go, a new party deck for 2Vine would be great. Hopefully someone will buy the house and rehab it , but if not just let it be torn down. 2Vine is a wildly popular trendy restaurant in a rehabbed ambulance garage (you would never guess.) Plus for the impending brownstones and apts they are building on Charlotte St, a pocket park for events catered by 2Vine would be nice. http://www.2vine.com/

Parma residents fight huge soccer complex

Proposal sparks anger toward Greece
Democrat and Chronicle

When John Meagher moved from Greece to Parma 15 years ago, he was looking for quiet and less traffic. Now planning is under way to develop 121 acres on Parma Center Road near his home.

But this is no Wal-Mart or sprawling office park that worries Meagher, a 47-year-old Kodak employee.

He's worried about a youth soccer complex.

As soccer becomes more popular and the demand for fields increases, undeveloped green space is turning into meticulously groomed playing fields. That's what the Greece Cobras youth soccer club wants to do — build the largest soccer complex in Monroe County near Meagher's home.

The complex would attract thousands of people whose children would play on as many as 25 fields and park in a lot with room for perhaps 1,700 cars.

Adding to the controversy: Most of those players wouldn't be children from Parma.

"The roads aren't built to handle that kind of traffic," Meagher said, estimating 3,000 people per game day.

"It's not that we're opposed to soccer or the Greece Cobras organization. We are against the location. ... There are plenty of other places along Ridge Road, or wherever."

Plans for the 25 fields and 1,700-space parking lot were discussed during an informational meeting in April. Subsequent discussion has scaled down the project to about 20 fields and 700 parking spaces, said Gary Pasono, president of the Greece Cobras.

No formal plans have been submitted to the Parma Town Board. Developer Bernard Iacovangelo, who is overseeing the project and said he is a board member of the Cobras, said he would submit the plans within two months.

Greece vs. Parma

A struggle has emerged between rural Parma, with roughly 15,000 people, and mighty Greece, the most populous town in Monroe County with more than 94,000 residents, said Parma Supervisor Rick Lemcke. "They're pitting town against town, soccer group against soccer group, and even kids against kids," Lemcke said of the opposition group, Concerned Citizens of Hilton-Parma. "I don't want it to turn into that. Kids are kids. I don't care if they're from Parma or from Greece."

Residents opposed to the project have put up signs in their yards and started a Web site, www.noparmasoccercomplex.com.

John Brazas of Parma, one of the leaders of Concerned Citizens of Hilton-Parma, said members of 35 to 50 Parma families have met regularly to discuss the situation. He worries about traffic problems that the complex would bring, as well as potential damage to the hometown team, the Hilton Heat.

"What will happen is some people will want to jump to the (Greece) league, and our league will be weakened," Brazas said.

The project

If the Town Board approves the project, the complex likely would be constructed in phases and be completed by 2008, officials said.

The Hilton Heat, which plays in Parma Town Park, has 19 teams and about 300 players, said club spokesman Scott Wolcott.

The Greece Cobras — with about 450 youths on 26 teams — have "home fields" at Total Sports Experience on Elmgrove Road in Gates and at the Grace & Truth Sportspark in Greece. Total Sports has nine outdoor fields, one large indoor field and two smaller indoor fields. Grace & Truth has four soccer fields.

The impetus for the Parma complex is not just the need for a centralized playing area, Pasono said, but that the land was available to the Cobras essentially for free.

Developer Anthony Comparato sold two parcels, at 134 and 140 Parma Center Road, to the Cobras on Dec. 27 for $1, said Parma assessor Don Wells. Comparato had owned the tracts — assessed together for $168,100 — since 1968, Wells said. Comparato did not want to comment.

"If this land was not donated, we wouldn't be doing this," Pasono said. "That was the driving vision behind this. It's somewhat unsettling when people say, 'Why do people from Greece want to come and do this in Parma?' It's simple: Because (he) gave us the land in Parma ... and nobody is going to turn that down."

Lemcke and others noted that most soccer clubs include participants from various towns. Estimates of the number of Parma youths who play for the Cobras have ranged from 15 percent to 33 percent.

"We don't look at this as 'town' stuff," he said. "Kids could be neighbors, and one kid is chastised because he plays for the Greece team. They feel Greece is treading on them."

Ann Kress of Bennington Drive in Greece, whose son, Joey, plays for the Cobras, said that shouldn't be the feeling.

"We have kids from other towns who play on the team," she said one night at Canal Ponds Park, where the Cobras were practicing. "I'm for it, and not just because it's not in my back yard. The Cobras need a place of their own."

Eduardo Passanesi of Victor is one of those out-of-town players. The 14-year-old boy's father, Hamilton Passanesi, said a soccer complex would not be disruptive.

"Soccer is not going to cause a lot of commotion," he said. "The complex (would be) for kids, for families, and not just for Greece."

Other projects

This is not the first time such a massive soccer complex has been proposed. A 24-field, 125-acre site was considered for Chili in 2001. A 22-field, 88-acre complex was proposed for Greece's Canal Park a year later. Plans for both sites were scrapped because of neighbor opposition.

Iacovangelo, who was involved in both failed projects, also is in the middle of the Parma plans. The difference, he said, is that the Chili and Greece sites were to have been run by Monroe County, while the Parma complex would be run by the Greece Cobras.

"They're attempting to equate this with the soccer facility proposed years ago for tournaments, and this has nothing to do with that," said Iacovangelo, president of Faber Homes. "This is for a soccer club, for (the Greece Cobras) and for any organizations that may join with the Cobras in the future."

Pasono said the project would involve no local taxpayer money, although he said appeals likely would be made to state officials and the U.S. Soccer Federation.

Iacovangelo said a formal plan would be submitted after Cobras officials crunch numbers to determine, for example, how many fields would be needed. But he vowed to follow through.

So did Brazas.

"If they take it to the (Parma) Town Board, it will come down to whether they listen to their citizens," Brazas said.

"The truth has to come out. We can't stop the process. But we'll go to war, essentially."

Cool pictometry shot:
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http://democratandchronicle.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060608/NEWS01/606080356

blangjr21

June 8th, 2006, 05:55 PM

2vine is a high quality resteraunt, and I've never noticed that house across the way, interesting to note that the resteraunt is a former ambulance garage! lol.

Also this nonsense about soccer complexes, how many freakin fields do these kids need, listen I'm all for recreation, but at what expense, this is a huge undertaking, and they may be getting too big for their britches with this one.

ROCguy

June 8th, 2006, 07:27 PM

I read somewhere that Rochester has the highest per-capita amount of youth soccer players than any metro in the country. Wouldn't surprise me at all if it lived up to that stat.

Greece vs. Parma

A struggle has emerged between rural Parma, with roughly 15,000 people, and mighty Greece, the most populous town in Monroe County with more than 94,000 residents, said Parma Supervisor Rick Lemcke. "They're pitting town against town, soccer group against soccer group, and even kids against kids," Lemcke said of the opposition group, Concerned Citizens of Hilton-Parma. "I don't want it to turn into that. Kids are kids. I don't care if they're from Parma or from Greece."

lol.... "mighty Greece". Don't mess with the Greeks!!!

blangjr21

June 8th, 2006, 07:31 PM

Flower City Printing opens plant, adds 30 jobs

Nishad Majmudar
Staff writer

(June 8, 2006) — Monroe County Executive Maggie Brooks inaugurated Flower City Printing's new Rochester plant this morning.

Flower City, a large format printing company that currently employs 220, has expanded into a $2.3 million, 150,000-square-foot facility at 1001 Lee Road.

In exchange for tax incentives and a $100,000 loan from the county's economic development department, Flower City added 30 jobs through the expansion. The company's new building is located in a state Empire Zone, giving it access to additional tax savings.

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Just a little news, but some food for thought, does everyone here realize how huge 100,000 sq. feet is, thats an unbelievable size for such a "small" operation. Maybe I'm crazy, but that just seems so huge to me.

blangjr21

June 8th, 2006, 07:34 PM

• Rewolf Properties, LLC (Lease/leaseback, sales and mortgage recording tax only)
1725 Mount Read Blvd. Rochester, NY 14616
Project Address: 1001 Lee Road Rochester, NY 14606
Rewolf Properties, LLC will be purchasing a 150,000 square foot facility located at 1001 Lee Road, the former Ben Mer facility. Rewolf will be leasing the facility to Flower City Printing. Flower City Printing is a packaging printer company that does display and label work for major retail chains. Flower City Printing has multiple locations in Monroe County and most of the work produced by the company is shipped outside New York State. The cost of the building is $2,325,000. Upgrades to the property include renovation, site work, and furniture and equipment purchases in the amount of $400,000. In addition, Flower City Printing will be purchasing $300,000 in manufacturing equipment. Flower City Printing currently employs 190 full-time. With the acquisition and upgrade of the Lee Road facility, they will create 30 new full-time jobs.

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Here is another little snipit about it, interesting amounts of money changing hands.

blangjr21

June 8th, 2006, 07:37 PM

The following projects were approved by COMIDA:

Harding Enterprises, LLC (Lease/leaseback)
100 Centre Drive
Rochester, NY 14623

Project Address: 125 Northern Drive
Rochester, NY 14623

Bob Harding has owned and operated commercial trucking, towing and transportation related companies since 1975. To accommodate growth in his existing businesses, as well as a new parts and service company, Harding will be constructing a new 7,800 square foot facility in the Town of Brighton. The companies currently employ 18 full-time within Monroe County and will be creating 12 new jobs over the next five years. The company seeks approval of JobsPlus based on the local labor and suppliers rule.

DePaul Properties, Inc. (Civic Facility Bond)
1931 Buffalo Road
Rochester, NY 14624

Project Address: 1931 Buffalo Road
144-168 Mt. Hope Avenue

DePaul Properties proposes to refinance its 1994 COMIDA Civic Facility Bond ($4,715,000) originally issued to finance property at 1931 Buffalo Road. New Civic Facility Bond financing ($6,285,000) will be used to renovate 144-168 Mt. Hope Avenue and demolish 108-130 Mt. Hope Avenue.
The facilities at 144-168 Mt. Hope Avenue will house DePaul agencies, to assist individuals with developmental disabilities, alcohol, gambling and drug addictions, and provide a recreation center to those individuals. The $11 million project will impact an existing employee base of 199 full-time employees and result in the creation of 20 full-time jobs within five years of project completion.

ACM Medical Laboratory, Inc. (Lease/leaseback)
160 Elmgrove Park
Rochester, NY 14624

Project Address: 160 Elmgrove Park
Rochester, NY 14624

ACM Medical Laboratory, Inc. is a full service medical laboratory located in Gates. ACM currently operates out of a 52,000 square foot facility on 3.3 acres. ACM will be adding 15,500 square feet to the building to accommodate its expanding clinical trials laboratory services. The total project cost is $1.8 million. ACM employs 291 full-time and 56 part-time. ACM will be creating 30 new full-time jobs and 36 part-time over the next five years. The company seeks approval of JobsPlus based on the local labor and suppliers rule.

Rochester Riverfront Properties (Lease/leaseback – sales tax and mortgage tax only)
12 South 6th Street, Suite 715
Minneapolis, MN 55402

Property Address: 1000 Genesee Street
Rochester, NY 14611

Rochester Riverfront Properties will be constructing an 80 unit Holiday Staybridge Hotel in Brooks Landing at the intersection of Brooks Avenue and Genesee Street. The hotel is part of a major revitalization project for the Brooks Landing area which includes the hotel, a new restaurant, office, and retail buildings. The 50,000 square foot four-story hotel will be located on 3.5 acres and will include an indoor pool, guest suites, conference rooms, and sport court. Staybridge Suites are part of the Intercontinental Hotel Group which owns Holiday Inn. The hotel is located in an Empire Zone in the City of Rochester. The total project cost is $9.9 million. Sales and mortgage tax exemption are being requested for the project as the project qualifies for the City of Rochester’s 485-E property tax abatement. The hotel expects to create 26 full-time jobs over the next five years. The project qualifies as a tourist destination.

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This would be the May approvals, not seeing anything all that shocking here. Interesting that Brooks Landing was finally approved, we'll see what happens with that project. Although it is a nice walk across the pedestrian bridge to the UofR from there. Hopefully it works out for everyone. It's no secret that the UofR (specifically the president) would like to see that neighborhood turn around, and become a "college town" for the UofR.

ROCguy

June 8th, 2006, 08:26 PM

WHAT'S UP WITH THE 5 YEARS THING!?!?!?! Why is it taking every single company expanding or moving to Rochester 5 years to add all of their jobs? Just hire the people now for craps sake.

RochesterAddict

June 8th, 2006, 08:31 PM

I just went for a run yesterday on the Genesee River Trail and crossed the pedestrian bridge you were speaking about. What a beautiful view I had from the top of the bridge. The trail was a nice respite in the middle of the city. The area has positive points where thay are placing the hotel. There are newer homes right next to where the Hotel will be, and they have already rehabbed the road around there with fancy streetlights and new curbs and sidewalks. I would like to see what restaurant will locate there. I also ran along the new Corn Hill Landing project, what an amazing place on the outside, with a breathtaking view of the skyline. The new bridge over the river will only enhance that. At Corn Hill Landing, the liquor store, dry cleaner, and "Tone" gym have already opened. It looks like the Ice Cream store, Rich Port Bakery and the Thai restaurant will be opening soon as well.

veryprotourism

June 9th, 2006, 05:09 AM

those strong museum pics are sweet.

ROCguy

June 9th, 2006, 05:28 AM

I know, it looks awsome. I went to the Strong Museum once when I was like 5, I don't rmember much except for you could basically play or interact with virtually everything you saw. Things on the walls, things on the floor. It was just rated the top childrens museum in the country.

blangjr21

June 9th, 2006, 06:42 AM

It is now the Strong National Kids Museum or something like that, it's being rebranded to bring in more out-of-staters! It is quite impressive when entering downtown on South Avenue from 490 Westbound. Everyone should check it out.

blangjr21

June 9th, 2006, 05:46 PM

Mayor: $16 million in aid for city's vacant property

Brian Sharp
Staff writer

(June 9, 2006) — Mayor Robert Duffy today announced $16 million in public-private funding for ongoing support of a program that buys, renovates and sells city vacant properties to first-time homebuyers.

The money will support the Rochester Development Housing Fund Corp. over the next three years. The group, begun in 2001, has sold 235 houses to date with another 85 in the pipeline. Jean Lowe, president of the corporation, said the new pool of money should provide for another 200 houses.

Much of the group's work has been in the 19th Ward, 14621, south of Maplewood and in Swillburg.

"It's clustered, so we feel we have an impact," Lowe said, explaining RDHFC must work within parameters set by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. However, she said, the goal is to branch out and get involved in a number of tax foreclosed properties. "This funding will allow us to do that."

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An interesting article. Private and Public dollars now going towards repairing abandoned and vacant properties to sell them to pre-qualified buyers. Sounds good to me.

RochesterAddict

June 9th, 2006, 05:57 PM

Yesterday's pic on picturerochester:

http://my-expressions.com/up_media/4051/pblog/5159/1149809395.jpg

This is the central business district, the buildings inside what we call the "Inner Loop." Chase tower is on the left (to be rehabbed), Clinton Square, then Bausch and Lomb, Xerox tower (just finished rehab), and then HSBC tower. The public library is on the left and Blue Cross and Blue Shield (Healthcare) is on the right in the foreground.

$16M to Renovate Vacant Homes
13 WHAM

On Friday, Rochester Mayor Bob Duffy will announce the closing of a $16 million deal for the purchase, renovation, and sale of vacant homes in the city.

The money will be used over the next three years.

Once the homes are refurbished, they'll be sold through the first-time home buyers association.

http://www.rochesterjazz.com/
The International Jazzfest opens tonight, this is not building development, but is economic developement. Imagine how much money this brings to Rochester...the website says that ALL of the club passes are already sold out. Wow, thats impressive, the only tickets left for shows are the first come, first serve.

Performing arts center in Canandaigua to open
News 10

It promises to bring big-name acts to the area. The performing arts center in Canandaigua will reopen after a $14 million expansion project. NEWS10 NBC got a new look at the center. Last minute preparations were being made to the stage and seating area. The lights were being put together to go into the brand new stage. They broke ground nine months ago, this whole community has acted as parents. It is special care for a special delivery.
“This is our child, the next generation,” said John Parkhurst and Ginny Clark, the two proud parents of the new performing arts center.
There is no state or federal money involved, private money from people in the community helped make the change. They doubled the depth of the stage. All the bigger shows mean more lights and more seats. There are now 5000 covered seats beneath the new lights and room for 10,000 more seats on the lawn. People will come here with their families, so it is a family-oriented place. Loyalty also has its rewards. The biggest contributors are VIP’s with a special view. These were designed to project out over the audience. There might be some questions about what C-MAC stands for, the Constellation Brands is the major sponsor and the MAC is the grandfather of the current owners. If you’d like to get your own behind-the-scenes tour, come to the open house on June 17th at 4:00 pm.
Watch the video here: http://whec.com/newspoll.asp?template=item&story_id=19142

Macy's goes nationwide as Kaufmann's bows out
Democrat and Chronicle

Regional names becoming an 800-store chain
When 49-year-old Deborah Cuevas moved to Rochester from San Francisco, there was one thing she wished she could take with her: Macy's.

So Cuevas is looking forward to Sept. 9, when Kaufmann's will be transformed into Macy's.

The conversion comes after Federated Department Stores purchased May Department Stores last year. Federated decided it would create a national department store rather than keep regional names. By September, there will be 800 Macy's stores in 45 states, including all four Rochester-area malls.

"I loved Macy's, and I know I am going to be there," Cuevas said. "They have great home furnishings and a great kids department."

The National Retail Federation reports that department stores accounted for only 4 percent of the retail market last year, compared with 7 percent in 1993. Regional department stores have suffered because of the competition with upscale stores such as Neiman Marcus and mass retailers such as Target.

Orlando Veras, a spokesman for Macy's, said it was chosen to be the national department store because it is nationally renowned and has a great history.

"Macy's has the Thanksgiving Day parade and Miracle on 34th Street, so our history will drive us forward," Veras said. "We are going to focus on customer service and aim to please them."

Although Macy's will not have as many special sales and coupon events as Kaufmann's, the retailer will offer affordable luxury, Veras said.

Federated intends to tailor Macy's stores to the core customers in each region. Karen Scott and John Ashford are the only Kaufmann's labels that will remain in the new Macy's stores; Macy's private labels such as INC and Alfani will make up the remainder of the fashion lines. In fall 2007, a new Martha Stewart home collection and Elie Tahari's new "T Tahari" line will be sold exclusively at Macy's.

"Macy's will provide assortments of clothing that excite customers and speak to their lifestyles," Veras said. "We are trying to keep what made the store exciting but add other great fashions, too."

Although he doesn't shop at Kaufmann's or Macy's, Anthony Scalia, 24, said the change will affect customer perception.

"Macy's is an upgrade over Kaufmann's, because when people think of Macy's, they think of New York," Scalia said.

Adam Bersin, owner of the Medley Centre in Irondequoit, said there has already been a change in the merchandise at the Kaufmann's store there.

"Macy's is a tremendous trade name with higher quality," Bersin said. "There is a lot of wealth in Rochester that is unsatisfied, and a higher-end store will help people stay closer to home."

Thank god, I hated Kaufmanns. A lot of people are excited, its still not an upscale store, but it is closer to what people in Roc have been searching for, more NYCesque stores.

I thought this was REALLY interesting, tunnels beneath Rochester I never knew about,
Watch video here: http://wroctv.com/news/story.asp?id=23349&r=l

blangjr21

June 9th, 2006, 06:05 PM

Fund housing repair, not demolition

By Joseph Palozzi

(June 9, 2006) — Kara Noto's tongue-in-cheek suggestion in her June 1 column that Mayor Robert Duffy "fix our 'house'" struck a chord I've been playing for years.

Home ownership, coupled with decent surroundings, is a magnet for responsible people.

Ownership equates to more property taxes and improved finances for the city. A recent proposal to spend an average of $15,000 each to demolish "abandoned" city houses is shortsighted and impractical. The city could spend the same $15,000 at wholesale prices to buy paint, toilets, sinks, cabinets, etc., and rehabilitate the same structures for eligible homeowners. Eligibility criteria could include minimum employment/income levels and applicants' "sweat equity" to refurbish their future homes. Such an undertaking could be a boon to our struggling building trades unions, and provide jobs and homes — and more taxpayers.

Tearing down a house, leaving a vacant lot to become an unkempt dumping ground for junk cars is ludicrous. Mayor Duffy, "give a man a fish, feed him for a day; teach him to fish, feed him for a lifetime."

Palozzi, of Irondequoit, is a retired carpenter and housing rehabilitation specialist for the federal Department of Housing and Urban Department and the city of Rochester.

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Funny that this was todays editorial and then this morning Duffy announced they would be doing just that, coincidence? Maybe!

ROCguy

June 9th, 2006, 07:07 PM

Rehabing is definitely the better opstion IMHO. It keeps the neighborhoods "whole".

ROCguy

June 11th, 2006, 04:37 PM

This is great news for the Fingerlakes region as a whole:

Food, wine gateway set to pop the cork

Stakes are high for culinary tourism's newest beacon, but its backers expect fruitful results

Karen Miltner and Amy Wu
Staff writers

(June 11, 2006) — The popularity and reputation of Finger Lakes wines are growing, catching up to the industry status of other New York agricultural products such as apples. The New York Wine & Culinary Center in Canandaigua, opening Saturday, hopes to boost interest even higher and attract more than 70,000 visitors a year to the region.

