Not Just Parking Lots Anymore

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Washington, DC is a thriving, bustling city filled with people and money. Even after business hours, the streets are filled with cars, the sidewalks are filled with people, and there are street-level businesses doing good business. 

One of the things to remember about historic preservation is that many of these older buildings don’t have underground parking garages, and to make them even remotely economically feasible, you need to provide parking for tenants, guests, and residents. New builds can hide the parking underground – old buildings can’t, and we have nothing in place to require it to happen. So, we maintain a sea of surface parking that we complain about endlessly, but we seldom come up with ideas to actually change that around. 

Our city municipal parking garages are inadequate, antiquated, and ugly. Forget smart parking – in most lots, you can’t even pay without cash. We don’t have a comprehensive civic, urban plan to turn the surface parking into shovel-ready lots while concentrating the daily influx of cars into designated, well-designed, modern parking garages. 

But here’s a homework assignment for Buffalo. DC’s Mount Vernon triangle was, until recently, a blighted shell of a neighborhood made up largely of cheap parking for commuters. Now? It’s re-making itself into a thriving community thanks to its proximity to downtown businesses and attractions. It’s “not just parking lots anymore“. 

So, that’s Buffalo’s homework assignment – to learn a lesson from places like Mt Vernon triangle; to take its blight and turn it into something attractive and exciting. It doesn’t matter if a building is new or old – what matters is what’s inside them. 

Hate Teach-in

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An assembly was held at a Minneapolis area Catholic School recently – it was mandatory for seniors and was on the subject of marriage.  It started out well, but suddenly veered into ugly territory: 

“The first three-quarters of the presentation were really good,” said Bliss. “They talked about what is marriage and how marriage helps us as a society. Then it started going downhill when they started talking about single parents and adopted kids. They didn’t directly say it, but they implied that kids who are adopted or live with single parents are less than kids with two parents of the opposite sex. They implied that a ‘normal’ family is the best family.”

“When they finally got to gay marriage, [students] were really upset,” said Bliss. “You could look around the room and feel the anger. My friend who is a lesbian started crying, and people were crying in the bathroom.”

The diocese won’t talk, and the school won’t say who gave the speech. The kids – to their credit – challenged the speaker on these points, as well as his opinions on same sex marriage. 

The kicker is that Minnesota will be holding a referendum on same-sex marriage, and these high school seniors will be eligible to vote right around the time it’s held. This was an attempt by the diocese – which is obviously vehemently opposed to the measure – to persuade or intimidate a captive audience into backing its political agenda. 

A priest and a volunteer couple presented the information. When someone asked a question about two men being able to have a quality, committed relationship, the couple compared their love to bestiality, Bliss said.

“Most people got really upset,” said Bliss. “And comments about adopted kids, I found those to be really offensive. There were at least four kids there who are adopted.”

Hannah, who is adopted, said one of the presenters said that adopted kids were “sociologically unstable.” She called the comments “hurtful” and comparisons between gay love and bestiality upsetting.

“My friend said, ‘You didn’t just compare people to animals, did you?'” said Hannah. “I think everyone has a right to their opinion, and I don’t judge them on it. But we don’t force people to sit down so we can tell them their opinion is wrong.”

Bestiality?!

It’s an interesting conundrum – the Church opposes contraception, opposes abortion, and – evidently – has some problems with adoption, as well. That sort of narrows a couple’s options, doesn’t it? The school should be ashamed of permitting this hate speech to be presented by clergy to a captive audience.

The diocese – well, with the Church’s permissive nature ranging to the downright enabling of child abuse by a multitude of priests throughout the world, I’m not surprised by its chutzpah or hubris at trying to persuade young minds to become hateful. 

I generally don’t take advice from people who have no experience in the matter being advised. I also think that it runs counter to Jesus’ teachings to preach hatred – to compare loving couples who aren’t bothering anyone to animals, or to suggest that adopted children are socially defective. 

You don’t have to support same sex marriage or adoption, you don’t even have to like it or tolerate it. What you shouldn’t do is go in front of a group of young adults – some of whom are gay and adopted – and tell them that they’re less than human; that they are broken or need fixing. 

