In depth with Mayor Restaino

For the 6th Consecutive month, the Express sat for an hour Monday with Niagara Falls Mayor Robert Restaino. Nothing was off limits. I asked every question submitted with the exception of a couple I considered to be unfair/provocatory. Some answers are in quotes. Some are paraphrased. My questions are italicized.

The Express has found over time, the way most journalists are functioning is to cover an event or meeting, ask two follow up questions and then publish. It is a traditional formula.

A better thing to do, however, is live and invest in the community, talk to all sides, all the time, sit with a subject like the mayor for an hour at a time. ask about the good, the bad and the ugly and then publish it without a slant. The leading person I have been asked to speak to in this format is Becky Wydysh. I would welcome a phone number or introduction

So the state of emergency. Can you please explain the timeline?

“With the council's action on July 17th, and knowing that they weren't meeting again until the end of July with no meeting.

in August, we had a conversation in the administration.

“We needed to get road paving done during the season, and we needed to get grass cut and held as well. I remember having reviewed the state law during COVID.

With that, he contacted Niagara County Manager Richard Updegrove and the office of Gov. Kathy Hochul and declared a state of emergency because it would enable paving and grass cutting because the bids had come in for both and not been approved by the council.

“And none of this would have been necessary except for usual basic services for paving and cutting grass becoming somehow controversial,” he said. “What is was controversial about it?

The answer would be, I don't know.”

Restaino said on the mowing contract, there was a clerical error but rather than bringing it to the attention of the administration (the name of the bidder was mistyped on the agenda), the opposition forces held it for the meeting.

“This highlights what this council does,” Restaino said. “They are horribly non-transparent. An incredible item for me was they get these items, and had they called that to our attention, God bless whomever, we could have had that cleared up.

Instead, it's always, ‘let's drop this at the meeting to play gotcha.’ ”

That makes sense but what about people saying?

“Hey, we looked at the contract a year ago, and it cost X, and now it's costing Y, and Y is twice as big?”

“The price is based upon the bid. All we're doing is appropriating sufficient funds to cover it.

“It's hard, you know, it's hard to compare year over year.

So basically the grass-cutting contract is really a function of private property ownership.

And these could be in town or out-of-town property owners.

“It's easy to sit somewhere and say, hey, what about this? Well, we're simply working to try and deliver basic service. There's no other nefarious conspiracy, which is always the narrative that people have an agenda that is other than just delivering government services will try to match.”

As mowing progresses, the mayor said he’s been getting messages from residents saying thank you.

Does the state of emergency make other funds available on the state or federal level?

No. It is the same funding already in the budget. The paving funds will be reimbursed by the state.

The city had an appropriation in the DPW budget for the additional grass cutting. That's the line item that will pay for it.

Where does the dog shelter stand?

“We are just getting a final approval, hopefully, on the remediated work on the flooring. I never could imagine that the flooring would be such a difficult item.

“I mean, I understand why, pursuant to the agriculture and markets law requirements, why it needs to be a specific way because it needs to be easily hosed on and cleaned, right? But it's gone through several iterations of remedy. So we're hoping it's going to do that.”

Why can’t you get the RFP out ahead of time?

“You make a proposal, you're selected, and the doggone damn place isn't ready yet.

“Now what do I do? Our plan is to do that warm handoff from the interim thing we've got now right into there.”

How about the ice rink? Has the new operator paid anything to the city?

“You know, I'd have to check with the controller's office.

I don't have that information.”

Is there any motion toward going after the old operator for what he was said to owe?

“I know that there's been some conversation in the law office about, you know, how expending the resources to chase the company because there's nothing you're gonna get from the private individual because the entire deal is wrapped up in a prior administration’s contract or prior cost.”

When are we going to actually see action on the city market?

“In terms of buildings being moved and backhoes in there, you know, it's funny that you should ask this question because I was driving into work this morning and thinking to myself.

“You know, all of these projects seem to get bogged down in planning and design.

“Planning and design is important, but sometimes there's a paralysis by analysis, right?

“I know that Flynn Battaglia is having meetings with members of our team, as well as USA Niagara, over design options. So we're at that phase to tell you exactly when something is going to start getting moved around. I don't have that information.”