The stakes are high. About $7.5 million in public and private money backs the destination for culinary and wine country tourists.

The four primary partners in the nonprofit expect the return to be $1.5 million to the region's economy initially, including increased employment, tourist spending and profits at other restaurants and wineries.

"Culinary tourism is a hot item these days. People want to travel where they can learn about food and wine. We are hitting all the buttons here. We want this to be a 'wow' experience," said Jim Trezise, president of the New York Wine & Grape Foundation, one of the four partners.

Inspiration comes from Richard and Robert Sands, the top executives at the world's largest wine company, Perinton-based Constellation Brands Inc. As they traveled the world looking for businesses to add to the company's portfolio, they studied successful wine regions such as California's Napa Valley and saw an opportunity.

In researching Constellation's purchase of the Robert Mondavi wine business, the Sands took a closer look at Copia, a $55 million wine and culinary education center and museum in Napa that came to be mainly because of the generosity of Robert Mondavi and his family.

They believed a similar concept — even if smaller in scope — could boost the wine region at home.

"We thought this would be a great thing for New York state and the New York state wine industry," said Robert Sands, Constellation's president and chief operating officer and the culinary center's chairman. "We were prepared to invest substantially in this."

And they did. Constellation bought and donated almost 4 acres of land for the 19,475-square-foot center, worth an estimated $675,000, and devoted other resources to the center.

They also recruited Trezise's wine group, Wegmans Food Markets Inc. and Rochester Institute of Technology, which has a well-respected hotel and food management program. Politicians were pitched the concept and secured more than $2 million in state and federal funds.

Wegmans, the area's third-largest employer and considered one of the leaders in the supermarket industry for high-end foods, provided an initial investment. But it also will become the center's largest customer, pledging $50,000 a year in tuition to send about 90 employees there for training in the first year.

John Martini, owner of Anthony Road Wine Co. in Penn Yan, Yates County, says the center is another positive step to promote the region.

"I think it's just making more people aware of it, meaning the New York wine industry," he said. "There's no end to what we have to do to try to get people to realize that (New York wineries) exist, and that we are good."

Backing came quickly

Gov. George Pataki is expected to head the list of dignitaries at Friday's official ribbon-cutting. The center, which anchors the south end of Canandaigua's Main Street by the Inn on the Lake, opens to the public Saturday. Cooking, food and wine education classes launch June 26. The center will showcase the state's prowess in agriculture: The $3.6 billion industry is second in the nation in production of apples, third for grapes and wine, fourth for pears, sixth for fresh market vegetables and seventh for strawberries and processing vegetables.

The challenge for any regional arts and culinary center is raising the money to build it, said Andrea Ott, director of client relations and marketing for Lord Consulting, which wrote the local center's initial business plan. "These players were successful in obtaining the funds quickly," she said. "It's quite rare it can happen this quickly."

Washington state is planning a similar center called the Walter Clore Wine & Culinary Center. So far, that project has raised $5 million.

Most look to Copia's success as proof that the centers are worth it. Copia has spurred Napa's downtown redevelopment and created jobs in the city and surrounding areas, said Kurt Nystrom, Copia's chief operating officer.

"We knew that we could not be (the scope of) Copia," Trezise said. "We didn't want to be as expansive. We wanted it to be more consumer-interactive."

The center will mainly serve visitors during the peak tourism season in summer and fall and then turn to its corporate and educational partners for the fall, winter and spring.

Alexa Gifford, the center's executive director, says the operating budget is $2 million and the goal is to break even.

"We can put a stake in the ground, but then there's the reality," Gifford said. "Over the next couple of months, we need to look at what kind of demand we have."

The business plan calls for the center to draw 70,000 to 80,000 the first year, 92,000 in the third year and 112,000 by the fifth year.

So far, the center has gotten hefty support. Beyond the four primary partners, it has picked up 33 sponsors, including Wine Spectator magazine, Eber Brothers beverage distribution company, Baldwin-Richardson Foods Co. and several regional wineries.

Scott Osborn of Fox Run Vineyards in Penn Yan, Yates County, who pledged $2,500 a year for the next five years, thinks the center can only help his winery.

"I don't really expect to get anything direct out of it, but the center is so important to the region that I will get something out of it," he said.

"It's a wonderful partnership with the private industry," said Joe Nicholson, owner of Red Jacket Orchards in Geneva, Ontario County. "We want to partner in the tourism aspect. The wine trail and all wineries and Red Jacket Orchards are all in the same kind of business of attracting tourists."

Lots to learn at center

The center's curriculum is designed to appeal to a broad range of epicurean interests, from hands-on classes with chefs and kids' cooking classes, to presentations by growers and producers, and winemaker lectures and tastings. Costs range from $35 to $55, with wine and/or food included.

Chrys Baldwin, director of operations and education, said she hopes to add free and lower-cost events, too.

Right now, most of these classes are being taught by instructors from around Rochester and the Finger Lakes, but Baldwin is hoping to schedule nationally known chefs and culinary celebrities as well. Moosewood Cookbook author (and Rochester native) Mollie Katzen will be there Oct. 10 and 11, and pastry chef Nick Malgieri is booked for Nov. 18.

Wegmans and RIT are developing the curriculum for industry and students, with much of the course work still in the planning stages. For example, this summer RIT and Wegmans are putting together a health and nutrition course to be introduced at a later time, said Francis Domoy, director of RIT's School of Hospitality and Service Management. Domoy is on the center's board of directors.

The Wine & Grape Foundation's Trezise hopes to broaden the pool of potential students who will benefit from the center, including high schoolers and restaurant workers.

The Finger Lakes location makes it an easy visit for consumers and industry people in the region. As for attracting tourists and food and wine professionals from other parts of the state, Trezise says several outreach efforts are under way.

Satellite centers at facilities such as The Center for Food, Wine and Culture at State University of New York at Stony Brook on Long Island are also in the works.

"Down the road, we hope to have minicenters scattered throughout the state," Trezise said

bungalowbuck

June 11th, 2006, 11:24 PM

i would love to see some pictures of rochester, particularly the east avenue mansions, the culver road and park avenue areas, and the seneca parkway area. i live in florida,
so rochester isn't exactly a sunday afternoon drive for me. those neighborhoods in rochester are one of the best-kept secrets in the united states. the victorian and arts and crafts styles are magnificent in those areas. preservationists such as myself would be so grateful to you. thanks very much!

ROCguy

June 12th, 2006, 12:06 AM

Are you originaly from Rochester? I'll try to dig it up, but I know a while ago I put together a huge collection of pictures that I found online. Corn Hill and the Park Avenue areas are my favorite.

ROCguy

June 12th, 2006, 01:41 AM

Done..it's not my thread. It was initially wheelingmnan's request for some skyline shots of Rochester...but I later hijaked it by loading it up with pics of corn hill and the park avenue area.

bungalowbuck

June 12th, 2006, 04:42 PM

Susie

June 12th, 2006, 05:32 PM

Could Rochester’s philanthropy be a driving force behind its pervasive social and cultural collapse?

It’s a question which should be asked and given serious thought. Not as a condemnation of the past, but as a hope for the future.

Simply stated, is there a connection between the fact that one of America’s most generous communities has decayed into one of America’s most socially flawed communities?

Rochester, New York, has two unique characteristics. It is the home of some of the nation’s earliest and richest charity efforts and, in recent years, home of some of the nation’s deepest-rooted and most widespread social pathologies.

In the face of decades of the highest rates of charitable giving in the country, after generations of being on the cutting edge of the non-profit world, with a long history of proactive social work, Rochester has simultaneously seen a steady decline in the values, self-reliance and social success of the very populations it has sought to serve.

It has one of the highest child-poverty rates in the country. It is the murder capital of the Northeast. It has more educational failure than almost all demographically similar communities. It has more out-of-wedlock birth than most demographically similar communities. It has dramatically more welfare reliance than communities with similar demographics and poverty rates. And the crime and incarceration rates are higher than similar cities in New York and across the country.

In short, when it comes to social pathogens, Rochester’s troubled neighborhoods are sicker than almost any others in the country.
Which is ironic because the modern theory of “social responsibility” says that social pathologies are the result of insufficient funding for human-service programs. The paradigm of America’s social engineers – and social workers – is that the problems of the innercity and the broken family can be cured by spending more money.

The irony comes from the fact that the inverse of that seems to be true.

If Rochester is to be an example, it seems like the more money spent on social programs the worse the problems get.

Being in New York, Rochester has some of the highest levels of government spending on social programs in the nation. That is particularly true of welfare and education. On top of that, private philanthropy in Rochester has always dramatically outstripped the national average. And Rochester’s charitable organizations have always set the pattern others have followed around the country.

American Red Cross Chapter 2, for example, is in Rochester and was the wellspring from which the organization spread around the country.

More to the point, in 1918 the Rochester War Chest was formed to collect donations for military families. In peace, that organization became the Community Chest and grew financially and philosophically before changing its name to the United Way in 1980. Each step of that process was at the leading edge of similar movements around the country. But each time Rochester was a little bit a head and quite a bit more generous.

Even over the past decade or two, as Rochester has declined as a manufacturing community and its economy – like all of upstate New York – has tanked, Rochester donors have had one of the highest per capita contribution rates in the nation.

This generosity has led to a very large number of non-profit organizations and to an abundance of programs for people in need. It has been that way for decades.

For decades, a disadvantaged person in Rochester has had access to far more programming and aid than such a person might receive in virtually any other city in America.

And yet Rochester’s poor people are worse, not better, than those elsewhere. Rochester is known not for its absence of social ills, but for its abundance. After generations of incredible generosity, Rochester’s poor people have gone just the opposite direction of what they were supposed to go.
Non-profits, individuals, government welfare agencies and the news media have all become highly skilled at demanding more social spending. We continue to write more grants and tell more sob stories, but the people supposedly being helped find themselves and their neighborhoods in progressively worse circumstances.

Communities which have had less social spending over time find themselves today in better shape.

And that irony can’t be ignored.

The question should at least be asked and intelligently answered.

Is Rochester’s generosity the root of its problem?

Have generations of handouts taken something away from poor Rochesterians that no amount of United Way deductions can replace? Has a history of relieving people of the consequences of their choices left them incapable of self-reliance? Has taking away the potential for failure also taken away the potential for success? By making striving unnecessary, have we made progress unattainable?

Is there some character poison that is found in too much charity? Can the best of intentions lead to the worst of outcomes?

Rochester’s twin traits beg that question.

And it must be answered. In order for the region’s generosity to be put to good use, and in order to assure that its philanthropy is not its greatest danger. Because what we’re doing is not only clearly not working, it may ultimately be the root of the problem.

And if it is, the cycle of pointing to problems as a pretense for more donations and spending must be broken. The write-a-check and build-a-kingdom approach has grown and failed for generations.

So we need to ask ourselves.

Are we sure we’re doing the right thing?

blangjr21

June 12th, 2006, 05:57 PM

Riverside construction expected to start within weeks

Brian Sharp
Staff writer

(June 12, 2006) — Construction of Brooks Landing is expected to begin in the next few weeks — eight months after the groundbreaking, 20 years after planning for the project began.

"It's just a phenomenal feeling to be able to look at this and feel like, after all these years, it's finally almost happening ... to stand there and look around and remember the way it was, and look at the way it is, and envision the way it's going to be," said City Councilman Dana Miller, a longtime neighborhood activist.

"You can almost picture it."

Picture a four-story, 80-room, extended-stay hotel rising on the west bank of the Genesee River, across from the University of Rochester campus. Picture a promenade, boat dock, waterfront restaurant. Picture a two-story office and retail complex and a new neighborhood coffee shop and café, operated by the nonprofit Sector 4 Community Development Corp. on the corner across Genesee Street.

Ron Christenson, whose Christenson Corp. is developing the hotel and restaurant, expects to close on all documents in two weeks and start construction soon after. Some utility work and site cleanup will precede construction. He said the hotel will be built first, and the company will grade and begin marketing the restaurant site.

The $20 million Brooks Landing project is envisioned as an engine for revitalizing the 19th Ward, returning Genesee Street to a busy, commercial corridor. John Borek, president of Sector 4 CDC, said Brooks Landing "will change the way the community and the rest of Monroe County sees southwest Rochester."

Discussion of the project dates to the late 1970s and the city's first plan to 1983. Among the stumbling blocks for the publicly and privately financed project was swapping 1.38 acres of Genesee Valley Park land with 19.5 acres of city-owned land being dedicated as part of Turning Point Park. Lately, it's been a matter of paperwork, having to restructure financing and reach final agreements.

Dave Etzel has run Jim Dalberth Sporting Goods for 20 years. The store has been on Genesee Street, near Brooks Avenue, for 50 years but had to relocate from the east to the west side of the street to make way for Brooks Landing.

"It's just been a slow process of older businesses closing up and moving out, mature businesses coming to the end of their lifecycle, people retiring," Etzel said. "This whole Brooks Landing project ... kind of got people worried about having to relocate or not stay here. Some people just closed up, thinking this (development) was going to happen years ago."

Now Etzel senses a rebirth.

The hotel, once planned for completion in 2006, now has a target opening date of May 2007. The office-retail building is going through final city approval. The University of Rochester will occupy the second floor.

And last week construction of the Urban Brew coffee shop moved to the building facade. Workers will tear off the building face over the next month, installing new doors and large windows. Coffee shop fundraising continues with about $100,000 still needed for the refurbishment. The plan is to approach large businesses while also generating more grass-roots support.

"Our hope is that, as people in the neighborhood see this thing really start to transform, that they will be willing to come forward and help us finish it," Miller, who serves as Sector 4 CDC chairman, said of the former vacant drugstore. "We're still, perhaps over-optimistically, targeting sometime in August (to open), but realistically we're probably a little beyond that."

On Thursday, Miller joined Mayor Robert Duffy, University of Rochester President Joel Seligman and others on a trip to Philadelphia to study the campus-neighborhood relationship in that city. The university has expressed interest in the Mt. Hope Avenue corridor on the east side of the river, as well as in the 19th Ward on the west. Seeing what has developed in Philadelphia, Duffy returned to work Friday invigorated by the potential in Rochester, with officials eyeing Brooks Landing as a beginning.

"We just don't take advantage of the beauty of this city like we should," Duffy said, calling the general lack of waterfront development the city's greatest opportunity and liability. "The future of Rochester is going to depend very heavily on how we maximize our assets."

Brooks Landing
Here are costs associated with the $20 million publicly and privately financed project along the Genesee River:
Development investment
Hotel: $9,050,000.
Restaurant: $1,250,000.
Office/retail building: $3,100,000.
NET office/retail building: $400,000.
Urban Brew coffee shop: $341,000.
Public improvements and land assembly
Streets, sidewalks, promenade, boat landing: $3,875,000.
Land assembly: $2,000,000
Work on Brooks Landing nears

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Good article on Brooks Landing, I see that land clearing is already underway there, and apparently they will finally begin construction within the next two weeks. I'm trying to dig up some pictures of it.

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Found one, but its a crappy picture.

http://cmsimg.democratandchronicle.com/apps/pbcsi.dll/bilde?Site=A2&Date=20060612&Category=OPINION02&ArtNo=606120304&Ref=AR&Profile=1039&MaxW=275&MaxH=225&Q=96

blangjr21

June 12th, 2006, 06:00 PM

Brooks Landing to link UR, 19th Ward

Paul Burgett
Guest essayist

(June 12, 2006) — Brooks Landing will be a dream come true for neighbors of the city's 19th Ward and the University of Rochester.

Long on the drawing board, the idea for this venture was born in the 1980s and nurtured by a long list of neighborhood residents, city planners and government officials, developers and UR leaders who saw in it the prospect of drawing our respective communities closer together.

Construction is expected to start in a few weeks on the $20 million project: a four-story, 80-room, extended-stay hotel on the west bank of the Genesee River, across from the UR; a promenade, boat dock and waterfront restaurant; and a two-story office and retail complex and, a separate development, a new neighborhood coffee shop and café on the corner across Genesee Street.

Brooks Landing will complement the Olean-Kennedy Revitalization Development project consisting of 144 townhomes and single-family homes in the nearby South Plymouth Avenue area.

Pioneers in the Brooks Landing effort on both sides of the Genesee River have worked hard over the years to forge productive relationships. Friendships and associations have been made that have seasoned and matured and created a strong human fabric that seamlessly bridges the river.

Over some 20 years, brainstorming sessions, design charettes, formal and informal conversations and presentations produced a variety of design iterations that yielded the current Brooks Landing concept, one that offers exciting options to residents of the 19th Ward and UR.

The planned hotel and restaurant; the new office building in which the UR will occupy space; and the coffeeshop which will be a hive of activity for UR, community people and visitors, will make the corner of Brooks Avenue and Genesee Street a lively intersection. These new amenities will join businesses already at or near the site.

For years, hundreds of UR faculty, students, and staff have been residents of the 19th Ward and call it home. And many of our alumni do as well. So in a certain sense, the UR has long been vested in this community.

Our new president, Joel Seligman, has demonstrated his commitment to the Brooks Landing project by speaking out publicly; by participating directly in helping secure necessary approvals; and by meeting with area residents, government officials, developers and others to express his support for the project.

After years of planning, of several fits and starts, the project is poised to begin. Its completion will open a new chapter in UR's relationship with its neighbors across the river — and that is an exciting prospect for us all.

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Just another article about the project.

BuffCity

June 12th, 2006, 07:57 PM

RochesterAddict

June 12th, 2006, 08:54 PM

Buff City...

Hit up Park Ave, East Ave, Corn Hill, Cascade district, High Falls, University Ave, Monroe Ave, St Paul Quarter, Grove Place and even parts of Main Street between Plymouth Ave and Scio St.

http://rochesterdowntown.com/locator/locator.html

This map will help. The architecture in some of these areas should churn out some nice photos.

ROCguy

June 12th, 2006, 09:13 PM

As to susie's article on Rochester's charitable citizens and poverty stiicken nieghborhoods.... whoever wrote that article is missing a huge peice of the puzzle. Rochester has been the top donation city for decades... and it is the METRO area. It's the city schools and some of its neighborhoods that have the major problems.... but its the whole metro area that donates more than any other in the country. The city's ills are from years of bad decisions and lack of good leadership. Not the areas friendly generous residents. And if Rochester had to be mean, selfish and greedy to be prosporous... I wouldn't want it to prospour and would prefer that it fell into susie's doomsday senario.

As for Brooks landing, it sounds great. Like a real kickstart for that part of the city. Glad to see that it is moslty privately funded too.

blangjr21

June 12th, 2006, 09:16 PM

The city of Rochester, along with five banks, the Greater Rochester Housing Partnership and Enterprise Community Partners, has closed on a $16 million financing pool to buy, renovate and sell more than 200 vacant homes in the city, officials said Friday.
J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. is the lead lender among the banks that provided $11 million. Bank of America Corp., M&T Bank Corp., KeyBank N.A. and Citizens Bank N.A. are the other participants.
Enterprise Community Partners and the Greater Rochester Housing Partnership contributed $3 million. The city contributed $2 million.
The $16 million will be used to acquire and rehabilitate single-family homes that will be foreclosed upon over the next three years, officials said. The homes will be sold to qualified first-time homebuyers.
“This funding will fight the tide of vacant homes and provide opportunities for families to get into quality, affordable homes,” Mayor Robert Duffy said.
The June 9 print edition of the Rochester Business Journal details another effort by the city to demolish 460 vacant homes in the city.

ROCguy

June 13th, 2006, 03:11 AM

i lived in rochester for almost two years back in the 70's. i have fond memories of my time there. i would love to see the rochester photo posters really start to document the neighborhoods in southeast rochester. i was in rochester three years ago, and i was pleasantly surprised to see that so much of the deterioration in the park avenue
area had been reversed. you have a wonderful city, and you need to show pictures of these fabulous neighborhoods to your world-wide audience.

lol...well if you are in the market. There's actually a really nice house on East Avenue in the city forsale... extrmeely rare to see because most of the mansions have been converted into condos or commercial buildings.. and the ones that are still single family are usually in the same family for generations who wouldn't think of selling it. This one was built in the 1920's and is for sale for just under $600,000

http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a221/nixter369/1eastavenue.jpg

here's the link to the online listing. It has some great interior and garden pics too. http://nothnagle.com/property/property.asp?PRM_MLSNumber=614424&PRM_MlsName=GRAR&VAR_SearchType=luxury

ROCguy

June 13th, 2006, 05:37 AM

Here's a pretty nice shot of DT with the river and Kodak building from today's Picturerochester.com pic of the day.

http://my-expressions.com/up_media/4051/pblog/5159/1150159815

ROCguy

June 13th, 2006, 05:48 AM

And because good things come in threes. Here's my third post in a row... Rochester's real estate market is still strong.

Sales of existing homes continue strong

Nishad Majmudar
Staff writer

(June 12, 2006) — Year-to-date unit sales of existing single-family homes in the greater Rochester area were up about 1 percent compared to the first five months of last year, according to new data released this morning.
The Greater Rochester Association of Realtors reported that the 1,054 closings in May in the 11-county Rochester area represented an increase of more than 11 percent from April.

