City loses director of planning

Kevin Forma, the director of planning with the city of Niagara Falls, has resigned his position rather than comply with the requirement city employees establish residence within 6 months of accepting employment.

Forma, the chief mover and shaker on important projects like the rebirth of Main Street and the City Market, held the job for 3 ½ years.

Here’s his status from LinkedIn posted Monday.

“Hello all after 3.5 very productive years in Niagara Falls, I will be leaving my position. This is a great position for someone who is looking for a challenging but very rewarding! Contact me if you have any questions.” He did not respond to a request for a phone call.

Later in the day Forma posted he had accepted a position with the Department of State as a Regional Revitalization Specialist.

Those sort of positions with the state oversee things like the Downtown Revitalization Initiative which has made a huge difference in Tonawandas and North Tonawanda.

At the October press conference announcing the first awards of development proposals for Main Street, Forma said the Niagara Falls DRI, funded with $10 million of State taxdollars in 2021 would begin implementation in the near future. Some of the involved projects were scaled down or changed because of Blue Cardinal’s failure, DiCamillo’s scaling back a planned expansion and Niagara University failing to move forward with the First Congregation Church of Christ project at 829 Cleveland Ave.

There has also been no progress reported on the construction no new student housing for Niagara University, a plan which was supposed to coincide with the implementation of a new zoning law limiting who can rent rooms in DeVeaux.

Forma said in at that conference that residents would start seeing improvements to the streetscape on Main Street in the near future. Some improvements have been made at DiCamillo’s, just not to the front-facing portion of the restaurant.

One entity getting things done with DRI money in the Suspension Bridge District is the Niagara National Heritage area, not only with its murals and traffic calming art at Main and Portage but also with the Freedom Plaza planned adjacent to then suspension bridge abutment near the Underground Railroad Heritage Museum.

Also, space has been marked off for a Harriet Tubman statue in front of the museum but that project is reportedly delayed because a positive finding on an environmental impact statement has not been addressed even if a Rochester-based artist has been working on a commissioned Tubman statue for 3 years.

There may be a discrepancy in the commission the city agreed to pay for out of funds set aside for the plaza area and what the sculptor was contracted to do. That miscommunication preceded Forma joining the city but there is reportedly a substantial funding shortage. Think of it as Spinal Tap's Stone Henge in reverse.

Here is the Niagara Falls job posting if you know anyone interested in replacing Forma.