Have you had any success in attracting tenants for the plaza there?

There's got a couple of interested individuals. The plan is to rent out a portion of the space as well as use part as public space.

“I am terribly impatient with these things but they do take time.”

Main Street redevelopment seems to be an incredible success. How do we get people to believe it is real?

“To some communities, $40 million dollars is not a lot of money but for a small pocket of Mains Street, $40 million dollars is an incredible amount of investment. And that's just for what's been announced so far.”

“The city is closing in on the finalization of a company that will build the university apartments. That has always been a centerpiece of this.”

The plan is for housing for Niagara University and SUNY Niagara to take center stage in addition to market rate apartments. The mayor said he recently met with SUNY Niagara President Holmes and his administrative team to speak in broad terms about how to get the 2-year college more connected to the city both through the Culinary Institute and engagement with their sports programs. A pressing matter is the fact NCCC has maxed out its on-campus student housing capacity.

Shawn Weber suggested last week that if, every dime spent down at the football stadium can generate a 6% tariff that kicks back to Erie County, (we’ll call it a tariff, not a tax) New York State can do the same thing with the State Park to kick revenue back to its host city. What do you think of that idea?

“That would be wonderful. It would allow in many ways, good things.

“It would be the equivalent of what you do sometimes with other developments, right? There is a PILOT (payment in lieu of taxes) you don't necessarily get the full taxable value of a parcel.

“If you think about, you know, the entire beautiful waterfront from the North Grand Island Bridge all the way to Devils Hole Park this is all Niagara Falls Park.

“And so any configuration to recapture some of the revenue generated there would be spectacular.

“And those are the kinds of things that we need to have majority representatives in the legislature to carry it forward.

“To be honest with you this isn't a partisan position I've taken. People want to paint it that way.

“But the reality is, from the beginning of time, governments have worked in that fashion, good, bad, or otherwise in people's opinions, that a party that is in the majority generally has the best capacity to carry out its objectives.

“In the rare moments that there is bipartisan agreement, then those things can get done, but by and large, when you sit in the minority, it's just not going to happen.”

Having had a big part in writing the charter and now experiencing working with it for a good number of years and seeing how it functions, is there anything you'd change?

“Well, let me just clear up a long-standing misconception. Please remember that the charter was on the agenda for voters. I believe the year was 1985. So the document was crafted before 1985. I I didn't leave law school until 1985.

“So the item was created and put on a referendum for vote. It became the method of government starting in 1988 under Mayor O’Loughlin.”

The Mayor said he was asked by the city council later on to look at the original and current charter and suggest changes. The administration at the time also engaged consultants to assist all of that for the rest of its history.

“So the notion that I drafted the charter? You know, I was also in Philadelphia in 1776.”

How would you feel about if somebody were to propose a ward system in the city so that there would be more representation for individual neighborhoods?

“It’s been talked about forever. The current challenge would be how the wards could be defined because there used to be 5 county legislature districts in the city. Now there's only four, and two of them have a part of their district outside the city.

“So there's really no roadmap to demarcate where these would be. Had that been done back then, at least then you would have had old demarcation lines to help you. Sure.

Now, it would be incredibly difficult, but not impossible.

Incredibly difficult.”

Talk about the current dysfunction on the city council in a ward system.

“There’s an incredible lack of understanding regarding at-large obligations and as a consequence you can see how the voting gets and the inflections that are thrown at people who are from this part of the city or that part of the city.

“It’s as if they've all forgotten that they represent all of the city.

I don't know whether or not that would ratchet up even more division.”

Talk a little bit about what it means that there's no GIVE patrols for right now.

“The police department continues to do work out there, gun violence intervention.

“The difference now is that any special investigation, any special effort is being solely funded by the general fund budget, as opposed to diverting the expense into a state grant.

“So you know, the other piece is even some of the community efforts.

“So you're either going to get, and they do, you're going to get police officers who will volunteer to go.

“But in order to get, you want to have, you know, a significant number, those elements of community outreach were also a part of the GIVE grant. Some of those things won’t happen.”