That means the region is still on pace to break 2005’s record of 13,312 home closings, though Robert Miglioratti, chairman of the realtors’ association, predicts sales for the calendar year sales will likely fall short of that record.

Home prices, however, continued a strong appreciation trend. The median home sale price for January through May was $107,500, a 4-percent increase over the median from the same period in 2005.

The average sale price also grew 4.5 percent during that period to $131,142.

Susie

June 13th, 2006, 02:32 PM

June 13, 2006
Flight of Young Adults Is Causing Alarm Upstate
By SAM ROBERTS
Upstate New York is staggering from an accelerating exodus of young adults, new census results show. The migration is turning many communities grayer, threatening the long-term viability of ailing cities and raising concerns about the state's future tax base.

From 1990 to 2004, the number of 25-to-34-year-old residents in the 52 counties north of Rockland and Putnam declined by more than 25 percent. In 13 counties that include cities like Buffalo, Syracuse and Binghamton, the population of young adults fell by more than 30 percent. In Tioga County, part of Appalachia in New York's Southern Tier, 42 percent fewer young adults were counted in 2004 than in 1990.

"Make no mistake: this is not business as usual," Robert G. Wilmers, the chairman of M & T Bank in Buffalo, told his shareholders this spring. "The magnitude and duration of population loss among the young is unprecedented in our history. There has never been a previous 10-year period in the history of the upstate region when there has been any decline in this most vital portion of our population."

In New York City and the five suburban counties in New York State, the number of people ages 18 to 44 increased by 1.5 percent in the 1990's. Upstate, it declined by 10 percent.

Over all, the upstate population grew by 1.1 percent in the 1990's — slower than the rate for any state except West Virginia and North Dakota.

Population growth upstate might have lagged even more but for the influx of 21,000 prison inmates, who accounted for 30 percent of new residents. During the first half of the current decade, the pace of depopulation actually increased in many places.

David Shaffer, president of the Public Policy Institute, which is affiliated with the Business Council of New York State, described the hemorrhaging of young adults as "the worst kind of loss."

"You don't just magically make it up with new births," he said. "These are the people who are starting careers, starting families, buying homes."

In almost every place upstate, emigration rates were highest among college graduates, producing a brain drain, according to separate analyses of census results for The New York Times by two demographers, William Frey of the Brookings Institution and Andrew A. Beveridge of Queens College of the City University of New York. Among the nation's large metropolitan areas, Professor Frey said, Buffalo and Rochester had the highest rates of what he called "bright flight."
Irwin L. Davis, president of the Metropolitan Development Association in Syracuse, which promotes economic growth in central New York, said, "We're educating them and they're leaving."

And Gary D. Keith, vice president and regional economist for M & T Bank, said, "Sluggish job growth is the biggest driver of out-migration among young upstate adults."

The decline in the 1990's in the population ages 18 to 44 of the 52-county upstate region was "chilling," he said.

"When the jobs don't grow, the people go," Mr. Keith said.

Matthew O'Brien, a graduate of Siena College in Loudonville, N.Y., was 26 when he left his home in Troy, just northeast of Albany, a decade ago for a better job offer down South.

He first moved to South Carolina, and now lives with his wife, Melissa, a Rochester expatriate, and their two children in Tampa, Fla., where he handles manufacturing operations for the company that makes Bubble Wrap packaging.

"I guess if I look back and think of the people I went to high school with, they all kind of went away to college, and that might have been a steppingstone to building a career," Mr. O'Brien said. "Not a lot did come back."

Some of the decline in the number of young adults may also have reflected children who left in the 1970's or 1980's with their parents.

Mr. O'Brien's parents still live in Troy, which was known in the 19th century for the manufacture of detachable collars and also led the nation at one point in iron and steel production. All but two of his eight siblings moved away, though.

While the chronic economic woes upstate have been of growing concern for a decade or more, the accelerating departure of young people is considered particularly alarming.

It has already been injected into this year's campaign for governor, with both major candidates, Eliot Spitzer and John Faso, highlighting population stagnation there and the need to help spur business activity.

Last month, after graduating with a master's degree in engineering from Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Andrew Allen, 23, returned to his parents' home in Greece, a Rochester suburb. He is weighing job possibilities and may pursue a doctoral degree.

But staying in Rochester, where his father works at Kodak, the city's second-largest employer, is probably not one of his options.

"Rochester is on the list, but do I think I'll work here? Probably not," he said. "When you think Rochester, you think Kodak. But you also think layoffs."

Of eight close friends of Mr. Allen's from high school, one is finishing graduate school in Rochester and one has decided to start a career there, he said. The others have left. As more young people depart, the population is aging. In Broome County, which includes Binghamton in the Southern Tier, the median age rose to 38.2 in 2004 from 33.3 in 1990.

"The number of upstate residents 45 or older increased by 15.3 percent, even as the number of young people, on whom they rely to hold jobs and pay taxes, went down sharply," Mr. Wilmers of M & T Bank said.

The number of young adults was expected to decline naturally as baby boomers, some of whom were younger than 35 in 1990, grew older. Only two counties in the state — Manhattan and Queens — actually gained young adults from 1990 to 2000.

From 1990 to 2004, all but one of the state's 62 counties recorded a decline in 25-to-34-year-olds, ranging from 1 percent in Manhattan to 42 percent in Tioga.

The sole gainer was neighboring Tompkins County in the Finger Lakes, where Cornell University, Ithaca College and tourism have boosted the job market.

The numerical decline during that period in Erie County, around Buffalo, was second only to the decline in Nassau County, where high home prices have also driven away many young adults.

In Syracuse, total population losses may have been stanched since 2000 as children have returned to take care of aging parents, jobs have become available in more diverse fields and housing prices have become more affordable. "It's given us some hope that we're going to arrest the continuing decline of young people," said Mr. Davis, of the Metropolitan Development Association there.

In the Rochester area, Andrew Allen's older sister, Laura Jeanne Hammond, 26, returned to her hometown after graduating in 2001 from the University of Missouri with a journalism degree. She was hired as managing editor of Next Step Magazine, which is distributed in school guidance offices, and also founded a social group, Rochester-Area 20-Somethings. "My friends escaped to New York City for a life of poverty and I bought a house and started a family," she said.

Since people in a specific age group in 1990 are not the same people counted in 2004, it would be imprecise to say that the population declines in the 25-to-34 age group represented people who necessarily moved out.

In 1999, upstate residents were asked in a poll for M & T Bank if they intended to move to another state in the next five years. Fully 40 percent of 18-to-30-year-olds replied yes. Most people said they would head to the South or the West. But among young adults, a high percentage said they were uncertain where they would wind up.

Among all people who left Erie County, according to an analysis by M & T Bank of data from 2003 tax returns, about half moved elsewhere in the state. About as many moved to Los Angeles County as moved to either Manhattan or Brooklyn.

Rolf Pendall, a Cornell University professor who studied population losses for the Brookings Institution, said: "Upstate New York and the great bulk of the territory of Pennsylvania are unusual in the United States in that this is an urbanized region, with 15 million residents in a couple dozen census-defined metropolitan areas. The Upper Great Plains, Lower Mississippi Delta and Appalachia are also regions that have lost population — and have in fact bled people for decades — but they are rural. They share, of course, issues of serious and long-term economic transition and transformation."

Catherine Richter, 23, a public relations executive, was raised in the Hudson Valley, attended the State University of New York at Geneseo and went to work in Rochester, but after becoming a victim of several minor crimes, she asked for a transfer to Albany. There, she joined a group similar to the one Laura Hammond founded in Rochester.

"The other option for a lot of people my age is to move down South, but I don't think that's for me," Ms. Richter said. "One of the main missions of the group is to stop the brain drain. And we're trying to do that by increasing the arts scene and lots of networking."

DallasTexan

June 13th, 2006, 02:57 PM

Geez, Susie... that's just slanderous idiocy from that biased Downstate rag!!!

;)

Susie

June 13th, 2006, 04:39 PM

Now you are sounding just like Rotboy

RochesterAddict

June 13th, 2006, 04:48 PM

Housing projects around city are reviving spirits
Democrat and Chronicle

For Barbara King and her family, life has never been better in their South Plymouth Avenue area neighborhood, a mile or so from downtown Rochester.

This spring, after years living in the neighborhood's Kennedy housing project, King, her son and niece moved into a new single-family home. "I feel that I'm important. This is home from here on," she said.

At least 143 other low-income families are likely to feel the same sense of pride that decent housing provides as a result of the Olean-Kennedy Revitalization Development Project. The $31 million project, which is financed with public and private money, is the biggest of its kind since the urban renewal era that followed the 1964 Rochester riots.

The housing project, conceived six years ago and scheduled for completion by early 2007, is one of many scattered across city neighborhoods.

Credit teamwork involving the administrations of former Mayor Bill Johnson and new Mayor Robert Duffy, federal housing leaders and private groups such as one sponsored by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Rochester.

King and hundreds of other low-income families no longer will be essentially warehoused in cramped, cheaply built public housing units.

"It's like, to me, living in Brighton or Pittsford," King said of her new home and revitalized neighborhood.

Still, there is much work to be done if more low-income city families are to enjoy decent, upgraded housing, too.

And with Housing and Urban Development Secretary Alphonso Jackson scheduled to visit Rochester on Monday, the timing couldn't be better to alert him to impediments.

One in particular is HUD's revised Asset Control Area program. Its new structure isn't affording homeownership opportunities the way the program once did because of changes in regulations that fail to recognize the comparatively low cost of housing in Rochester.

Surely Jackson is interested in ironing out kinks in ACA. It's one way to lift the spirits of families such as King's and keep Rochester out front as a model for urban renewal in the 21st century.

City dreams come alive

Revitalization is opening the doors to new homes and new hope for many Rochester residents
Democrat and Chronicle

It seems a contradiction, but to revitalize our city neighborhoods, we have to embark on a very aggressive demolition program of city housing.

As a forest regenerates itself, new growth requires the loss of some of what exists now. That is what happened in the Olean-Kennedy Revitalization Project, at $31.8 million in public and private funds, the city's largest redevelopment project in 30 years. This type of effort is vital for realizing Mayor Robert Duffy's vision of public safety and economic development gains for city residents.

Rochester circa 1950 was built to accommodate a population of 330,000-plus — and today is home to fewer than 220,000 people. As a result, the city's ever-increasing housing vacancy rate recently eclipsed 10 percent.

Boarded-up homes, at worst, can become places of illegal activity and a fire hazard. At best, they are a blight on a neighborhood and a hindrance to new development.

Demolition is the only viable option for these types of properties. In April, Mayor Duffy announced a new initiative to rid neighborhoods of 450 of the most derelict vacant properties.

While the demolition of vacant properties will, in and of itself, improve the appearance of some neighborhoods, it will not revitalize them. The rebuilding of such neighborhoods, at reduced density, offers promise for their revitalization and growth.

Working with for-profit, not-for-profit and neighborhood partners, the city has fostered and will continue to spur redevelopment projects that greatly reduce density and include housing of varied types, purchase prices or rents. Some examples:

The Anthony Square project on West Main Street. Once ravaged by crime and poverty, today Anthony Square stands as an attractive, mixed-income neighborhood. Project cost: $13.1 million in public and private funds. Anthony Square was the prototype for the Olean-Kennedy project.

Cuba Place has been transformed from an active, open-air drug market into a street of homeowners with 11 new homes built by Flower City Habitat for Humanity. Public/private funding: $1.3 million.

A redeveloped mix of affordable homes has proved successful on Brown Street ($8.1 million) and Fulton Avenue ($5.1 million). Density has been greatly reduced on both streets; crime and violence have greatly diminished.

Webster Avenue improvements include 10 new homes built through the Home Expo program (Project cost: $1.2 million.) Similar efforts will soon be under way in the Jay-Orchard Street neighborhood.

With the Newcroft Park development off Atlantic Avenue near Winton Road, the city transformed a former brownfield into a street of new $200,000 homes.

Market-rate housing: The Chevy Place project in the East End has served as a catalyst for other private housing development nearby. Another city-sponsored housing project on Charlotte Street will soon begin.
We will build upon this solid foundation of success and, under Mayor Duffy's leadership, embark on aggressive efforts to partner with local businesses, banks and developers to design strategies to dramatically increase investment in city neighborhoods.

Home sweet home in city's southwest
Democrat and Chronicle

One of the newest kids on the block in Rochester is the Olean-Kennedy Revitalization Development Project. A community center and 144 rental units — townhomes and single-family houses — on four newly built city streets plus 24 other satellite streets in the area, constitute the new neighborhood, financed by $31.8 million in public and private funds.

Residents' incomes range up to $28,000 yearly; monthly rents range up to $610 plus utilities.

Eleven of the units are targeted for grandparent-headed households, with a household member having either a physical or developmental handicap. The Kinship Care Resource Network of Catholic Family Center provides services to these households.

How did this neighborhood rejuvenation get started? In 2000, the Rochester Housing Authority commissioned a study to evaluate two of Rochester's oldest public housing projects — Olean Townhomes and Kennedy Townhomes, both in the Plymouth-Exchange neighborhood.

After working with the RHA staff, residents, neighborhood representatives and local government officials to analyze the strengths and weaknesses of these projects, RHA presented a plan to revitalize the complexes and surrounding community. This plan involved demolishing the 111-unit original projects and replacing them with a less dense housing development that is a better fit for the neighborhood and serves people of varied income levels.

Providence Housing Development Corp., a nonprofit affiliate of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Rochester, and Rochester's Cornerstone Group were selected to develop the project, along with our partners: LeCesse Construction, Atlas Builders, SWBR Architects, Stantec, attorneys Mark Greisberger and Steven Weiss, and Niall Murray of ODMD, a housing consulting firm of New York City. The 67 units of Phase I in what is now known as Plymouth Manor have been completed and are almost fully occupied. Construction of Phase II — 77 units in what is now known as Carlson Commons — began in February and will be completed from July through early 2007.

As required by our funding sources, tenants for both phases were selected by a random lottery after a one-month open application period, with priority going to residents displaced from the original projects.

We received more than 1,000 applications for both phases and now have a five-year waiting list at each property for interested families.

What they said
"I was living in the building that they tore down, Plymouth Manor. ... They relocated us to other RHA (Rochester Housing Authority) sites, and when they rebuilt we had first choice. Now I live in a brand-new three-bedroom house, and I love it. ... I live there with my son and my 22-year-old niece.... I have a back yard and a front yard. I'm just waiting for the grass to grow so I can sit outside. Before I moved here, they said Violetta was a bad street. Now it doesn't look like a bad street. The police have got things under control."
BARBARA KING
Violetta Street resident

"It's a very nice neighborhood, quiet, spacious and comfortable and peaceful. I like the fact that I'm right off of the Genesee River. ... On the Fourth of July, I'll have the chance to see the fireworks right from my back porch."
FELICE GUNNER
Doran Street resident

"I'm really excited. A lot of what was replaced was project-type housing that was built in the 1960s. Now there's more of a community flavor. It's a mixed-use population, which means you have people who are on Section 8 and DSS and middle-income people who can buy their homes. It stabilized the neighborhood to have people move in who are above the poverty level. ... It looks like family units with driveways and yards for children to play in. Before it wasn't designed for families. Now it looks like a regular neighborhood."
PATRICIA JACKSON
Executive director of SouthWest Area Neighborhood Association

"I'm very pleased with the development because of this area's historic significance. ... It's close to Frederick Douglass' old church. It's pleasing to ride through and to see people with safe and sound housing. ... I hope that economic development will improve the storefronts in the area to meet the needs of the community. I think you're going to see more homeowners in this area do more to their houses to make the entrance into the city more beautiful and accommodating to residents and other people."
THE REV. ERROL HUNT
Presiding elder of Rochester Syracuse district of the A.M.E. Zion Church

Public housing has shut door on warehousing
Democrat and Chronicle

The Olean and Kennedy housing complexes were prominently located in Rochester's southwest quadrant at Ford Street and Plymouth Avenue. The two together comprised 191 units of elderly and family housing. Both complexes were built in the late 1960s and early '70s. The era in which they were constructed focused on maximizing land use while minimizing cost. The result was high-density living units with low-cost construction.

The Olean units situated between Bartlett Street, Ford Street and Plymouth Avenue were a prime example. These units were constructed using a prefabricated modular system as part of what was known as the Department of Housing and Urban Development's "instant housing" program. This minimalist approach reduced the quantity and quality of materials used, significantly reducing the cost of construction, but it also shortened the life of the buildings. The unit layouts were inadequate. They lacked adequate closet space, the bedrooms were small, there were no basements — and the density of population was 44 persons per acre, 244 percent above today's standard of 18 persons per acre. This warehousing mentality created "superblocks" or "projects" that were easily identifiable as public housing.

Contemporary public housing philosophies and design standards have changed dramatically. The Olean-Kennedy Revitalization Project is founded on a set of principles for creating high-quality residential environments that blend with and complement the surrounding neighborhoods.

This methodology integrates low- and moderate-income renters with higher-income homeowners. These single, two- and three-unit family homes are designed to enhance the neighborhood landscape by utilizing architectural styles found in the immediate neighborhood.

This creates housing that gives residents a sense of pride, status and community belonging while removing the stigma that public housing residents are somehow different from their neighbors.

ROCguy

June 13th, 2006, 04:54 PM

I watched the video on that first lady from the Kennedy Housing project talking about how much she loved her home. I think it's great that these people are starting to take pride in their neighborhoods. The neighborhood goes against what most of us on here would consider development because it's suburban-like tract housing less than a mile from downtown... but that's how the residents want it... The lady said "to me, this is just like Brighton or Pittsford... I like it!"

RochesterAddict

June 13th, 2006, 04:57 PM

Duffy: Arts crucial to city's revitalization
Rochester Business Journal

Mayor Robert Duffy on Friday said the city is eager to incorporate arts and cultural projects into revitalization plans.
Duffy delivered the keynote address at the latest Innovation Conference Series of the Arts & Cultural Council for Greater Rochester.
“We have the opportunity of a lifetime to redefine Rochester,” Duffy said. “Arts and culture is not only something that breathes life into a community—it is an economic driver.”
Representatives from Seattle and Providence, R.I., spoke about how creative approaches to the arts and culture have transformed their cities.
Michael Killoren, director of Seattle’s Office of Arts & Cultural Affairs, said non-competitive, artistic partnerships among businesses, government and non-profits set the tone.
“Every corporation, every business, every restaurant has art,” Killoren said of Seattle. “We take it for granted that of course we’ll have art by local artists in our buildings.”
Larry Quick, a civic and corporate strategist in Providence—whose WaterFire art installation has pumped millions of tourism dollars into the city’s coffers over the years—urged Rochesterians to find what he calls the region’s natural advantage and to build on it.
“Start with what you’ve got, and see what organic growth you can spin,” he said. “All of your development comes from organic growth.”
Local arts groups and city officials also discussed how the arts have been and can be used alongside public projects in Rochester to promote livability and build community.
Among city officials in attendance were David Moore, police chief; Julio Vazquez, community development commissioner; Charles Reaves, commissioner of parks, recreation and human services; and Carlos Carballada, economic development commissioner.
Duffy said he is assembling an arts and culture advisory board to set a path forward in incorporating the arts into public projects. He urged the audience to get involved.
“The arts and cultural community should be at the table when the decisions are made, weighing in,” he said. “This is an area that, I think, impacts everything.”
Duffy, who with City Council President Lois Giess presented a check for $10,000 to the Arts & Cultural Council, drew a standing ovation at the conclusion of his remarks.
The event, “Culture & Community Renewal: Rochester, Seattle and Providence,” drew several hundred people who work or volunteer in arts and cultural organizations, and architecture and design firms.

http://whec.com/gfx/240/8635.jpg
Sonnenberg rededicated with optimism

Ceremony held at new state historic park
Democrat and Chronicle

CANANDAIGUA — When Sonnenberg Gardens & Mansion opened this year, the words "State Historic Park" were part of its name for the first time.

The change reflects the state's purchase of the 19th-century Victorian mansion, with its nine specialty gardens on 52 acres.

That $3.2 million purchase, completed in March, saved Sonnenberg from a foreclosure that could have resulted in a sale to the highest bidder — with no protection of Sonnenberg's historical character and no guarantee of availability to tourists.

Instead, Sonnenberg, which operates as a nonprofit corporation with a paid staff of five and about 400 volunteers, reopened on Mother's Day for a tourist season that runs until mid-October. About 33,000 visitors came last year.

A rededication celebration for Sonnenberg was held Sunday.

Jim Ingalls, who served as president of the Friends of Sonnenberg until he was named interim director recently, said the grounds and mansion remain a unique attraction. "I think the biggest appeal is just the beauty of Sonnenberg. People who have not been here before find out how beautiful it is — the flowers, the trees, the buildings," Ingalls said.

Financial challenges

Local Sonnenberg supporters are quick to point out that its purchase by the state Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation does not mean that the floral estate's financial concerns are over. Sonnenberg must pay for its annual operating expenses, which are now about $675,000. "We have to maintain Sonnenberg. The gardens have to be planted. The buildings have to be kept up," said Caroline Delavan of Canandaigua, a member of Sonnenberg's board of trustees.

Admission charges, rental for special events and membership fees account for about half of Sonnenberg's revenue, with donations making up most of the rest. The big emphasis in recent years has been on reducing costs, with the full-time staff being cut in half.

Sonnenberg Gardens, a nonprofit corporation that took over responsibility for everything on the property in 1973, remains responsible for balancing the books, even though the state owns the property.

Sonnenberg's financial difficulties surfaced in 2002 when former director John Murphy Jr. was accused of diverting more than $600,000 of Sonnenberg money into his personal accounts. He pleaded guilty to a charge of second-degree grand larceny and in 2003 was sentenced to 4 to 12 years in prison. Murphy is now in a work-release program at the Hudson Correctional Facility in Columbia County. He is scheduled for a parole hearing next year.

The state's $3.2 million purchase of Sonnenberg not only saved the site from foreclosure, paying off about $1.4 million owed to the Canandaigua National Bank, but also provided about $1.8 million for renovations to preserve Sonnenberg's historical character, Ingalls said.

The state takeover of Sonnenberg was in response to calls for assistance from the community, including elected officials.

"Most of the people were concerned about having to see it go. They didn't want to see a housing development there," said Paul Kellogg, 79, who owned a restaurant in Canandaigua for 50 years and has been a longtime volunteer at Sonnenberg.

The state Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation oversees 35 historic sites and 175 parks. Five of these parks, including Sonnenberg, are considered historic.

"Sonnenberg is a jewel in the area and a popular tourist destination," said Wendy Gibson, spokeswoman for this state office, which has been promoting Sonnenberg in its brochures and Web site.

Restoring the past

The Sonnenberg mansion was completed in 1887 as a summer home for Frederick Ferris Thompson and his wife, Mary Clark Thompson.

He was a founder of the First National Bank (now called Citibank) of New York. She was from Canandaigua. Her father was Ontario County Sheriff Myron Clark, who later served as governor of New York.

"She was a concept person," said volunteer Ken Hutton, 54, of Canandaigua, as he helped rake the muck out of one of the ponds in the Japanese Garden.

The grounds feature flowers in geometric shapes, ranging from the sunken beds with colorful annual foliage in the Italian Garden to beds of flowers, including varieties of daisies, in the Old-Fashioned Garden.

Sonnenberg, Ingalls noted, means "sunny hill" in German and was the name given to the site in the 19th century.

The plans are to keep Sonnenberg in its original state as much as possible, with the state money helping with preservation plans.

A major project that Ingalls hopes to get under way this year is restoration of the veranda — the large porch that wraps around part of the 40-room mansion. The refurbishing, estimated by Ingalls to cost $1 million, will strengthen the porch's support structure without changing the appearance.

Sonnenberg seemed like an escape to the past for Lisa Reimer, 37, of Buffalo, and her mother, Betty Reimer, 62, of Marilla, Erie County. They were among the tourists visiting the grounds recently.

"You have to use your imagination to see what it would be like to come here with horses," said Lisa Reimer.

Millie Pecora, 60, and her husband, Peter, 66, of Webster, also liked what they saw.

"It reminds me of Europe — the gardens, the architecture, the statuary," Millie said.

Sonnenberg is a great piece of history in the Greater Rochester area.

Housing sales fall 4 percent from 2005
Rochester Business Journal

May homes sales in the Rochester region fell 4 percent to 1,054 from 1,098 a year ago, the information subsidiary of the Greater Rochester Association of Realtors Inc. reported today.
However, sales were up 12 percent from April, when closings totaled 941. The May median price of $116,900 was up 9.8 percent from $106,500 last year and up 11.2 percent from $105,102 in April.
The dollar volume of sales in May was $148.6 million, up 21 percent from $122.8 million in April and up 6 percent from $140.2 million last year.
Closings in Monroe County in May rose 3 percent to 2,916, compared with 2,832 a year ago. Closings also rose in Genesee, Livingston, Seneca and Yates counties. Closings fell in Ontario, Orleans, Steuben, Allegany and Wyoming counties.
GRAR represents more than 3,000 real estate professionals.

One paper has a one slant, another a different slant?

In response to a earlier suzanne article, I thought it was interesting as well:

'05 crime rises here, across U.S.
Democrat and Chronicle

Violent crime increased nationwide in 2005, fueled in large part by statistical spikes in midsized metropolitan areas such as Rochester, according to FBI statistics released Monday.

Murders soared from 59 to 104 in Birmingham, Ala., up 76 percent; from 59 to 85 in Charlotte-Mecklenburg County, N.C., a 44 percent increase; from 87 to 122 in Milwaukee, a 40 percent jump; and from 79 to 109 in Cleveland, a 38 percent increase. Rochester was part of that trend, rising from 36 to 53, or 47 percent.

Detroit, Los Angeles and New York were among large cities that saw the number of murders drop.

The nationwide increase in overall violent crime was 2.5 percent — the largest percentage rise since 1991.

The national rise was attributed to increased gang activity and to changes in police hiring and enforcement strategies.

Are people getting more violent or less intelligent?

Jerome

June 13th, 2006, 05:56 PM

RochesterAddict

June 13th, 2006, 06:58 PM

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2006/06/13/nyregion/censuslarge.jpg

Interesting to see Westchester and Nassau county have similar stats.

The Upstate Economy, the Problem That Still Plagues Politicians and Their Promises
NY Times

New York Democrats at their party's state convention last month repeatedly invoked the same theme: the need to reinvigorate the economy upstate, where ailing cities like Buffalo and now Rochester contrast starkly with New York City and its shimmering prosperity.

But the Democrats — convened, not coincidentally, in Buffalo — face a daunting challenge. Decades of campaign promises from both parties to make upstate more competitive, and their mixed records on redeeming those promises, have left some New Yorkers skeptical that either party has the will or the ability to fix the foundering economy.

"They all had ideas, but none of the ideas worked," said Denis M. Hughes, president of the New York State A.F.L.-C.I.O.

Upstate New York has been buffeted by military base closings and the impact of free-trade agreements on manufacturing. In the 1990's, according to a study by the Brookings Institution, the population of the 52 upstate counties grew by only 1.1 percent, a growth rate slower than that in every state but West Virginia and North Dakota. Prisoners accounted for nearly 3 in every 10 new residents.

"The economy of upstate New York, by nearly all major measures, worsened in the 1990's," the study concluded, lagging behind "both the nation and its own performance in the 1980's."

When Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, a Democrat, likened upstate New York to Appalachia earlier this year, some Republicans accused him of city-centric elitism. But it was business leaders who complained, in a Public Policy Institute report two years ago, about high taxes and asked, during the third term of Gov. George E. Pataki, a Republican: "Is upstate New York going the way of Appalachia?"

The institute, which is affiliated with the state's Business Council, concluded that upstate "has few of the advantages that New York City gets from its international role. It has to compete with regular places like Ohio and Virginia. In that competition, costs do matter."

The institute added, "What is relevant is if property taxes and energy and workers' comp and health insurance cost more in Elmira than in Virginia."

Another report by the institute praised early efforts by Mr. Pataki to improve the business climate but said the recession that struck in 2001 "took the wind out of those sails."

David F. Shaffer, the institute's president, said, "When the 1990 recession came along, upstate simply never fully recovered — and has lagged behind ever since."

The institute largely blamed "the dominance exercised by the downstate political culture," which is generally synonymous with Democrats, even though the downstate suburbs have, until recently, traditionally voted Republican and the city itself has elected a Republican mayor four times in a row.

Historically, the biggest benefit to the upstate economy was probably the Erie Canal, completed in 1825. It was championed by a New York City mayor, DeWitt Clinton, a Jeffersonian Republican (a precursor to today's Democrats, although both modern parties claim a connection) who was later elected governor.

In the 20th century, two Republican governors, Thomas E. Dewey and Nelson A. Rockefeller, expanded the state Thruway and the state university system upstate. A Democrat, Hugh L. Carey, was known for tax cutting that helped the upstate economy rebound.

Another Democrat, Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, helped convince New Yorkers that the city and suburbs should send more money to Albany than they receive, an insight that helped his two downstate Democratic successors in the Senate, Charles E. Schumer and Hillary Rodham Clinton, make further inroads upstate.

In 2004, Mr. Schumer was re-elected with 59 percent of the upstate vote after touting his work helping the economy by, for instance, encouraging more air service to upstate cities.

"It starts to seep in that Democrats can be good fiscal managers, that New York City is not your enemy," said William T. Cunningham, an adviser to Democratic and Republican officeholders. "It makes it easier for a Democrat to campaign upstate and poach on the Republicans."

Senator Clinton, virtually unchallenged this year within her own party, is hoping to run even better than last time upstate, which traditionally votes Republican, to show Democrats across the country that she has bipartisan appeal.

To that end, she has, among other things, assiduously courted Corning Inc., one of the largest and oldest employers upstate, and pressed for several policies that benefit the company.

"I think there is a general perception that both Senator Clinton and Senator Schumer have been more attentive to upstate needs than has traditionally been the case for U.S. senators from New York," said Mr. Shaffer of the Public Policy Institute. But he said the solution lies in Albany.

"New York State government caused the problem and New York State government can fix it," he said. "All four candidates for governor seem to me to be genuinely aware of, and concerned about, the problem; when they talk about upstate they're not just pandering to the remnant citizenry of some hopelessly beleaguered region. Whether one or more of them has the program, the will and the firepower to do something about it, time will tell."

In Buffalo, both Mr. Spitzer, who overwhelmingly won the party's support for governor, and Thomas R. Suozzi, his challenger and the Nassau County executive, conspicuously pledged to fix the moribund upstate economy.

Governor Pataki has been credited with helping the Albany-area economy by encouraging the nanotechnology industry, which has had a spillover effect in creating other high-technology jobs. But overall, private sector job losses upstate have continued, except in categories like health and social services that depend on government.

Regardless of Mr. Pataki's record, after 12 years of a Republican governor Democrats are in a position to capitalize on calls for a change in how upstate is handled.

Outside New York City, the state has nearly as many registered Democrats as Republicans.

In addition, upstaters are disproportionately old, a constituency that Mr. Cunningham, who has worked for Mr. Carey, Mr. Moynihan and Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, said was "concerned about Social Security and health care, and these are issues that the Democrats have dominated."

Charles A. Gargano, the chairman of the Empire State Development Corporation and a Pataki appointee, said upstate benefits when taxes fall, reducing the cost of doing business.

But, he said, "The Legislature is more concerned with spending than cutting taxes." It has often thwarted Mr. Pataki's economic development strategies, he said, which might suggest it does not much matter to upstate whether a Democrat or a Republican is elected governor.

Richard P. Nathan, co-director of the Rockefeller Institute of Government and a professor at the State University of New York at Albany, was born in Schenectady and recalls how much upstate has changed.

"When we recruit faculty," he said, "we say there's good living in upstate New York, you can get a nice house for modest prices, good schools, you can commute easily. There are nodes in Saratoga, Albany, the Finger Lakes, where you can build on the ambiance. New strategies might be ripe for these times: not smokestack-chasing, not big factories, but communities that can attract people.

"And yet," Professor Nathan added, "it's not easy to be optimistic."

sargeantcm

June 13th, 2006, 07:00 PM

June 13, 2006
Flight of Young Adults Is Causing Alarm Upstate
By SAM ROBERTS

The numerical decline during that period in Erie County, around Buffalo, was second only to the decline in Nassau County, where high home prices have also driven away many young adults.
Oh really now. What have I been saying all along...

Let me ask - what good is it having a job if you can't afford to live there?

But everyone chooses to ignore that side. Rising home prices are a good thing!

The other thing to consider is that today's younger people are generally more mobile - how many families, anywhere, are staying completely together in one region these days? I bet not too many. Sometimes I would argue that is a good idea to leave, and see the world.

RochesterAddict

June 13th, 2006, 07:11 PM

I agree it a VERY good thing to leave a place and explore the world, meet different kinds of people and learn how things work. Many people will come back after a while, I know MANY of my friends want to come back to Rochester, unfortunately many are vested in their new cities with girlfriends from somewhere else or jobs that they cannot telecommute with.

ROCguy

June 13th, 2006, 08:10 PM

blangjr21

June 13th, 2006, 08:17 PM

GRE, RBA to discuss merger

Ben Rand
Staff writer

(June 13, 2006) — The two organizations principally concerned with boosting business in greater Rochester are looking at the possibility of joining forces, perhaps by the end of the year.

Greater Rochester Enterprise, a privately led economic development group, and the Rochester Business Alliance, the area’s chamber of commerce, have agreed to form a study committee to explore the benefits of a merger, according to a memo to GRE members dated today.

GRE, organized by investors in late 2001, has assumed the lead role for marketing Rochester as an economic destination. The RBA, meanwhile, bills itself as a provider of information, advocacy, human resource services and networking to area employers.

The goal of the merger, according to the memo, would be to create a “single, more powerful resource to serve the business community more effectively than ever.” Another potential benefit would be to save time and improve efficiency. According to the memo, the two organizations have 15 common board members.

If completed, it would mark the third major economic development consolidation of the past few years. The IMC, which principally served the area’s industrial sector, merged with the Greater Rochester Metro Chamber of Commerce to create the RBA. Earlier this year, the Rump Group, an ad-hoc group of chief executives formed to advocate for public policy change, moved under the RBA’s umbrella.

Talk of a merger comes in a year when the RBA has sounded a clarion call for economic change. The organization played the lead role in creating “Unshackle Upstate,” an agenda calling for a range of economic reforms to benefit the state’s business climate. More than two dozen business organizations have signed on to the agenda. The state Legislature has yet to act on the agenda’s recommendations.

The study committee, made up of 12 people who were not immediately identified, will meet for the first time this Friday and will be charged with drafting an proposed implementation plan to be executed by year’s end.

The memo disclosing the merger talks, obtained by the Democrat and Chronicle, was sent to GRE members from organization Chairman Wayne LeChase, owner of LeChase Construction Services.

LeChase was not immediately available for comment.

ROCguy

June 13th, 2006, 08:21 PM

But gee... I thought that "unrealized problems go unsolved". I thought everyone was in denial about Rochester's problems and blah blah blah? Rochester's never going to recover economically because everybody is just denying it and saying Rochester is booming and everyone is happy go-lucky!

RochesterAddict

June 13th, 2006, 09:09 PM

Rochesteraddict didn't you do the same thing? I have a feeling that Rochester would draw more college grad expats (people who to go college somewhere else) than some cities would because it's really "home townish". Although most of the people I know here are going to school in NC because in state tuition is dirt cheap... the ones that do leave ain't coming back. Even if the job opportunities are great here, there's reall not that much of a sense of home. If Rochester can get its act together and start growing jobs again, I'm sure it would be able to keep plenty of its young there and bring a good number of people back. That's what's happening in Syracuse now, after it was in worse shape in the 90's than Rochester is now.

Yes I did do that, it was a great experience living in Atlanta, but Im glad it is behind me. I was offered great jobs in NYC, Florida and NJ as well. I have also visited Charlotte a million times to see friends that work for Bank of America. Ive learned the grass isnt always greener and I never appreciated what I had here in Rochester until I left. That is why I now explore Rochester a lot, read everything I can about here and find something different to do everyday, that is what makes ME love living here.

ROCguy

June 13th, 2006, 09:36 PM

That's great. Just curious, where'd you move to before returning home to Rochester?

blangjr21

June 15th, 2006, 04:59 AM

Flood Broad Street? Idea would restore Erie Canal bed

Lara Becker Liu
Staff writer

(June 14, 2006) — The original Erie Canal bed snakes through Rochester like an artery — unseen beneath a concrete skin that is Broad Street and perfectly designed, some say, to pump life into the heart of downtown.

That is, after all, how the canal once functioned, bearing ships between the Hudson River and the Great Lakes. And visionaries say it once again could be a functioning waterway — by ripping up Broad Street and using the old canal bed.

After the canal was rerouted in the early 1900s, a subway line replaced it, only to be shut down in 1956.

The canal bed/subway tunnel has long sat idle, except as a canvas for graffiti artists and a shelter for the homeless. But visionaries continue to champion its potential, and their ideas have lately piqued the interest of the new city administration.

After years of discussion about filling the tunnel with dirt — because corrosion in some parts is thought to pose a safety hazard — the city is now preparing to request $300,000 in federal funds to study a dozen alternative uses for the near-milelong tunnel.

Several original concepts will be examined, including a subterranean recreation center, a trolley line and a public art corridor. But the ones generating the most buzz involve old ideas: putting in a light rail transit system; and restoring the canal.

City officials are careful to say that all options must be explored. But they appear most intrigued by the notion of re-watering the canal.

"This one certainly jumped to the forefront," said Mayor Robert Duffy, who toured the tunnel about two weeks ago and deemed what he saw "very exciting."

The concept in its grandest form calls for peeling back Broad Street from the central library (the Rundel Memorial Building) west and north to the area near PAETEC Park, putting a sort of bathtub liner in the exposed canal bed and filling it with water.

Boaters could then travel from the Genesee River into the canal, using a round lock just south of the library.

Vibrancy from canal

The concept not only evokes images of a Little Venice, but it is also seen as the idea most likely to spawn private development and tourism in an area that includes 9.6 acres of underutilized or vacant property. "I tend to think the canal has a little more economic oomph to it," said acting city engineer Tom Hack. "It will create its own tax revenue, enough income where coffee shops and other retail would be self-supporting. You don't (even) need the tourism aspect. It's kind of like gravy on the potatoes, but it does work without the gravy, for sure."

Generating revenue would be key, for re-watering the canal could cost $200 million, according to one preliminary estimate — close to what Renaissance Square is expected to cost.

Such estimates give some people pause, especially after the expense of the failed ferry.

"I would say I'm pretty skeptical that that would be the best use of public resources," said former City Councilman Brian Curran. With the city losing population, he added, development along the re-watered canal wouldn't generate much new revenue; it would merely shift people and resources around.

"The crucial need for Rochester is the creation of jobs, jobs that pay a livable wage, and I've never seen any indication that that kind of project would do much to create jobs," Curran said. "I think we get carried away with grand, symbolic gestures — things that look good and sound good but don't have much substance behind them — and this one sounds to me like another one of those."

The idea of resurrecting the canal downtown originated with Thomas X. Grasso, a retired geology professor and president of the Canal Society of New York State and Inland Waterways International. He presented his idea — which Rory Zimmer, an intern architect at SWBR Architects, added to — around the time last year when the city announced plans to fill in the tunnel. Opponents succeeded in stalling that plan.

The men are passionate about their proposal and have recently formed a group to promote it. The group includes Zimmer's brother, Timothy Zimmer, who works in the city's Planning Department, and public relations coordinator Michael Hess.

"We're taking a cue from ourselves, in terms of our canal history. Fairport, Pittsford, any canal community in New York state is really vibrant, and probably only because of the canal," said Rory Zimmer.

He and Grasso anticipate many challenges. "The thing I worry about (is that) the fast ferry sets back risk-taking for five, 10 years, or even a generation," Zimmer said.

Grasso acknowledged that money was an issue. Otherwise, he said, "it's a no-brainer. ... If you can't sell the iconic image of America — the old Erie Canal, with boats across an 1842 aqueduct in the middle of a city — as a tourist attraction, then we deserve to fail."

Other cities, including Oklahoma City and San Antonio, have completed similar projects and claimed success.

Seeking proof of impact

One area of study will be whether those cities "have improved their ability to bring population and business as a result of that," said Deputy Mayor Patty Malgieri. "That's the kind of real impact, or proof of impact, we're looking for."

She and others said that Rochester couldn't take on a project this big on its own. Besides state and federal money, the city would likely need "upfront private investment," Malgieri said, and developers willing to do "some speculative development in areas where we're thinking of doing public investment."

Also, the project would be divided into "digestible" phases, according to Hack. One phase, for example, might involve re-watering the portion between the aqueduct and West Main Street, at an estimated cost of $40 million to $50 million.

Some funding is already in place, including $9.8 million from the pot originally designated to fill in the entire tunnel that will now be used to fill in the portion north of West Main Street, which remains unstable.

There's also $6.5 million for an "aqueduct project," which would create a physical connection between the Riverside Convention Center and the Blue Cross Arena at the War Memorial. A walkway would go from the convention center to the RG&E building at South Avenue and Broad Street, into the aqueduct and from there into the Blue Cross Arena.

Ready to study

City officials are to meet today with the people who have previously pitched ideas for the tunnel, to discuss the study. Officials are hopeful the study will begin as early as fall and be completed within two years.

They also stress that its findings could preclude pursuing any of the options.

"The bottom line is, we're going to create a master plan of the corridor," Hack said. "The best of the best will come up to the top. We'll look at the cost, run all those numbers, look at the big conceptual picture. Then we'll say, 'OK, what is the actual benefit?' If it will generate revenue, housing and retail — if it generates all that, then there's something to work toward. If it doesn't, that's your answer."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Truthfully I think this is a pipe dream, and as the article says another large amount of money to spend on such a project that is uncertain in outcome. Although my father, a huge critic of the fast ferry project from start to finish actually thinks that it is a good idea, which striked me as odd.

What is everyone elses thoughts?

blangjr21

June 15th, 2006, 05:02 AM

http://www.rochesterdandc.com/graphics/news/canalroute.jpg

Here is another article about it as well.

If other cities can do it, why not us? kids ask

Lara Becker Liu
Staff writer

(June 14, 2006) — Where there is water, people come — even when that water runs no more than a mile long or 4 feet deep.

So concluded sixth-grade students at the Genesee Community Charter School, who spent the year studying canal systems and capped it off by raising enough money to travel to Ottawa, Providence, R.I., Oklahoma City and San Antonio to learn how refurbished or newly built waterways have sparked a renaissance in those cities.