The community keeps cycling back and saying there was that email that was all over the place last year that came from Troy Earp saying, “here's how everybody juices up their overtime so that they can inflate their pensions” and this is horrible and borders on fraud, and then the whole thing just went away. Can you explain?

There was never a public discussion about it. That email was internal. “How it became external, I can't tell you, but it went through the internal process, you know, with any reason.

It became an excuse for some council members to take no action.”

Restaino said the long and short of it is two council members who voted against it, one of them (Cauley) voted against the GIVE grant twice. GIVE activities, and the grant are reviewed by the State Division of Criminal Justice Services.

“If the state believes there were some measures that were untoward I'm sure they would take action.

“In fact, when the executive deputy commissioner was here, one of the things that deputy commissioner said was overtime is a valid expense for the activities covered by the grant.”

Well, I've gone back at some of those people, too, and are saying this is corrupt and that's corrupt. And what I always say to them is, okay, if this is corrupt and you think there's something going on here, file a complaint. Can you turn it into the attorney general? Can you turn it into the DA's office?

“As a matter of fact, I have said allegations with no evidence is nothing more than a lot of yack.”

The mayor said he remains mystified about how the current council can make paving, lawn mowing, an anti-gun violence patrol and environmental studies controversial.

They can complain about pot holes and vote against paving.

They can complain about unkempt lots and vote against mowing.

None of it makes any sense.

What is your grant writing process in the city?

“Well, we have a consultant who does a lot of our grant writing for us.

“Our departments will identify things that they see, and even our grant writer will identify things and communicate and then talk and say with a department that it would apply to, and then get generate the appropriate information for the application and submit it.”

A friend helps the Greater Buffalo Niagara Regional Transportation Council. He sent me a few questions. Has a traffic study been requested by the GBNRTC to improve the flow of traffic in the city, reducing cars, buses in downtown and around the entertainment district, and extending the trolley and adding vehicles to make the area more walkable? Has that ever been a concern? (Editor’s note: Few people will read this far. The guy who sent me that question is one. And I am grateful for him and appreciate his love of rules, meetings, and bureaucracy because it is rooted in the study of rhetoric.)

“I would say that, yeah, it would be a concern, but I can't tell you that it's been formally delivered.

“I know that the state, as I remember, ESD and USAN, having studies, traffic studies done in the entertainment district.

Obviously, I don't think they've ever taken any action on the results of those studies.”

“So why doesn't the city have a representative on the GP, on the RTC council and on the rail committee, because there's a new subcommittee looking at passenger commuter train between Buffalo, Tonawanda, Niagara Falls, and Buffalo?

“I'm aware of all that. Yeah. Okay. Typically, our our director of planning is following.”

And what's your thought on the Aerospace Museum?

“I'm a guy that enjoys looking at all of those things. In fact, the time that I was there last, I kind of got lost in the history of our region as it relates to all of that.

‘I would think that given some of the development opportunities for USA Niagara is proposing that there could likely be a location.

“The most difficult part is, you know, a long-term business plan?

“You take a look at entities like the Aquarium for an example they have to develop a business plan that's going to allow them to be sustainable.”

How do we get Third Street to become something?

“I think, one of the things we have to do is be a bit more aggressive in getting good tenants. I trust our team, especially the team that's assembled on Main Street.

“I'm not so sure that some of the property owners along that third street corridor have engaged in the same kind of rigor. It's more like, can we get something in here to fill it?

“Which doesn't fit if the idea originally was to create an eclectic experience along Third Street. That mark has been missed.

“Yeah, I have frustration with some of the landholders that are there because I think there's really more that can be done even even to the extent of just making a building appearance pleasant. “I understand from a business perspective that developers want to cover cost, including the things they have to do, but in the interim of getting there, at least beautify the building and give a more welcome look.”

Did the deal for the church with the heritage area close?

It hasn't closed yet but the deal is not dead. A recent sign of hope was he saw Saladin Allah in the community.

“I said, ‘Saladin, can you do me a favor? All those weeds and things that they're growing in. Can you cut them or do something?’ He said, ‘they'll be gone.’”

“And he took them out. You know, I got to get Emory Simon to do the same for Slipko’s because that's a train wreck.”