There's a lesson in that for Rochester, the students say, and they plan to share it at a presentation at 7 tonight at the Kate Gleason Auditorium in the central library's Rundel Memorial Building.

Eric Quitter, 12, visited Oklahoma City's Bricktown, a mile-long waterway district that has transformed a deteriorating area into an entertainment hotspot.

"The potential that canal had — just think what one in Rochester could do," Eric said. "If we just had something to tie it (downtown) all together, it could be amazing."

Such a plan exists: the Grasso-Zimmer proposal, named for its creators, retired geology professor Thomas X. Grasso, who is president of the Canal Society of New York State and Inland Waterways International, and intern architect Rory Zimmer. They call for peeling back Broad Street to expose the original canal bed beneath and refilling it with water.

The students studied their proposal, and "their final determination is that they think it's an idea worth considering," said school leader Lisa Wing.

"They know there are funding obstacles. They know ripping up Broad Street would create, perhaps, a traffic nightmare downtown. And they don't have all the answers to some of those grownup things. But they do understand there are ways that people in other cities do get things funded that are really major in scale."

That "the future generation (is) getting involved with this" is gratifying, Grasso said. "They're so excited about it, it just kind of gets you excited yourself."

ROCguy

June 15th, 2006, 05:09 AM

I think that you beat me to posting this story. I think it would be great. I don't see it as nearly as much of a risk as the ferry was. This is something that is less seasonal. People go downtown every day all year.... they only go to Charlotte from May to September. Businesses that would move in around the revitalized area of downtown would be able to make money year round, and it wouldn't take NEARLY the commitment that the ferry did. There aren't environmental issues.... AND it's happened before. The Erie canal snaked through Downtown Rochester for the first 110 years of the city's existance. Also, it's not as much of a pipe dream as you might think (and I thought until I read the whole story). It's not the whole path of the canal that would be restored, it's a small mile long stip of it. Here is the proposed path in question:

http://democratandchronicle.com/graphics/news/canalroute.jpg

blangjr21

June 15th, 2006, 05:17 AM

The only way that I would really ever use it is to park at the B&L parking garage, and then take a water taxi to either PaeTec Park or Frontier Field for a ballgame, etc. The thing I wonder is will it take dollars away from High Falls? I don't see this as being a "nightlife" proposal. I just wonder what the reason is for this. I think that we are seeing a good amount of development right now, what development would be springing up along this canal?

blangjr21

June 15th, 2006, 05:25 AM

You know thinking about it now, I guess it could be used to ice skate on in the winter, and things like they do in Ottawa, and Providence has done great things with their waterfront. I just think if we invested 200 million in the water we have now we'd be better off, call me crazy I guess.

You all should check out this video about the new housing projects in the City of Rochester. It's very well put together and a nice story.

http://www.rochesterdandc.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060611/VIDEO/306090009

ROCguy

June 15th, 2006, 05:30 AM

I saw that video the other day. It is a great story and it does make you realize that not everyone in bad areas of the city are "bad". There are many families just like that one in the inner cities accross the country. Single mothers that just want a safe place for their kids. While I still think that the new tract housing in the city looks horrilbe and out of place, if it makes a better enviornment for people to live in the city, I'm all for it.

blangjr21

June 15th, 2006, 05:31 AM

I actually think that it fits in really well with the surrounding landscape. So it's not as dense as the other houses built in the 1920's, oh well. It looks pretty dense regardless. It is one of many "project" style housing complexes currently going up in the city. I for one would rather see that than what I saw in Buffalo on my way to HSBC Arena.

blangjr21

June 15th, 2006, 05:37 AM

http://www.rnews.com/images_story/disabilityctr6_14.jpg

New space can serve more clients.
Disability Center Has New Home
by Mark Schoenberger
Published Jun 14, 2006

Employees of the new Center for Disability Rights say the organization’s new space will help them serve even more of those who need them.

The center celebrated the grand opening of its new building on State Street, just down the street from its old offices. It spent $3 million to renovate the 100-year-old structure and make it accessible for the disabled.

The new space gives the 800 employees there 20,000 square feet of space.

"We've had to limit our growth for the last few years,” said Chris Hilderbrant, the center’s director for advocacy. “We had staff sharing phones, sharing computers and desks and we were not able to meet the need that’s out there. So now we'll be able to better meet that need, we'll hire more people, we'll serve more people."

The Center for Disability Rights services 1,200 people in Monroe County and surrounding areas.

RochesterAddict

June 15th, 2006, 04:23 PM

Old subway tunnel creating new stir
Groups oppose move to fill in northern section
Democrat and Chronicle

The city should hold off on filling in the Broad Street tunnel north of West Main Street — at least until a study of how best to make use of the rest of the tunnel is complete, a consortium of interest group leaders said Wednesday.

The leaders were invited to City Hall to discuss the city's latest plans involving the old Erie Canal corridor, now a tunnel that runs beneath Broad Street.

Debate about what to do with the tunnel — fill it with dirt, fill it with water, put in a light rail train — continues. But city officials, mindful of the South Avenue garage ramp collapse, now want to move aggressively to fix structural weaknesses in the northern portion of the tunnel.

They also want to ensure that millions in federal funding earmarked for filling in the tunnel — a project put on hold last year — gets used before it's reallocated.

They propose that:

$300,000 be used to study the best use of the tunnel between South Avenue and West Main.

$2 million to $3 million be spent fixing the portion beneath the Democrat and Chronicle building, where newsprint was delivered by train until 1997, and repaving the street surface.

$9.8 million be spent filling in the northern portion and redoing the road deck to create a tree-lined boulevard.

The group leaders, while acknowledging the need to address the tunnel's corrosion, questioned why the work couldn't wait until the study — which they argue should examine the entire length of the mile-long tunnel — is finished. If timing is so critical, they said, start the study sooner and finish it faster.
The current timeline calls for the study to begin this fall and last about two years.

Filling the northern portion cuts off the connection to sites such as PAETEC Park, said Christopher Burns, a member of the Subway Erie Canal Revitalization committee, who has advocated for a trolley system in the tunnel.

"You've taken an amputate rather than operate approach to it," he said.

Acting City Engineer Tom Hack disagreed, saying the road deck would have to be removed and the tunnel partially filled anyway if, say, a canal were to be put there.

"It does not prevent (future) excavation," he said, adding that filling the tunnel is the least expensive option.

John Dennis, of the Erie Harbor Partnership, said, "I don't see putting millions in a tree-lined boulevard if we're going to dig them up someday. I think it's a waste of money."

The plantings and other enhancements would cost less than $1 million, Hack said, though he acknowledged the money could be redirected.

Barbara Hoffman, a Susan B. Anthony neighborhood resident, meanwhile said any improvement on the west side, even along Broad Street, "would be welcome. It is a desperate, desolate, dingy area."

And Michael Hess, a member of the newly formed Advocates for the Development of Rochester's Canal, said the infrastructure improvements were fine, so long as the city gets moving on the bigger picture — which, in his vision, involves re-watering the old canal. "You can only make people want to live in a place that's cool to live in," he said. "The only way to do that is create a destination. Any number of trees or decorations is not going to do that."

Across the river, sixth-graders from the Genesee Community Charter School shared the results of a study they went to four cities to finish. They believe there are merits to the Grasso-Zimmer plan, a proposal by local architects that involves re-watering the canal to make it a destination, as similar projects have proven for Providence, R.I.; Oklahoma City; San Antonio, Texas; and Ottawa.

"They moved the rivers in Providence," said Sandy Ryan, who left there right after high school and now lives in Penfield, "Imagine what we could do."

What's next
The city is expected to request $300,000 in federal funds for a study of the Erie Canal/subway tunnel at a Genesee Transportation Council meeting today. The city will continue to collect input about the best use for the tunnel, and also consult with national experts. The study would commence in the fall and last about two years, after which the buy-in of politicians would be sought to secure funding.

Work then would begin on the aqueduct project, a walkway linking the Riverside Convention Center to the War Memorial at the Blue Cross Arena.

Meanwhile, improvements will be made to West Main Street, and the first pieces of a heritage trail installed

Heritage trail aims to spotlight forgotten treasure
Democrat and Chronicle

On West Main Street, the sidewalk will tell the story.

The city, as part of a $1.2 million improvement project, plans to install the first pieces of what could become Rochester's Heritage Trail, a pathway akin to Boston's Freedom Trail.

The trail would be a stone or stained-concrete line embedded in the sidewalk that would run the length of the north side of West Main, between Madison and Broad streets.

Future plans call for extending the trail east on Main, down Broad Street to the aqueduct over the Genesee River and the Rundel Memorial Building — along the one-time path of the Erie Canal. Eventually, it is thought, the Heritage Trail could encompass other historic areas.

The plan has not yet been presented to City Council.

It is hoped that the trail will draw pedestrians from downtown into the Susan B. Anthony neighborhood, where both the famous suffragist and the civil rights crusader Frederick Douglass once lived.

"It's to bridge that gap between downtown and the Susan B. Anthony neighborhood, because 490 is such a formidable barrier," said city landscape architect Jeff Mroczek.

John E. Curran, a downtown resident and planner for the grass-roots group Neighbors United, said the trail could uncover "a number of historic treasures." The faded Franklin Roosevelt mural on a building on West Main might pop out. Or the beauty of the building where Nick Tahou Hots is located.

Ultimately, the trail — in conjunction with a creative reuse of the original canal bed — could be key in revitalizing Rochester's historic section, said Curran, who also is a member of the Subway Erie Canal Revitalization group.

"If we can improve the Susan B. Anthony neighborhood, we're beginning to develop the west side, which has really been ignored," he said.

Additionally, the city plans to invest in enhancements along the West Main Street corridor between Broad Street and Jefferson Avenue. Improvements would include: reconstruction of sidewalks; gateway piers (at Canal Street and Madison); historic plaques inlaid in the sidewalk; new tree grates; planters; period lighting and brick-paved crosswalks.

Also, a vacant lot would be landscaped to provide a neighborhood gathering space and greater visibility to an adjacent parking lot; the site where Anthony cast her first vote would be memorialized with a brick plaza and historic plaque; and, between Canal and Broad streets, a historic plaque and sidewalk would be placed along the path where the Genesee Valley Canal once crossed West Main Street.

The project — of which $250,000 would be covered by a grant secured by Assemblyman David Gantt, D-Rochester, and the rest by capital improvement funds from the city — could be put out to bid as early as this fall, Mroczek said.

http://democratandchronicle.com/graphics/news/canaltrailroute.jpg

This story isnt development, but the video shows all of the new building going on in the St Paul Qtr: http://www.13wham.com/news/local/story.aspx?content_id=7A3918FC-04FC-4D18-A6B6-CA88F33E6BAB

RochesterAddict

June 15th, 2006, 04:33 PM

BOTTOMED OUT
City Newspaper

Rochester, says William H. Hudnut, III, has "bottomed out." And that, he adds, is a good thing.

Hudnut is a senior fellow with the Urban Land Institute --- a Washington D.C.-based research group that studies land use --- the former mayor of Indianapolis, and a former Rochesterian. In the area last week to speak at NeighborWorks Rochester's annual luncheon, Hudnut talked with City about what Rochester could do to turn itself into a thriving urban center. We are sitting in Bennigan's Grill and Tavern overlooking East Main Street. Hudnut says he remembers when this street really was Main Street.

Just out of sight is MidtownPlaza. "If it's failing, why keep it?" Hudnut asks. While not directly involved with the Urban Land Institute's analysis of Rochester's downtown, Hudnut's thinking squares with that of his colleagues. In addition to supporting their recommendation to demolish Midtown (except for the tower), Hudnut agrees with ULI analysts that Rochester can sustain 5,000 to 7,000 new downtown housing units.

In the five years since he last visited the area, Hudnut says, Rochester officials have not done enough to promote downtown development. Neighborhoods, though, seem to be making a comeback, says Hudnut, who drove around some of Rochester's hot and not-so-hot spots prior to his talk. "I can see positive changes like in the Swillburg neighborhood compared to several years ago," he says.

But Hudnut, a strong proponent of regionalism, thinks poor cooperation between the city and surrounding municipalities is one of the biggest impediments to growth. "You can't be a suburb of nothing," he says. "You need to have a downtown that is vital or revitalized to make it work." While he says he understands that both the city and county have financial problems, he says that certain measures, such as integrating the area's police forces or purchasing operations, could save money.

And he hesitates to endorse the city's recent proposal to take over control of Durand Eastman beach from the county. "I bet you a lot of people that use that beach are not city residents," he says. "They're county residents. The county, I think, has the moral responsibility to help with these recreational activities."

What area leaders need to do, says Hudnut, is create discussion groups where people can air concerns and discuss solutions. He points to the adoption of "Unigov" in Indianapolis, a form of metropolitan government which merged some of that area's government departments and services.

Rochester should also avoid certain pitfalls, namely thinking too big, says Hudnut. "I think you have to begin small and not look for the big hit," he says. Thinking small for Hudnut means, among other things, supporting small business initiatives and demolishing vacant houses. And Rochester, he says, should start by revitalizing its center city. "Cities die from the inside out, not the outside in," he says. "So it's important, I think, to begin at the inside

Voice of business may get a boost

2 private area alliances consider joining forces
Democrat and Chronicle
http://democratandchronicle.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060614/BUSINESS/606140320/1001
Businesses that need advice on matters ranging from human resources to public policy and globalization — or are considering relocating to Rochester — might soon have a single organization looking out for their interests.

Greater Rochester Enterprise and the Rochester Business Alliance, the two private organizations principally concerned with boosting business in the region, may join forces.

The boards of the two organizations said Tuesday they have agreed to form a study committee to explore the benefits of a merger, which, if it occurs, could take place by year's end.

A combination would put GRE's mission as the primary player in marketing Rochester as an economic destination under the same umbrella with RBA's more traditional role as a provider of information, advocacy and human resource and networking services.

The ultimate goal of a merger, officials at both organizations said, would be to create "a single, more powerful resource" to support business on a range of common interests.

A combination, officials said, would potentially reduce redundancy — the organizations have 15 common board members — and improve efficiency.

Though the two organizations have distinct missions, "we both decided we should look at this to see if having one voice speaking for the business community would be a good thing," said Martin Mucci, chairman of the RBA's board and a senior executive at Paychex Corp.

The study would be conducted by a 12-person committee, with the RBA and GRE each appointing six members.

The committee's role will be to determine if a merger is feasible and beneficial and draft a plan, perhaps to be completed by year's end.

If completed, it would mark the third major economic development consolidation of the last four years.

The IMC, which principally served the area's industrial sector, merged with the Greater Rochester Metro Chamber of Commerce to create the RBA. Earlier this year, the Rump Group — an ad-hoc group of chief executives formed to advocate for public policy change — came together with the RBA.

Any merger would seek to preserve the independent missions of each group, said Wayne LeChase, chairman of GRE, which was founded in 2001 to work on recruiting new and retaining existing businesses and aggressively market the region.

Like Mucci, LeChase, head of LeChase Construction Services, is a member of the study committee.

"I feel that this committee will find a way to bring the strengths of both organizations together," LeChase said. "They're going to look at creating more efficient, more succinct operations."

Talk of a merger comes in a year when the RBA has sounded a clarion call for economic change.

The organization played the lead role in creating "Unshackle Upstate," an agenda calling for a range of economic reforms to benefit the state's business climate. More than two dozen business organizations have signed on to the agenda. The state Legislature has yet to act on the agenda's recommendations.

Meanwhile, GRE has been taking an inventory of the region's strengths, establishing contacts with site selectors, corporate relocation executives and local CEOs in a bid to present Rochester as the place to be for business. The GRE is in the middle of a $14 million, five-year funding cycle. It also receives about $50,000 a year from the County of Monroe Industrial Development Agency, which generates revenue primarily from fees.

Monroe County Executive Maggie Brooks said she would let the individual organizations determine if a merger is the right step. But she said she was pleased to see discussions about streamlining economic development, which she believes is the region's top priority.

"My only goal is that we make sure we always have economic development at the forefront," she said, noting that streamlining "gives us the best chance for success."

Carlos Carballada, a former banking executive and now economic development director for Rochester Mayor Robert Duffy, said structure was not as important to him as results.

It is important, he said, for the community to collaborate and remove bureaucratic hurdles to job creation. Both the RBA and GRE have reached out to Carballada in his short time in office, he said. "We're all in this together," he said, "and so far, that's the reaction I've gotten."

A GRE investor agreed, saying that having a unified organization would help. "One contact point for economic development in the Rochester area makes the most sense," said Bob Moore, of Moore Corporate Real Estate, an investor in GRE. "If this is the best way to go about that, I'm in favor it."

Booster group receives award
Democrat and Chronicle

Greater Rochester Enterprise is being recognized for its work by New York state.

The privately led economic development group received a "Best of Class" award for a recent brochure on the area's food and beverage industry from the New York State Economic Development Council. GRE also received a certificate of excellence for an advertisement promoting the region's success in attracting pasta-maker Barilla America to Avon.

Survey: Firms optimistic about hiring
Rochester Business Journal

Rochester-area businesses continue to show optimism in terms of future hiring plans, a Manpower Inc. poll of employer work force plans indicates.
Half of the businesses interviewed for the Manpower Employment Outlook Survey said they plan to increase hiring in the third quarter, up from 47 percent in the second quarter.
Thirty percent of businesses here forecast no change in hiring plans, down from 33 percent last quarter. Some 8 percent expect to decrease staffing in the coming quarter, up from 3 percent in the second quarter. Twelve percent of area businesses said they were unsure of their hiring plans, down from 17 percent last quarter.
Job prospects appear best in construction, durable and non-durable goods manufacturing, transportation/public utilities, wholesale/retail trade, finance/insurance, real estate, education and services. Hiring in public administration is expected to remain unchanged.
Some 24 percent of Buffalo-area businesses expect to increase their staff in the third quarter, up from 20 percent last quarter. Forty-four percent expect no change in staffing, unchanged from the second quarter. Some 32 percent of businesses were unsure of their hiring plans in the next quarter, up from 20 percent last quarter.
In the Syracuse area, a quarter of businesses forecast an increase in staffing in the next quarter, down from 32 percent in the second quarter. Some 53 percent of employers expect no change, down from 63 percent. Two percent forecast a decrease in hiring next quarter, down from 8 percent.
Statewide, one third of businesses expect to increase staffing levels in the next quarter, up from 29 percent last quarter. Some 57 percent of businesses expect no change in staffing levels in the coming quarter, compared with 58 percent last quarter. Five percent of businesses statewide expect to reduce their payrolls in the next quarter, down from 7 percent last quarter.
The Rochester area continued to fare better than the national outlook. Some 31 percent of businesses nationally expect to add to their staff during the third quarter, roughly unchanged from last quarter.
The Manpower survey is based on interviews with some 16,000 public and private companies in 470 markets across the country.

Landlords' costs force likely uptick in rents
Democrat and Chronicle

But increases lower here than elsewhere, experts say
The Rochester area remains a high-rent market compared with other cities, and tenants should expect to pay even more if their leases expire during the summer months.

However, it could be worse.

An affordable house-buying market, historically low interest rates and other factors have made the rental market much more competitive, keeping the price increases below what they have been in other cities.

"It's soft," said Joseph Hanna, owner and founder of Hanna Properties. "There are more vacancies now as there have been historically."

Higher gas and energy costs have hit landlords. Several interviewed in the last two weeks said they are absorbing most of the increased costs and passing on modest rent increases.

Hanna, who owns many properties in the popular neighborhood around Park Avenue, decided he had to pass on some of the utility costs this year after bills at some buildings increased by as much as 70 percent. He now is raising rents $5 to $12 a month when leases are up.

Tenants Alicia and Aaron Cook said the increase in the cost of doing laundry foreshadowed the $10 rent increase notice. When they first moved in almost a year ago during the height of the Hurricane Katrina crisis, the laundry charge went up from $1.25 to $1.50 a load because of the cost of natural gas.

It's only a 1.5 percent rent increase, but the couple already thought the $840 a month for a two-bedroom apartment was a bit high, even though it's about $100 cheaper than they would have paid in their native Birmingham, Ala. "We weren't excited about it," said Aaron Cook, 28, a dentist completing a residency at Rochester General Hospital. "But we have a nice view and we look at it as a bargain."

The U.S. census in 2000 showed that nearly 46 percent of renters in the Rochester area spent at least 30 percent of their incomes on rent and utilities. Only five U.S. metro areas had a higher-cost market.

A report released in January shows that the market still shows the same trends. The Housing Council of Rochester and Monroe County found that, on average, renters in Monroe County are paying more than 35 percent of their incomes on rent and utilities.

The average holds across all races and income levels for renters from 2003 to 2005, said Anne Peterson, executive director of The Housing Council and a Democrat and Chronicle real estate columnist.

"They are operating on the outer fringes of their income," she said. Ideally, you shouldn't be paying more than 35 percent of your income.

Downtown rents — excluding subsidized housing — also have increased, but that is partially because of new high-end developments such as Corn Hill Landing. The Rochester Downtown Development Corp. says the average rent from January to March 2005 was $655. During the same period this year, the cost was $796.

Rents across the nation are increasing, Peterson said.

Yet rents are going up because of demand in fast-growing cities such as Atlanta and Las Vegas and the largest metro areas such as New York City, she said.

In Rochester, they are increasing mainly because of the "cost of doing business and the cost of energy," Peterson said.

Kristen Miller, 26, rents a $750 two-bedroom apartment on Park Avenue with a roommate. "It's a little high for my taste," she said of the cost.

She and her roommate are currently shopping for a house in Webster and believe they can find a house for which the monthly mortgage payments are cheaper than their rent.

The housing market continues to outpace the Rochester economy as a whole, adding a layer of competition that landlords didn't always have.

"They can buy a house for $100,000; Rochester is unique in that situation," said Rick Snoddy, owner of Goodman Realty.

Landlords must decide whether they want to fill vacancies by offering incentives or lower rents, or by recovering some of their costs for utility increases and a new ordinance that requires them to rid their structures of lead paint.

Home Properties Inc., one of the area's — and the nation's — largest apartment managers, last winter tagged a $30 to $35 surcharge on rents from November to April for its local properties.

"People do recognize that heating costs have gone up," said Charis Warshof, Home Properties' vice president of investor relations, noting that the company has seen heating costs increase more than 20 percent over the past two to three years. "Nobody likes (surcharges). We don't like it."

Rochester is a more expensive market than other upstate cities, Warshof said.

To conserve energy, area apartment managers have bought more energy-efficient furnaces and increased the cost of laundry as well.

"We're picking nickels and dimes, but it's not making up for the big pieces we are facing," Hanna said. "The market won't allow it."

The "For rent" and "Apartment available" signs that dot the lawns down Park Avenue, East Avenue — prime spots for serial renters and young professionals — are a telling story of the market. Some landlords have added perks to entice renters, including a month of free rent, reduced security fees, and looser pet policies.

However, even renters who are getting good deals are checking things out.

Matt DeKratel, 29, a longtime renter, says he can't complain about the monthly $345, plus utilities he pays for a house he rents with roommates on Park Avenue. But lately he's been just looking.

Andrew Cardona, 28, said you don't have to buy a house to find a bargain. He was paying $560 a month for his apartment in the Park Avenue area. But he recently found another one-bedroom for $480 a month.

"I'd say it's more of a renters' market. A lot of landlords can't fill their apartments," Cardona said.

Interesting...

Area homes undervalued
Democrat and Chronicle

Houses in Rochester are among the most undervalued in the nation, according to a study released this week.

With an average house price of $114,800 for January, February and March, Rochester ranked among the 25 most undervalued metro areas among 317 regions. The study by National City Corp. and consulting firm Global Insight concludes that the region's houses are priced 9 percent below what the market could bear.

Area real estate professionals say higher property taxes keep prices down.

The situation, though, means that houses are more attractive to outside investors who want to become landlords or turn a house for profit, they said.

The affordability of houses also is something that economic development officials point to as a recruiting strength.

The new study looked at factors such as income and unemployment and determined what the average price should be.

The region's house prices are lower because the population isn't growing as rapidly as in some other cities, said Thomas Schnorr, president of ReMax First in Greece and Brighton.

But because Rochester is considered an undervalued market, it has become more attractive to outside buyers, Schnorr said.

The local economy and high property taxes have kept home prices lower in the area, said Stacey Spoto, associate broker at Hunt ERA/Columbus Division in Brighton. A family that could afford a $500,000 house elsewhere might only be able to afford a $300,000 house here because of the higher taxes.

Study ranks housing prices compared with what the market could bear:
1. Naples, Fla. , +103%
2. Salinas, Calif. , +79%
96. N.Y.C.-White Plains, +26%
276. Buffalo, -6%
294. Rochester, -9%
316. Dallas -19%

The Battle for Event Dollars
13 WHAM

On Thursday, CMAC, the newly rehabbed performing arts center in Canandaigua, officially reopens. PAETEC Park, Rochester’s new soccer stadium, opened two weeks ago.

Those openings mean there are now five major venues in the area vying for entertainment dollars. Although each venue has its own niche, all could compete to attract other groups and performers.

Jeff Calkins, who runs the Blue Cross Arena in downtown Rochester, says the competition is not a bad problem for the area.

"Some cities will not have enough venues and you lose events because you can't satisfy larger groups, larger events,” Calkins said.

The venues will also be competing for sponsors who only have so many advertising dollars to spend.
Watch video here: http://www.13wham.com/news/local/story.aspx?content_id=7496F0FF-0119-44DD-9AA4-88CB85BE3D54

RochesterAddict

June 15th, 2006, 04:51 PM

Donbuy looks like your company is receiving VERY different economic information than this company is, with only 1-2 malls being built nationwide per year, and maybe 10 lifestyle centers a year, Rochester could be the first city in upstate NY to get a lifestyle center/mall in a long time.

Chili shopping center proposal
News 10

"No Mall On Paul", hundreds of signs with that slogan have been posted in Chili. What is all the controversy about? A development company out of Cincinnati is proposing to build a shopping center on Paul Rd. But not all neighbors are on board with the idea. “Our concerns are the traffic, because we get some much traffic the small street as it is now,” Shirley McGavern said. She has lived off this road for more than 15 years.
The idea of North American Properties is to develop the land on Paul Rd. into an open-air shopping center. “They’re not asking for any tax breaks. This will bring shopping and development to the area, but we are limited because there is very little space left in the center of the town to develop,” Chili Town Supervisor Tracy Logel said. The town's supervisors try to stay neutral, but she says traffic should not be a problem with this proposal. "I think that with proper planning, the development of this size with the wide turn in lanes, that would not be that big an issue,” Logel said. Neighbors are also concerned about losing green space. Some say development here would change the fates of their neighborhood. "I’m really concerned about every time you look around there is at Wal-Mart or one of these stores taking out the green space,” McGavern said. “I really resent that.” The supervisor is hoping the community will look at what is best for the town overall. “If this is our last place to develop commercially, do we want to prevent it from being developed commercially? And forever locked the town in to not having any more growth from services and taxes that would be provided for us,” Supervisor Logel said. Still, some of those who would live by the proposed development not want to see change.
The plan was tabled at Tuesday night's town planning board meeting. It will be brought up again in about a month.
Watch video here: http://whec.com/newspoll.asp?template=item&story_id=19211

The Paul mall

Planning board poised to undergird local influence
Democrat and Chronicle

The Town of Chili Planning Board should vote tonight to bolster its role in deciding the future of a proposed 345,000-square-foot shopping complex.

Whether the rezoning request sought by developers of the project should be approved is another critical topic to be decided later, when more information is obtained. But for now, the Planning Board should accede to North American Properties' immediate request that it become the lead agency for state environmental quality review. Doing so would give the planning board the upper hand in shaping or denying the project. That's as it should be: local control. Already there is vocal opposition to building the 53-acre shopping center on Paul Road. Neighborhood residents complain that the complex would cause heavy traffic and the flooding of nearby Beaver Creek.

Such concerns are legitimate. But they also could be satisfactorily addressed. Paul Road, for example, could be widened as nearby Chili Avenue was a decade ago to accommodate increased traffic resulting from a new Wegmans supermarket in Chili. Similar concerns were addressed after plans were unveiled for a Super Wal-Mart that replaced the Westgate shopping center in Gates.

Still, North American Properties may have to rethink its desired Paul Road site. The town's updated master plan recommends restricting commercial development to the Chili Center area.

Too, town residents also should start thinking about a compromise. Commercial development would help offset rising property taxes in the town. And it's still unclear whether Chili could lose $1.3 million in sales tax revenue under a redistribution formula proposed by Monroe County Executive Maggie Brooks to pay the county's Medicaid tab.

Starting tonight, the Planning Board can help put the town in the driver's seat to position its future.

RITE AID REDUX

Developer's eyes are back on this Monroe Avenue block.
City Newspaper

Developer Fred Rinaldi is back with another proposal to tear down the old Monroe movie theater, now the home of adult-entertainment business Show World. Rinaldi has submitted plans to the city that call for demolishing the theater, the apartment building at the corner of Monroe and South Goodman Street, and two houses on Amherst Street.

But Rochester Zoning Director Art Ientilucci says its unlikely that the city will approve the proposal. "In every way the plan is deficient," he says. "The façade design is very poor in relation to the streets. The orientation of the building is poor in relation to the street. There's too much parking. It's detrimental to the Amherst Street frontage. It's detrimental to development along Monroe Avenue ...." Ientilucci takes a breath. "Unfortunately there's not much merit to this plan."

About seven years ago, recalls former Southeast Area Coalition leader Mary Wells, Rinaldi submitted a similar plan. At that time, however, Rinaldi proposed both a Rite Aid and a Wendy's restaurant on the site. This time, the fast food restaurant has been replaced with a larger Rite Aid, with a drive-through. After the city rejected his initial plan, Rinaldi proposed keeping the theater intact and putting the Rite Aid inside it, says Wells. But even that plan seriously deviated from the city's design standards, says Ientilucci.

As for the current plan: Rite Aid can apply for variances --- a potentially huge task --- or go back to the drawing board, Ientilucci says.

Rinaldi did not respond to requests for an interview.

I can only pray that Show World comes down! Id love to see a lifestyle center built on this plot or condos.

Walgreens not welcomed by all

Chain faces several community protests
Democrat and Chronicle

Town officials trying to stimulate a sluggish economy are welcoming Walgreens, the pharmacy chain with the largest volume of sales in the nation.

But Walgreens' arrival has also presented challenges to communities. They must make these stores, which average more than 14,000 square feet, fit into congested areas while addressing neighborhood concerns.

Over the past year, two Walgreens stores have opened in Gates and Irondequoit. A third is under construction in Penfield. A site is ready for building in Brighton, while another is being cleared in Henrietta. Additional Walgreens are slated for Chili, Greece, Irondequoit and Webster.

But the chain has learned that a one-size-fits-all approach doesn't work here.

In Brighton, the town is requiring that at least 60 percent of sales at the new store be pharmaceutical and is requiring that the developer put in sidewalks.

In Webster, some citizens — dissatisfied with the short buffer between the planned store and their homes — have filed a lawsuit.

The planned Walgreens in Chili is now in the courts because several residents are determined to preserve the 192-year-old Stagecoach Inn.

In Penfield, the developer and the town agreed that only contractors from Monroe and adjoining counties could work there. Protests have continued there because unions want a commitment from Walgreens to use union labor — with guarantees of adequate health care.

And for the proposed Walgreens in Irondequoit, the developer reduced the size of the store from 14,550 square feet to 11,572 square feet after the Planning Board expressed concerns that it would block the view of nearby businesses.
Carol Hively, spokeswoman for the Walgreen Co., which is based in Deerfield, Ill, said that controversies such as these are unusual. She declined to say how Walgreens intends to address the issues.

Walgreens' push

The new stores are part of a national push by Walgreens to open about 500 additional stores a year, with the total reaching close to 5,500 by the end of the summer. The senior population locally is projected to grow 38 percent over the next two decades.

"As that part of the population gets older, they tend to use more prescription drugs," Hively said.

Almost half of the population nationwide takes a prescription drug over the course of a month. Currently, 150 pharmacies exist in Monroe County, according to statistics compiled by the local Health Economics Group Inc.

Hively said that the extensiveness of Walgreens offerings and services sets it apart from its competition — with its typical store stocking 25,000 nonpharmaceutical items.

Walgreens officials won't say how many stores are projected here, other than to note that 77 of its 5,251 stores now open are in New York state.

What is clear is that the company does not shy away from competition. In Henrietta, for example, the company wants a store at East Henrietta and Calkins roads — a CVS, Eckerd Pharmacy and a Wegmans with a pharmacy are already there.

"It's a business decision. I guess they want to be near their competitors. I hope they all make it," said James Breese, Henrietta's supervisor.

Demolition of the former Henrietta Sym's store — the site of the new Walgreens — began this week.

"You look for a prime intersection, where there is a signal light, where there is traffic and a lot of people living nearby, and that it's convenient to get there," added Guy Hart Jr., a partner in the Syracuse-based HDL Property Group, the developer for most of the local Walgreens.

Because location is so important to Walgreens, towns have to take extra care in making sure a site is right for the community.

The Brighton example

Brighton Supervisor Sandra Frankel said that, even though the northwest corner of South Clinton and Elmwood Avenue was zoned for office space, a Walgreens seemed like a good fit because demand exists from nearby doctor's offices, Strong Memorial Hospital and neighbors.

In 2005, the town made an agreement with HDL Property saying it could build at that busy corner but only if certain conditions were met. Walgreens had to provide sidewalks at the intersection and have at least 60 percent of its revenue come from prescription sales. That's because the town wanted to ensure the store would not drive out nearby convenience stores and would stay suitable for the corner.

The town also required the developer to use 90 percent local labor.

In clearing the property for construction, HDL Property four times dipped below that 90 percent requirement, prompting Frankel to issue a stop-work order in late January. Hart said that the agreement was not met because a Lockport contractor that did the demolition took longer than he had expected.

Frankel said she is hopeful work on the project can begin soon but gave no timetable.

Planning board criticized

The controversy in Chili focuses on why the Walgreens slated for the town has to be at the site of the Stagecoach Inn, at Union Street and Buffalo Road.

Jim Martin, chairman of the town's Planning Board, said there's nothing the board can do to stop the sale, especially since the inn is not on any kind of registry. But residents questioned whether the Planning Board adequately considered the importance of this building in its review, and they sued.

The debate before the Planning Board in December focused on what constitutes historic relevance. "If the White House was not on the National Register, would it be less historic?" asked Keith O'Toole, the assistant town attorney.

The controversy in Webster crystallized earlier this year when a group of homeowners filed a lawsuit against the town Planning Board and the developers of a proposed strip mall of about 9 acres that includes a Walgreens.

The lawsuit contends that the development should have been set back 200 feet rather than the 100 feet set by the Planning Board. Hart said there is an agreement — not yet announced — to settle the lawsuit that would increase the buffer space.

But some of the residents in the Pepper Ridge subdivision bordering the proposed development said the Planning Board had let them down.

"They are supposed to protect the residents of the town, and they didn't on a lot of the issues," said David McLellan, 42, president of the Pepper Ridge Homeowners Association.

Webster Planning Board Chairman Tony Casciani disputes the claim, noting there will be an 18-foot-high barrier to separate the planned development from the housing.

"What the heck do you do to accommodate people?" Casciani said.

I thought this was interesting...
About Walgreens

Walgreens has a local connection. Kathleen B. Walgreen is a native of Rochester and chairwoman of the Walgreen Drug Stores Historical Foundation. She is the wife of Charles Walgreen III, former chairman and CEO, who is grandson of the founder. She graduated from Our Lady of Mercy High School in 1961 and established a scholarship at the school.

Buffalo has New Era, Rochester has Alleson Athletic...

Alleson Athletic breaks ground
Rochester Business Journal

Athletic apparel company Alleson of Rochester Inc. Wednesday broke ground on the expansion of its warehouse distribution operation and call center in Henrietta.
Alleson will invest $3.5 million in the project, which is expected to create 50 jobs. Monroe County Executive Maggie Brooks joined Alleson owner William Levine and other state and local officials for the groundbreaking.
The manufacturer and distributor of athletic wear will build and equip a 52,000-square-foot addition to its 76,000-square-foot headquarters and distribution center on Brighton-Henrietta Town Line Road. Alleson currently employs 73.
“Alleson Athletic is one of our community’s great success stories,” Brooks said.
Monroe County provided a $100,000 low-interest loan from the Monroe County Revolving Loan Fund, in addition to a $50,000 low-interest loan from the Community Development Block Grant program. The County of Monroe Industrial Development Agency and Empire State Development Corp. offered a $150,000 capital grant to be used to offset construction and machinery costs associated with the project, county officials said.

Alleson Athletic Expanding
13 WHAM

Alleson Athletic is expanding its facility and creating 50 new jobs.

The $3.5 million expansion will add 52,000 square feet to the company’s corporate headquarters and distribution center on Brighton-Henrietta Town Line Road.

A news release said the firm considered Texas and Tennessee for the expansion.

Monroe County provided low-interest loans, and the state kicked in a $150,000 capital grant.

The company makes and distributes athletic apparel.

Sports firm breaks ground
Democrat and Chronicle

Monroe County Executive Maggie Brooks joined the owners of Henrietta-based Alleson Athletic Wednesday to break ground on a 52,000-square-foot call center and warehouse and distribution facility. The 73-year-old family-owned sports apparel company, which had considered expanding in Texas or Tennessee, chose to grow locally as a result of numerous county and state incentives.

Alleson received $350,000 in loans and grants and $461,000 in property, sales and mortgage tax abatement from the Monroe County's Industrial Development Agency.

"Alleson Athletic is one of our community's great success stories," Brooks said. "We know that companies have a choice in where they do business and I thank Alleson Athletic for its commitment to expanding its operations locally."

Sorry, Im done for today...lol

ROCguy

June 15th, 2006, 06:02 PM

Well damn.... you posted just about every story in the D&C today. lol. Well, here is an editorial evaluating the plans for revitalizing the canal bed. I think this guy hit the nail on the head......

Canal restoration

Lots of good ideas, but jobs must remain top priority

(June 15, 2006) — What's there not to like about plans for reviving the Erie Canal in downtown Rochester that include ripping up Broad Street and allowing boaters to use the old canal bed?

Such plans fit nicely with visions of the Renaissance Square complex, a redesigned Midtown Plaza and a plethora of new market-rate housing units that would place Rochester among cities with vibrant downtowns.

Requesting $300,000 in federal aid to study restoring the canal bed and at least a dozen other alternative uses is reasonable. The request, which is being prepared by Mayor Duffy's administration, is certainly preferable to using $9.8 million in federal money originally earmarked to fill in the Erie Canal subway tunnel with dirt.

Still, the Duffy administration must not lose sight of its three top priorities, which reasonably focus on economic development, public safety and education.

As former city councilman Brian Curran points out: "The crucial need for Rochester is the creation of jobs, jobs that pay a livable wage." He's also right that in all the so-called "blue-skying" about redeveloping the Erie Canal bed, there has been little to indicate such a project would create substantial numbers of jobs.

While Curran raises points that put a damper on the enthusiasm about the prospect of utilizing natural waterways to stir downtown development, it shouldn't be dismissed that there are big differences between Rochester and, say, San Antonio. Much has been made of how the Texas city used its downtown waterway to help revitalize its downtown. But remember, San Antonio is a fast-growing city with many big-city amenities. It also doesn't have to be concerned about its waterway freezing during winter.

Again, the Duffy administration should move forward with plans for a thorough study of the many exciting ideas for the canal bed and subway tunnel.

But creating jobs that keep talented young people in this community and attract others as well as families must remain the top priority. Growing the economy, after all, will ensure the success of plans for the canal and all the other projects on the drawing board for downtown Rochester.

RochesterAddict

June 15th, 2006, 07:32 PM

The editorial does have an excellent point, but there is another side as well.
No company wants to move to a depressing city with no sort of vibrancy. The door swings both ways. Both jobs and recreation should develop at the same time to ensure success. But this is the real world and we all know that doesnt always happen. So I will take jobs or investment and hope that one sparks the other. Optimism is ALWAYS the best policy. You have to spend money to make money. And life is about chances, you havent lived if you dont take a chance every once in a while. That is why the ferry will NEVER be viewed as a failure in my eyes, they took a chance and it didnt work. So what? (They also didnt give it long enough or advertise.) Bill Gates wouldnt be the richest man in the world if Jobs and himself didnt take a chance on the home PC. The center city is the heart of Monroe county, dream, spend and invest in it! Rochester is too conservative too often.

Jerome

June 15th, 2006, 09:14 PM

And they only lost 100, what's the deal in Rochester, I thought Rocboy said the losses would diappear this month?

Albany-Schenectady-Troy: Since May 2005, the number of jobs has increased by 3,300, or 0.7 percent, and the number of private sector jobs has increased by 3,900, or 1.1 percent. The area's unemployment rate was 3.7 percent in May 2006, compared with 3.9 in April and 3.7 in May 2005.

Binghamton: Since May 2005, the number of jobs was unchanged, and the number of private sector jobs increased by 100, or 0.1 percent. The area's unemployment rate was 4.4 percent in May 2006, compared with 4.8 in April and 4.6 in May 2005.

Buffalo-Niagara Falls: Since May 2005, the number of jobs has decreased by 300, or 0.1 percent, and the number of private sector jobs was unchanged. The area's unemployment rate was 4.9 percent in May 2006, compared with 5.4 in April and 5.2 in May 2005.

Elmira: Since May 2005, the number of jobs has increased by 100, or 0.2 percent, and the number of private sector jobs has increased by 100, or 0.3 percent. The area's unemployment rate was 5.0 percent in May 2006, compared with 5.1 in April and 5.3 in May 2005.

Glens Falls: Since May 2005, the number of jobs and the number of private sector jobs are both unchanged. The area's unemployment rate was 4.1 percent in May 2006, compared with 4.8 in April and 4.2 in May 2005.

Ithaca: Since May 2005, the number of jobs increased by 100, or 0.2 percent, and the number of private sector jobs has decreased by 100, or 0.2 percent. The area's unemployment rate was 3.0 percent in May 2006, compared with 2.9 in April and 3.0 in May 2005.

Kingston: Since May 2005, the number of jobs has increased by 700, or 1.1 percent, and the number of private sector jobs has increased by 600, or 1.2 percent. The area's unemployment rate was 4.0 percent in May 2006, compared with 4.2 in April and 4.0 in May 2005.

Nassau-Suffolk: Since May 2005, the number of jobs has increased by 7,600, or 0.6 percent, and the number of private sector jobs has increased by 6,700, or 0.6 percent. The area's unemployment rate was 3.8 percent in May 2006, compared with 4.0 in April and 3.9 in May 2005.

New York City (five boroughs): Since May 2005, the number of jobs has increased by 58,200, or 1.6 percent, and the number of private sector jobs has increased by 57,500, or 1.9 percent. The area's unemployment rate was 4.6 percent in May 2006, compared with 5.1 in April and 5.4 in May 2005.

Poughkeepsie-Newburgh-Middletown: Since May 2005, the number of jobs increased by 2,400, or 0.9 percent, and the number of private sector jobs increased by 1,300, or 0.6 percent. The area's unemployment rate was 3.9 percent in May 2006, compared with 4.0 in April and 3.9 in May 2005.

Putnam-Rockland-Westchester: Since May 2005, the number of jobs has increased by 4,500, or 0.8 percent, and the number of private sector jobs has increased by 4,700, or 1.0 percent. The area's unemployment rate was 3.8 percent in May 2006, compared with 3.9 in April and 3.9 in May 2005.

Rochester: Since May 2005, the number of jobs has decreased by 7,400, or 1.4 percent, and the number of private sector jobs has decreased by 7,600, or 1.7 percent. The area's unemployment rate was 4.5 percent in May 2006, compared with 4.7 in April and 4.5 in May 2005.

Syracuse: Since May 2005, the number of jobs has increased by 4,000, or 1.2 percent, and the number of private sector jobs has increased by 3,300, or 1.2 percent. The area's unemployment rate was 4.5 percent in May 2006, compared with 4.8 in April and 4.8 in May 2005.

Utica-Rome: Since May 2005, the number of jobs has increased by 300, or 0.2 percent, and the number of private sector jobs has increased by 300, or 0.3 percent. The area's unemployment rate was 4.3 percent in May 2006, compared with 4.7 in April and 4.7 in May 2005.

Susie

June 15th, 2006, 10:30 PM

Jobless rate falls to 4.7 percent in May, but jobs lost

By VELVET SPICER
Rochester Business Journal
June 15, 2006
The Rochester area unemployment rate dipped slightly in May, but the area has lost more than 7,000 jobs in the last year.
The jobless rate fell from 4.7 percent in April to 4.5 percent last month, but was unchanged from a year ago. The number of jobs had a net decrease of 7,400, or 1.4 percent, since May 2005, and the number of private-sector jobs fell by 7,600, or 1.7 percent WOW!!!.
The metropolitan area includes Monroe, Livingston, Ontario, Orleans and Wayne counties. Rochester was joined by Ithaca and the North Country as one of three areas with year-over-year job losses.
Statewide, the unemployment rate decreased to 4.6 percent in May from 4.9 percent in April and 5.1 percent a year ago. Some 73,900 non-farm jobs have been added statewide since April 2005, and private-sector jobs have increased by 70,800, not seasonally adjusted.
From April to May, 3,500 private-sector jobs were added statewide, while 500 non-farm jobs were added on a seasonally adjusted basis.
The manufacturing sector continued its decline with a loss of 18,600 jobs since May 2005. The educational and health services sector showed the steepest increase with 29,100 more jobs over the last year.
The number of unemployed in the Rochester area fell from 24,700 in April to 24,000 last month, but was unchanged from a year ago. The number of employed here increased to 509,400 in May from 504,200 in April, but was down from 511,300 in May 2005.
The number of unemployed in Genesee County fell to 1,500 last month from 1,600 in April, but was unchanged from a year ago.
Unemployment rates for area counties are:
• Monroe County—4.5 percent last month, unchanged from the previous month and the previous year;
• Genesee County—dropped to 4.3 percent in May from 5 percent in April and 4.5 percent the previous year;
• Livingston County—was 4.6 percent last month, compared with 5.1 percent in April and 4.7 percent the previous year;
• Ontario County—was down to 4.2 percent last month from 4.8 percent in April, but was up from 4 percent in May 2005;
• Orleans County—fell to 5.4 percent last month from 6.2 percent in April, but was unchanged from the previous year; and
• Wayne County—was 4.6 percent in May, down from 5 percent in April, but unchanged from May 2005.
The Buffalo area’s jobless rate improved in May to 4.9 percent, compared with 5.4 percent in April and 5.2 percent the previous year. Unemployment in the Syracuse area last month was at 4.5 percent, down from 4.8 percent in April and in May 2005.

Susie

June 15th, 2006, 10:33 PM

(June 15, 2006) — The number of local people with jobs continued to shrink in the year ending in May, according to data released today by the state Department of Labor.

In the five county area, 509,400 people had jobs in May, which was a drop of 1,900 employed people from May 2005, according to the phone survey of households released by the state.

The unemployed numbers, meanwhile, were the same. The jobless rate was 4.5 percent, representing 24,000 unemployed people in May, which was unchanged from the same time last year.

Experts have said this discrepancy might result from people getting so fed up with the local labor market that they stop looking for jobs, retire early, go back to school or leave the area.

The five-county area includes Monroe, Orleans, Livingston, Ontario and Wayne counties.

The state jobless rate was 4.4 percent in May, which was down from the 4.8 percent recorded in May 2005.

JDAVIA@DemocratandChronicle.com

RochesterAddict

June 15th, 2006, 10:40 PM

VIPs to toast new culinary center
Rochester Business Journal

More than 500 state and local officials are expected Friday at a press conference and VIP reception at the New York Wine & Culinary Center.
The $7.5 million center in Canandaigua opens Saturday. The roughly 20,000-square-foot building will promote New York agriculture, including culinary and wine offerings. It is expected to draw some 75,000 visitors a year and contribute $11 million to the local economy annually.
Highlights of the Wine & Culinary Center include a tasting room featuring a rotating selection of New York wines, a hands-on training kitchen and demonstration theater, retail center and garden.
The June 9 print edition of Rochester Business Journal contained extensive coverage of the facility.
The celebration comes a day after Thursday’s unveiling of the Constellation Brands-
Marvin Sands Performing Arts Center, which can hold 15,000 people on the grounds of Finger Lakes Community College. The expanded and updated facility held an open house this afternoon and into the evening that included tours and a performance by the Finger Lakes Concert Band and Rochester City Ballet.

ROCguy

June 15th, 2006, 10:40 PM

Jerome

June 15th, 2006, 10:59 PM

Oh yeah, Buffao's doing real great too. When the hell did I say losses would disapear this month? You need to stop putting words in my mouth. And hey mr. high and mighty, Buffalo ain't doing so hot either. Buffalo had zero growth in the private sector and a loss of 300 overall (therefore you statement that only Rochester and Ithaca saw decreases in jobs was false). What's your beef with Rochester and ME?! What did I ever do to you to make you act like such a bastard towards me and put words in my mouth. Are you susie's husband or something? I was doubting that anyone would marry her, but you two sound like the perfect match.
1) I said Private Sector jobs. I view the fact that we lost governmental jobs a good thing. Rochester on the other hand lost private sector jobs almost 2% and gained 200 governmental jobs. Both are very bad trends.
I am glad to be in an area that is not losing jobs after gaining jobs in most months earlier this year, (some 2,400 in March alone), than in a city that is losing jobs at an ever increasing rate. Are we booming no, but are you dying - yes.

2)I am correct that the only two metros to lose PRIVATE SECTOR jobs were Rochester and Ithaca and Ithaca lost only 100, not the nearly 2% or nearly 8,000 that Rochester lost. If you could read you would see that it is true.

3) I called you on it because you emphatically stated last month that, that months huge job loss was do to ANNOUNCED job cuts at Kodak. You were confident that future months would show a much smaller loss or even a gain. YOU WERE AND ARE WRONG!

ROCguy

June 15th, 2006, 11:51 PM

Well, for one, this month was a smaller loss than last month, smaller by over 1000. I remember what you are talking about now, and I said that Rochester would probably see a sizeable decrease in the numer of jobs lost, or possible increase in the number of jobs gained by August/September. So Rochester's dying when losing 7000 jobs huh? Did Buffalo die whent it lost jobs in the high tens of thousands in the 70's? No. So shut up and get off of your unjustified pedistal.

And FYI... Last year Rochester was gaining jobs in the 7000-8000, with 2000-3000 gaines in the private sector up until July. So don't think either city's near future is set in stone.

http://labor.state.ny.us/workforceindustrydata/apps.asp?reg=fin&app=emp
2005 423.7 424.1 426.0 431.8 435.8 436.7
2004 419.5 422.0 423.7 425.3 432.6 434.6

I've warned you before Jerome and I'll warn you again.... don't hate, it's bad for your digestion. :)

blangjr21

June 16th, 2006, 03:26 AM

OK everyone lets grow up here, you are all rediculous bickering and bantering back and forth. These facts are based on assumption. Yea Rochester has lost 7,600 jobs since may of last year. What are we gonna do about it, doesn't make much sense to continue parading around about it. We had lost YTD in April 8,000+ so now we have since gained 400 from that number big deal. What we need is real numbers, none of this labor stats crap, I want month to month numbers. Besides we all know Kodak will be shedding more jobs soon, so we may as well just figure on thousands more jobless. Jesus christ you all are embarassing.

blangjr21

June 16th, 2006, 04:19 AM

Since nobody else will step up to the plate take a look at the New York State Department of Labor website, now I could be wrong but this is what I get from it.

Total Non-Farm Labor
April 2006: 507,300
May 2006: 512,000
Gain: 4,700
May 2005: 519,400
Losss YTD: 7,400

Total Private Jobs:
April 2006: 422,300
May 2006: 428,300
Gain: 4,900
May 2005: 435,800
Loss YTD: 7,600

The largest gains for the past month have been in the service sector (big surprise there!) 3,400 jobs the past month. Leisure and Hospitality also were large gainers at 2,800. The largest losses were in Education fields (strangely enough) -1,400.

These are the kind of stastical analysis we should be looking at, not some garbage thrown at us by the media, aren't we all smarter than this? Or are we just competing to see who can throw it up here the fastest (every month we look forward to this day susie! and apparently jerome too). Lets be smarter than the media and analyze the data.

Jerome

June 16th, 2006, 02:23 PM

What any economist will tell you is that you must compare the same month this year to last year to get a true picture of the economy to compare March to February is as silly as comparing January to December. If you did that you would see that Rochester lost thousands of jobs in that month. But that would be meaningless since the losses are seasonal as December has a lot of Christmas help that disappears in January. If you knew anything about trending employment growth you would know that only month over prior year month really matters. Drill down further in the DOL website and you will see that the State tracks the data by month for each community for the last several years. You will see that employment is always highest in December and in late spring as is the labor market. You will also see employment take large drops in January and July (because of schools being out of session)

blangjr21 I think this pretty much sums up why your logic of comparing May to April is fatally flawes.

Susie

June 16th, 2006, 04:09 PM

Returning veterans battle local job market

Fewer opportunities exist here now

Joy Davia
Staff writer

(June 16, 2006) — Ryan Erb, 23, gestured at the hunting show on his television. That's what the Herkimer County native would prefer, a house in a rural area, allowing for his favorite hobby.
But on a recent afternoon, Erb was instead lounging in his Brighton apartment with his wife, Misa, 29, and daughter, Mika, 14 months. The couple, following Erb's return last year from active duty with the U.S. Army, settled in Brighton because there were more jobs here than in his rural hometown.
Erb's employment experience since joining the civilian work force in November has been mixed — similar to experiences of other veterans here and nationally. However, local veterans also have to battle the local job market.
Local employment data released Thursday continue to show a steady unemployment rate but a decreasing work force.

Overall, the May jobless rate was 4.5 percent, which was unchanged from the same month last year, according to a phone survey of households. That survey also showed that the area had a year-over-year job loss of 1,900 positions.
When it comes to private employment, the five-county area — Monroe, Orleans, Livingston, Ontario and Wayne counties — shed 1.7 percent of its jobs (7,600 jobs), said a separate employer survey. It was one of two metropolitan areas in the state in which the number of people with jobs didn't grow or remain steady. The Ithaca region was the other area, losing 0.2 percent of such positions.
In some ways, Erb was lucky because his military experience has helped him land jobs. Nationally, veterans tend to have a lower jobless rate than nonveterans, according to a May U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics survey.
Still, the job market isn't as robust as it was six years ago, especially locally, said career officials. While veterans might get a job upon leaving active duty, it might not be the ideal job.
Erb, for example, didn't like his first job as an electronics assembler. His new security job is better, but he'd rather be a police officer and will take that test later this year.
Rochester, about six years ago, used to be a jobs destination for veterans because of the swell of manufacturing jobs here, said Peter Blind, vice president of work force development and human resources for the Veterans Outreach Center.
"It was a lot easier then to help veterans connect with the right kind of job," he said. "There were more opportunities out there and employers were begging for these people."
That is no longer the case, he added, especially given the downsizing of manufacturers such as Eastman Kodak Co.

The Rochester area's employment news for May showed that 80 percent of job losses in the last year were in manufacturing, said Tammy Marino, a senior economist with the state Department of Labor.
The sector dominated by Kodak, called nondurable goods, shed 13 percent, or 4,300 jobs, in the last year.
Transportation equipment manufacturing firms — which include Delphi Corp. and Valeo — had a year-over-year 22 percent drop, losing 1,100 jobs, according to the state-released survey of employers that lists jobs by industry.
But groups such as the outreach center and the local Marine For Life Program — a resource for Marines leaving active duty — said they're trying to counter the stagnant job market by creating their own network of employers to tap for veteran jobs.
Maj. John Baker, who heads the local Marine For Life Program, aims to find companies "that understand the general characteristics of a Marine and knows what they can do," he said.
This could mean finding companies in which a Marine is in a position of power, perhaps with hiring duties.

The outreach center, meanwhile, has a pool of 150 companies that is regularly tapped for veteran jobs. And counselors help the veterans' transition from military life to the civilian work force.
Erb, for example, said it has been a transition switching from patrolling the streets of Baghdad to security at a local yacht club.

He misses being a team leader back in Baghdad. Erb has also adjusted to working with women again (he said he's cleaned up his language, for example) and no longer having a weapon on him all the time.
He also gets antsy working only 40 hours a week.

"I keep thinking that if I work more, I can better provide for my family," Erb said, adding that he could do that in his other job.
"Although this position is a lot better," he said.

JDAVIA@DemocratandChronicle.com

RochesterAddict

June 16th, 2006, 04:34 PM

RochesterAddict

June 16th, 2006, 04:48 PM

CMAC opens in Canandaigua
CMAC ready for first concert
NEWS 10

There was reason to celebrate in Canandaigua on Thursday. It was the grand re-opening of the Constellation Brands-Marvin Sands Performing Arts Center. The biggest change at C-MAC is inside. After nine months of renovations, they've doubled the size. The center has added 2,500 general admission seats and 50 box seats. There are also 10,000 lawn seats to choose from.
The theatre was originally called the Finger Lakes Performing Arts Center, or FLPAC when it opened in 1983. But, their big concert artists started demanding more, they didn't want to perform for small crowds.
The family of the founder of flpac, the Sands family, decided to do a $13 million renovation project. The renovations are complete and none of the money is coming from taxpayers. Most of the money came from 50 community members who made ten year commitments to the box seats.
Bonnie Raitt, Chris Botti and Big & Rich are among the many acts scheduled to perform at C-MAC this summer. The Rochester City Ballet is scheduled to perform Saturday.
Watch Video here: http://whec.com/newspoll.asp?template=item&story_id=19238

The video says that each box seat sold for $100,000 each!

Sneek peak at the New York Wine and Culinary Center

Wine lovers get ready for New York Wine and Culinary Center
NEWS 10

You've heard the slogan "I Love New York." Now a group is banking on the fact that people will love New York State wine and food. Friday afternoon, there's a ribbon cutting for the New York Wine and Culinary Center. It opens to the public Saturday, but Thursday NEWS10 NBC got a sneak peak during another celebration.

It’s not a bad view outside, but it's what's inside the New York Wine and Culinary Center that has people talking.

“The idea of being able to stand around the culinary kitchen, cook amongst your friends and then walk it through to the beautiful dining room and sit down and be able to enjoy it with the wine maker, with the chef, it's pure enthusiasm, tons of fun,” said Ginny Clark of the new project.

Clark works for Fairport-based Constellation Brands, the largest wine company in the world. Richard and Robert Sands are the company's top executives.

They recruited Wegmans, the New York Wine and Grape Foundation and RIT, which has a hotel and food management program. The four partners broke ground in Canandaigua nine months ago on the new facility. They had the thought that perhaps the center could put the spotlight on all that New York agriculture has to offer.

If you try a wine in the wine tasting room you can only buy two bottles of it at the center. After that, you're directed to the New York winery that makes it.

“If people discover a wine that they like in the tasting bar we encourage them to go online right here and contact the winery and have it shipped to their home so we're trying to be a partner in the industry and make sure that everybody gets more business,” said Jim Trezise, of the New York Wine and Grape Foundation.

People who are hungry can go to the center and take cooking classes as well. The classes are easy to follow. Some of the classes are going to be taught for kids, by kids. Deals are also in the works to bring celebrity chefs in to teach classes to the public. The center will also serve as classroom for food service employees and students from Wegmans and RIT. Visitors that enjoy the equipment that chefs are using in the kitchen, such as pots, pans and knives, can buy them right in the culinary store.

For visitors who want to enjoy a free outing, they can visit The Pride of New York Exhibit Hall. They’ll learn that New York is second in the nation for producing apples, third for honey, grapes, and wine, fourth for pears and we have a total of 212 wineries. Many of the growers will be making presentations at the center.

Friday at 2:00 pm, the State Agriculture Commissioner will be in Canandaigua for a ribbon-cutting ceremony. The center does not open to the public until Saturday.

For a list of cooking classes, instructors and everything else you need to know, click here. http://www.nywcc.com/
Watch Video here: http://whec.com/newspoll.asp?template=item&story_id=19239
You can also see hot, hot Jennifer Johnson reporting on the story. :)

Finger Lakes tourism gets a lift

Wine, arts centers should help boost Canandaigua's businesses
Democrat and Chronicle

Wick-edly Sent, a soap and candle store, has given its employees more hours. Sweet Expressions, which sells novelty chocolates, has expanded its "Made in New York" products. The Inn on the Lake has spent $2.5 million on the first phase of a massive renovation. Bristol Harbour Resort will soon launch tour and culinary packages with its overnight stays.

Canandaigua-area businesses are getting ready for what they hope is a banner tourism season, thanks to excitement surrounding the opening of the New York Wine & Culinary Center and the extensive renovation of and bigger concerts at the Constellation Brands-Marvin Sands Performing Arts Center.

On Thursday, dignitaries toured the performing arts center, formerly the Finger Lakes Performing Arts Center, which has undergone a $13 million facelift. Today, more than 100 politicians, including Gov. George Pataki, and tourism industry representatives are expected at the official ribbon-cutting of the wine and culinary center.

Both attractions open to the public on Saturday. The arts center will have free tours starting at 4 p.m., with evening performances by the Finger Lakes Concert Band and the Rochester City Ballet.

"This will really help business, as opposed to last year with (the) economy being tight and gas prices being high," said Don Stevens, co-owner of Wick-edly Sent.

"Everything helps," added Scott Mackey, the other owner. "It has to bring more people in."

Wick-edly Sent is showcasing its wine-themed candles, a popular item pegged to the growing popularity of Finger Lakes wineries. The business is brainstorming ways to partner with the wine and culinary center down the street from the shop.

The summer tourism season is key for Canandaigua, which anchors the north end of the Finger Lake bearing the same name. Tourism revenue comprises 30 percent to 35 percent of sales generated in the city, according to research done by the Canandaigua Chamber of Commerce.

Canandaigua is the county seat of Ontario County, which about 1.5 million people visited in 2003, spending $90 million, according to sales tax data analyzed by the Empire State Development Corp. That was the most recent data available.

For the 14-county Finger Lakes region, tourism added $2.18 billion to the economy in 2004 and 2005, according to the New York state Tourism Promotion Agency Council, a nonprofit that tracks the industry.

About 24 million people each year visit the 14-county Finger Lakes region. The wine and culinary center's goal is to increase that number by 5 percent in five years' time.

"This has huge potential, if the numbers they predict are correct. This has huge potential to contribute to our economy," said Andrew Harkness, president of the Canandaigua chamber.

The performing arts center, in the nearby town of Hopewell on the campus of Finger Lakes Community College, also hopes to increase its draw by thousands because the expanded stage and additional seats under the shell make it worthy competition to the area's other large outdoor concert venue, Darien Lake. Among this year's acts: Bonnie Raitt, Johnny Mathis and Larry the Cable Guy.

The latest boost comes in large part because of the Sands family. The late Marvin Sands founded Canandaigua Wine Co., which grew to become Constellation Brands Inc., the world's largest wine company.

Sands' sons, Richard and Robert, conceived of the wine and culinary center as they saw what other wine regions had established while researching companies for Constellation to acquire. They persuaded Wegmans Food Markets Inc., Rochester Institute of Technology and the New York Wine & Grape Foundation to sign on as partners.

"We believe that certainly Canandaigua should be the center of the New York state wine industry," said Richard Sands, Constellation's chairman and chief executive. "Given Constellation Wine's presence in Canandaigua and Naples ... it makes sense that Canandaigua should be the launching off point" to promote the industry.

The Sandses have also donated money to other Canandaigua organizations such as Thompson Health, the YMCA and Sonnenberg Gardens & Mansion.

Constellation is "one of the major employers (in the region) and Marvin Sands (was) one of the nicest men I've ever met," said Jeff Anthony, owner of Dick Anthony, a men's clothing shop, who added that the family's contributions to Canandaigua are immeasurable.

The Sands family also owns principal interest in the Inn on the Lake next door to the new wine and culinary center, which anchors the south tip of Main Street at the lake.

The upscale hotel, which completed $2.5 million in renovations in May, plans more changes at the property. The upgrade included a new restaurant, Max on the Lake, operated by noted Rochester restaurateur Tony Gullace.

The inn plans joint packages, such as accommodations and cooking classes, with the center.

Nearby restaurants and bars have tapped into the gold mine by expanding their wine menus. There is talk of local restaurants featuring the center's cooking-class dishes with hopes of drawing in more customers, said the chamber's Harkness.

While the early beneficiaries of the center are expected to be hotels, restaurants, gasoline stations and retailers, area officials hope the new venues will result in offshoot industries.

"It's not just more tourists, there will be another wave in a year or two," said Harkness. "In the longer term it supplies more business in the area, it will generate taxes. A lot of the jobs will be good for younger people."

By the numbers
24 million: Number of visitors to the 14-county Finger Lakes region each year.
$2.18 billion: Total annual tourism spending for Finger Lakes region.
3.24: Average number of nights that visitors stay.
$88.80: Average amount spent per person per day.
1.5 million: Number of visitors to Ontario County, including Canandaigua.
$90 million: What visitors spent in Ontario County.

Wine center
What: New York Wine & Culinary Center.
Address: 800 S. Main St., Canandaigua.
Phone: (585) 394-7070.
Web: www.nywcc.com.
Features: Include exhibitions and a garden featuring the state's agricultural products and wine industry; a retail shop; and state-of-the-art kitchens.
Hours: 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday through Saturday; noon to 7 p.m. Sunday for the wine tasting room, exhibit hall and retail shop; 11:30 a.m. to 10 p.m. Monday through Saturday, noon to 7 p.m. Sunday for the Taste of New York Lounge.
Tours: Free guided tours of the center will be offered on the hour during June and July.
Cost: Admission is free, with fees for wine tastings.
Opening weekend: The center will have special classes and seminars on Saturday and Sunday. These events are free and open to the public.
Classes: For a complete schedule of classes and events open to the public, check the Web site.
Backers: Constellation Brands Inc., Wegmans Food Markets Inc., Rochester Institute of Technology, New York Wine & Grape Foundation.

Performing arts center
What: Constellation Brands-Marvin Sands Performing Arts Center.
Address: One Lincoln Hill Road, Hopewell.
Web site: www.rbtl.org/ShowsEvents/FLPAC.aspx.

CMAC by the numbers:
50: New VIP box seats.
5,000: Number of seats now under the amphitheater shell (up from 2,700).
4,500: Square footage of the stage (up from 3,000).
$1.5 million: Amount contributed by Constellation Brands to secure the naming rights.
$13 million: Amount spent on the expansion

Susie

June 16th, 2006, 05:02 PM

Susie

June 16th, 2006, 05:03 PM

Experts have said this discrepancy might result from people getting so fed up with the local labor market that they stop looking for jobs, retire early, go back to school or leave the area.

RochesterAddict

June 16th, 2006, 05:34 PM

Guess I hit a little too close to home. I would not call anyone who is 23 and has a child an adult, obviously they are immature and too dumb to wear a condom. Either that or WT. Where the hell is Herkimer? Im sure its a place that doesn't matter, like Albion. My fantasy world doesnt include you and your lifestyle, that is why I dont understand your side. Thank god. Four of my friends recently in the past 6 months took new jobs at different companies, in all sectors, banking, information technology, sales, and biomedical reserach, that means there are four other jobs that need filling somewhere, if my friends found a new job, others can too. It is always harder to find a job in a small city, but networking, who you know, and your charisma can pay off big in Rochester and other small cities. This is the most mobile generation ever, people are moving to Rochester, and moving away. Numbers are higher for away, so is everywhere but the West and the South. Those are places that had no people ten years ago, its all a cycle. I feel like Im in a cycle! The same topic over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over, Suzanne give it a rest, it is a bore. Yes it may affect your family, but the 50th post on it is enough. We got it, you want to move away, houses are selling well in Rochester, maybe even out in Hamlin? Your info says Buffalo is hiring, are you Polish? Follow the rest of your family, please.

ROCguy

June 16th, 2006, 07:24 PM

Yes Susan, you and Jerome posted that story yesterday with the same bolded info today you bolded yesterday.

That kid is a bad example in that story. He is 23 and has a child, what the hell is a 23 year old doing with a child if he cant afford anything. He is a hick, did you see the picture, scary, I wouldnt hire him either. You are getting your picture taken to be published regionally and u wear your favorite t-shirt and basketball jersey? Please. And the only reason to join the army is if you have no skills or no brains, so did he expect to become CEO of a company when he returned. He is complaining about a job he doesnt like. There is a job for everyone, it may not be a job one likes, but it is a job, and a person with no education who made lots of bad decisions in life should be happy they have anything. Garbage men get paid VERY well, the job may suck, but its a job. If you dont want to do those jobs, go to school, we have a million colleges here regionally, utilize them. He needs to know his role, jobs in manufacturing are gone in America, today in Kansas they announced they are closing the 120 year old Rubbermaid factory and sending it to China. 525 workers are being laid off. The replacement is the service sector. Those jobs pay less, so an uneducated person will need two jobs to compensate and feed a family. Its a way of life, deal with it, or solve your own problem.

WHOA WHOA WHOA. Rochesteraddict, I really respect your love for Rochester and standing up for it is great. But saying that only idiots join the military is just WRONG. Don't get ahead of yourself because you are making yourself look bad. What the story says is true, the job market isn't great in Rochester right now and it's hard for a lot of people to find jobs. The point here to should be to counterstrike susie and jerome's theory that Rochester is going to "die", and go beyond the point of no return. Shoot down the points they are wrong on, don't shoot down everything.... especially people who fought for this country........... as for you susie. While Rochesteraddict may be way over the line in calling soldiers unskilled, he's not wrong in calling you a bitter old hick. And all 8000 people who lost their jobs didn't leave the area. My aunt was one of them, she lost her job at Bausch last year, but is still in Roxhester and now just stays home or goes to work for her husband's company. The overwhelming majority of people who lost their job over the year didn't leave, and the unemployment rate still went down. I don't see why you have to periodicaly come on here and bitch.... and don't EVEN start with that "unrealized problems go unsolved" because nobody denies that Rochester needs some serious economic improvemnt. So shove it. People like Rochester susie. I'm sorry you had to find out this way.

RochesterAddict

June 16th, 2006, 08:27 PM

Roc guy...

I am allowed to have ANY OPINION I WANT. This is a blog where opinions and development is shared. I am not looking for friends here, I have plenty of those, I am just finding a way to take a break at work and share on a blog. And if Susan wants to make me her Nemesis on here, I am fine with that too. Jerome and Suzanne are not enemies just people with a different opinion than mine and yours. But when someone chastises someone or belittles them for having a different opinion that is when it is taken too far on here and is wrong. Sometimes a dose of their own medicine is all simple minds can handle.

My Mantra: To each his own. You make your own world. Misery loves company.

The best way to enjoy Rochester is to plan something with your friends for everyday of the week, even if you cant make it, you will always have something to do. Boredom leads to unhappiness.

blangjr21

June 16th, 2006, 08:35 PM

I just wanted to throw some more numbers out there for everyone who is hatin' on Rochester, and thinking that Buffalo's shit don't stink (not that I don't love Buffalo, I do believe me.) Just throwing up some numbers for statistical purposes.

Monroe County Population:
1960: 586,387
1970: 711,917
1980: 702,238
1990: 713,968
2000: 735,343

Erie County Population:
1960: 1,064,688
1970: 1,113,941
1980: 1,015,472
1990: 968,532
2000:930,703

It's just the way it is, cities grow, and wither, and grow and wither, its a vicious cycle. Tell me that Rome wasn't burned to the ground and rebuilt again. Or Washington DC, hell our modern day example of New Orleans. Nothing will get done by siting around in your computer desk continuing the ineptetiude that we currently live with.

Susie why don't you run for office, I'm sure that you could get things done. You certainly have the spirit, and I'm sure you can change your town (Hamlin?) if that is where you live. I'm not gonna sit here and deny the problems that Rochester and Monroe county face, and I certainly don't get the jollies that others on this site get with little project after little project. Don't you wish for something betteR? I know I do. I'm tired of people moving away, the only ones that can change the problems we have right now, are those who stay.

I guess I'm trying to be one of those who changes things, why don't we all band together and try the same. I've always respected your drive Susie, why don't you help me out, make some suggestions, or something constructive.

bayviews

June 17th, 2006, 02:13 AM

blangjr21

June 17th, 2006, 04:32 AM

Until others on the forum compare cities to Hartford and Newark and Providence, I'll continue to work the way that they do, by comparing Rochester to Buffalo.

Susie

June 17th, 2006, 05:47 AM

I just wanted to throw some more numbers out there for everyone who is hatin' on Rochester,

Erie County Population:
1960: 1,064,688
1970: 1,113,941
1980: 1,015,472
1990: 968,532
2000:930,703
It's just the way it is, cities grow, and wither, and grow and wither, its a vicious cycle. Tell me that Rome wasn't burned to the ground and rebuilt again. Or Washington DC, hell our modern day example of New Orleans. Nothing will
get done by siting around in your computer desk continuing the ineptetiude that we currently live with.

.

Perhaps you would have had a better point if you had not understated Erie County's 2000 population by over 20,000. Your data does not match the census.gov figures. Why do you have to lie to make youself feel better about our beloved Rochester?

ROCguy

June 17th, 2006, 06:16 AM

You make an excellent point Susie. He put the 2004 estimate instead of the 2000 estimate. And he was kind enough to not put both, because if he had it could be seen that Erie County had 950,000 people in 2000, and then went down to 930,000 by 2004. Meaning that they lost 10 times the population that monroe county did durring that same time period (an estimated 2400, which was cut flat and gave the metro area pretty much no change in population from that time by the over 4000 that Ontario County gained) and 2000 more people in that 4 year period than it lost in the entire decade of the 90's. But seiroulsy, enough with the Buffalo Vs. Rochester stuff. I like both of them and have stood up for Buffalo when others bash it. Jerome wouldn't do the same for Rochester (and I'm sure he'd claim it's because Rochester doesn't deserve it). Buffalo and Rochester are on the same boat. They are both great cities that need to take on Albany together if they want to make WNY more business friendly.

blangjr21

June 19th, 2006, 02:45 AM

http://www.costanzaenterprises.com/Images/MarketStation350.jpg

Owner Works to Update Station 55
by Cristina Domingues
photo by Jeff Hamson
Published Jun 18, 2006

It may be an empty building now, but “Station 55” will soon become a new place to eat, shop and live.

The owners said the building will house 100 indoor market stalls where vendors can lease space. They are also trying to bring in a small restaurant.

The second floor is slated to become artist-type lofts. The Public Market is just down the street.

"It's a risky venture in that there's no proven marketplace yet for this kind of use. However, we do think that with the close proximity to the Public Market, [that it] lends itself to being redeveloped," said Drew Costanza, owner.

Costanza said other cities have taken on similar projects with success. He said the former warehouse is in good condition and he expects to spend $1.5 to $2 million to renovate it.

It is slated to open this fall.

ROCguy

June 19th, 2006, 02:49 AM

Sounds nice.

blangjr21

June 19th, 2006, 02:53 AM

I found this structure that will house "Station 55" through local live. It is located at the corner of East Main and Railroad Avenue near the Armory and Auditorium Theatre. Interesting project, in an interesting and "new" neighborhood. I say new neighborhood because that area is not seeing much in the way of revitalization at this point. A welcome addition to the neighborhood I'm sure.

Susie

June 19th, 2006, 03:37 PM

Area's top students seek greener quads

'Brain drain' of high school graduates a worry

Matthew Daneman
Staff writer

(June 19, 2006) — Joseph Lucco, born in Honeoye and raised in Livonia, was looking for something new. So after graduating from Livonia High School last spring, he headed south 11 hours to Duke University.

David Perez didn't find what he wanted in a college locally, so he's going to Army Reserve basic training and then the State University College at Buffalo after he graduates Saturday from Rochester's School of Engineering and Manufacturing at Edison.

And Molly Fillion, graduating from Churchville-Chili High, plans to attend Cedarville University, a Baptist institution seven hours away in western Ohio.

The area's best and brightest high school students — its valedictorians — more often than not hit the road to go to college, leaving the Rochester region or even New York state altogether. They leave even though Rochester increasingly is a college town, with numerous undergraduate institutions nearby and with the University of Rochester now the region's single largest employer.

A Democrat and Chronicle survey of college plans by nearly 120 area high school valedictorians from the classes of 2004, 2005 and 2006 found that more than 40 percent enroll in colleges out of state — double the national average. On top of that, more than a quarter of area valedictorians go to a New York college outside the Rochester area.

The survey looked at stated college plans of valedictorians provided by their high schools.

Nationally, about 20 percent of high school graduates who enroll in college immediately after graduation head out of state, according to Postsecondary Education Opportunity, an Iowa-based higher education think tank.

And 44 percent of the nation's fall 2005 college freshmen went to school more than 100 miles from home, according to a survey by the Higher Education Research Institute at UCLA.

For the Rochester area, already dealing with the loss of many of its college graduates to other parts of the country, the "brain drain" of high school students is also a concern, said Kelly Saucke of ROC City Coalition, one of a number of groups formed to attract and retain young professionals.

Although keeping high school graduates here when they want to experience life outside the region may be difficult, she said, "it's a matter of drawing them back into the city once they've experienced the world."

Fillion, 17, who is heading to Ohio, said she wasn't necessarily looking to leave the state. But having lived in Churchville her entire life, "I wanted to be farther than three hours. I wanted to expand my horizons a little bit. I kind of felt I was supposed to be at Cedarville."

More opportunities

To be sure, area high school graduates aren't avoiding the region's colleges. About 85 percent of St. John Fisher College's student body comes from within 100 miles, said President Donald Bain. And about a quarter of Monroe County's recent high school graduates enroll at Monroe Community College. But valedictorians often have more educational opportunities before them than typical students, said Joyce Blowers, a guidance counselor at Lima Christian School.

"It pays to be up there," she said. "Colleges still compete for kids like that."

Valedictorians typically are involved in athletics or music or are in some other way leaders in the school, said Kevin Quinn, secondary level vice president of the American School Counselor Association. "Many times they have something else to offer schools ... beyond their academics."

And it's almost expected that valedictorians will attend brand-name schools.

"When kids are doing research at where they are going to college, your valedictorians are looking at a list of specific schools," said Joseph Tweed, president-elect of the state Association of College Admissions Counselors. "And those schools are (largely) not in Rochester. University of Rochester is probably in there."

Many of the nation's best-known schools attract legions of valedictorians. Of Lucco's 11 best friends at Duke, six were valedictorians, he said. Duke was Lucco's dream school since seventh grade, and "I always felt I had to be valedictorian to stand a chance to get in," he said.

Of course, a significant percentage of local valedictorians do enroll at local colleges.

Ashley Sullivan, graduating from Hilton High, plans to attend the State University College at Geneseo and live on campus. Last fall's incoming freshman class at Geneseo included 37 high school valedictorians.

Most of her high school friends are going to college within New York, though geography was usually not a big factor, said Sullivan, 18.

The Democrat and Chronicle analysis found local valedictorians enrolling largely at UR, Rochester Institute of Technology, SUNY Geneseo and Roberts Wesleyan College.

Outside the area, Cornell University was a major draw for the area's valedictorians.

Perez had wanted to enroll at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point or in the University at Buffalo's civil engineering program, but he wasn't accepted. So he plans to start at Buffalo State next spring, after basic training, and get some engineering courses out of the way while reapplying to those schools.

Exports

New York is a large exporter of college freshmen. Postsecondary Education Opportunity's analysis found that in eight of the nine years it studied, more freshmen left New York for schools elsewhere than came from other states to study here. In 2004, the most recent year of the analysis, New York's freshman deficit was nearly 1,900 students.

Megan Waterman, 19, a 2004 graduate of LeRoy High, is now a student at Maine's Bowdoin College.

Being a valedictorian itself doesn't necessarily mean a student is more apt to head out of state, she said. Instead, she said, "it might be a marker of having parents who are willing to look into other options. Maybe the parents who are encouraging their children to work hard and get good grades are saying, 'Look at this college in Maine; maybe it'd be a really great fit for your personality.' Other people who don't have as much assistance maybe see something in the area which is a fine school, but they're not made aware of all these different options."

New York does make some efforts to keep its brightest.

Through its Scholarship for Academic Excellence program, the state's Higher Education Services Corp. each year gives as many as 2,000 scholarships of $1,500 each to the top graduating student in each of the state's high schools. And numerous SUNY schools, including SUNY Brockport, offer close to a full ride for valedictorians who meet certain criteria.

After a lifetime in Monroe County, Eric Wilusz enrolled at Worcester (Mass.) Polytechnic Institute after graduating from Rush-Henrietta High School in 2004. Wilusz applied to three schools, all out of state, though geography was not a major factor in deciding where to go.

Susie

June 19th, 2006, 04:48 PM

ROCHESTER'S CANAL PLAN IS ALL WET

A long time ago, the Erie Canal flowed through Rochester.

Then they invented trains.

After that, canals weren’t really that big a deal. When cars and trucks came along, canals became useless for anyone but canoeists and carp.

Now they are relics.

Pretty, perhaps. Historic, maybe. Useful, not by a darn sight.

Which is probably why Rochester wants to buy one.

In the dizzying world of “Just how stupid can the politicians be?” somebody is grabbing for the brass ring. Striving hard to top the fast ferry, the idea has been put forth to “re-water” the Erie Canal.

Or, more exactly, a portion of it.

Long ago, the portion of the Erie Canal that passes through downtown Rochester was drained and paved over. It became Interstate 490 and Broad Street, with the new canal shifting south out of the city. Now, urban planners and a bunch of rich-kid, charter-school sixth-graders want to tear up Broad Street, rebuild the canal from the main library across downtown and north to near the new soccer stadium.

The “Democrat and Chronicle” editorial page thinks it’s a great idea. The mayor says it’s an exciting suggestion that needs to be on the table. Various loudmouths with Messiah complexes promote it as the answer to the city’s economic problems.

All have one thing in common.

They’re out of their freaking minds.

The only way this makes sense is if we’re in an alternate universe where the role of government is to kill every bit of life and prosperity there is left in the city.

The difference between this and the fast ferry is that this costs five times as much.

It is one more berserk suggestion from people who think progress is finding ever more outlandish ways to spend the taxpayers’ money. Each successive administration wants to build a monument to itself and the flirtation has begun with this one.

To make things worse, there are actually two competing plans for refurbishing the canal. Somehow the city’s leaders have been seduced into comparing the relative merits of the two instead of throwing them both out altogether.

So let me do that for them.

This idea is insane. Anyone who spends one thin taxpayer dime to study this proposal should be impeached. Anyone who advocates it should be sent to the R-wing for a mental-hygiene assessment.

The claim is that re-watering the canal would bring tourist dollars and prosperity to Rochester. The claim is that businesses would pop up all along its length.

That is a crock of bull.

A couple of miles of muddy water four months a year – remember, in New York they drain canals in the winter – is going to do nothing but raise the drowning risk for inner-city kids who don’t have bus fare to the city pool. If somebody brings in a hot-dog cart and a bait shop it’ll be a miracle.

An important city arterial will be lost, a significant obstacle will be brought to downtown, $200 million will be wasted and nothing will come of it. It’s like the fast ferry, High Falls and the Renaissance Center all wrapped into one. It’s as if we miss being called The Stupidest City in America and we’re going to fight to get our crown back.

It is an embarrassment to the city and the administration that this is even being considered.

And it raises the fear that, not yet six months in, the new administration is losing its bearings. After pledging to focus on schools, public safety and jobs, there are already temptations to wander into the land of the white elephant. The same pie-in-the-sky public-spending nonsense that characterized this city for 15 years has risen like a zombie from the grave the new mayor supposedly put it in.

Unable or unwilling to do anything worthwhile, the same old people have decided to go to the same old fantasy land.

Which is exactly the opposite of what Rochester needs.

We don’t need landmarks, we need factories. We don’t need ways for rich people to use their boats, we need ways for poor people to feed their families. We don’t need to go to a party, we need to go to work. Not a penny should be spent on idiotic studies. Every cent that can be spared should be used to bring businesses to town.

We should stop begging Albany and Washington for money, we should focus instead on earning our own. Governmental success is not measured by how big a welfare check you get, but by how many businesses you open and jobs you create.

If the administration is confused about which way to go, somebody should pull out the mayor’s inaugural address and follow its straightforward course. Jobs, safety, schools.

That’s what Rochester needs.

And it needs to remember this simple math. Canal equals fast ferry and fast ferry equals failure.

Pursuit of this canal re-watering plan will lose the city the countywide support the new administration earned. Pursuit of this canal re-watering plan will be proof that nothing has changed.

And that the city is doomed.