That sort of thinking and dogma never, ever ends well. 

Principle

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Xavier University has suddenly announced it will cancel birth control coverage for its employees. As Atrios writes, 

Obviously this is an incredibly principled move based on deeply held religious beliefs that they discovered about 5 weeks ago.

In other words, around the time that the GOP made contraception a campaign issue, and people began bleating about how the uniform application of a civil statute constitutes a violation of “religious freedoms”. What will race hustler Barry NObama think of next? 

Maziarz Backs Bellavia #Shotsfired

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If you had any doubt that Chris Collins‘ star has not only faded, but has been all but extinguished, witness State Senator George Maziarz’s astonishing, early endorsement of David Bellavia to challenge Democrat Kathy Hochul in the newly constituted NY-27. 

In just a few short weeks, Bellavia has taken the reins in this Republican primary – he announced first, he challenged Collins to a series of debates – an activity Collins detests, and he has lined up the support of millionaire Jack Davis. Bellavia has seemingly accumulated not only momentum, but something he has always sorely lacked – money. Now, boots are on the ground collecting signatures, and Bellavia expects to well exceed the approximately 1,000 signatures needed to get on the Republican ballot, and may also seek a second line. 

Collins has a tough row to hoe. As I wrote in November, Collins’ tenure in government was packed with mini-scandals. He referred to the Jewish Assembly Speaker as the “anti-Christ”, and the time when Collins jokingly demanded a “lap dance” in order to save a seat at the State of the State address for a well-connected female executive at a local construction company. It ignores the fact that, to some people, informing them days before Christmas that they’d be losing their state-funded daycare services and that they’d have to quit their jobs to watch their kids, is quite scandalous indeed.

Secondly, Collins did not, as some claim, “fulfill all his promises“. Collins raised taxes, deepened regional cleaves, and ran on “Three Rs – Reforming Erie County government, Rebuilding the local economy, and ultimately, Reducing taxes.”

He did not reform county government – in fact, he resisted and blocked reforms almost routinely (another “r”); he did not rebuild the local economy, but ensured that stimulus funds were hoarded to artificially improve his balance sheet; and he did not reduce – but raised – taxes. That’s breaking your promises, and that’s failure under any measure. It’s no wonder he lost.

Bellavia is now collecting support from the Republican establishment – especially those who were never big fans of Collins’.  Here is the relevant text of the Maziarz endorsement press release:

New York State Senator George D. Maziarz today announced his Republican Primary endorsement of conservative Republican David Bellavia for Congress in the 27th Congressional District of New York.

“I’ve known David Bellavia and his family for many years and I can speak with great confidence about his principle, honor, and integrity,” Sen. Maziarz said. “I am very proud of the way David represented western New York when he fought so heroically in the Iraq War. When he returned from combat I encouraged his interest in politics and I can say without reservation David Bellavia is by far the best person to represent our area in Congress.”

Upon Bellavia’s return from combat, Maziarz was instrumental in awarding him with the New York State Conspicuous Service Cross and inducting him into the New York State Veterans Hall of Fame.

“While I admire David for his military service, it is important for the voters to know his knowledge of national issues far exceeds his opponent in the Republican Primary and his general election competitor,” Sen. Maziarz said. “David knows how those issues impact the working class, because he is just like the constituents of the 27th District – a hardworking family man who knows what it’s like to struggle with high taxes and balancing the family budget.”

“I am humbled by Sen. Maziarz’s early support in this Republican Primary because I know he weighs endorsements very carefully,” Bellavia said. “He has been a mentor to me with his advice and counsel and an example to me with how he conducts himself as a public servant. His backing is a real shot in the arm for our campaign, especially because almost his entire State Senate district lies within the 27th Congressional District.”

“I will strive to serve Sen. Maziarz’s constituents in Congress with as much devotion to duty as he has shown for 17 years in the State Senate,” Bellavia said.

Saving Trico & the Leadership Vacuum

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It’s only been a few short weeks, but I’m already absolutely sick & tired of hearing about, talking about, or thinking about the decaying, unusued Trico factory. Empty now for a decade, it stands as an overgrown, brown headstone honoring the memory of industries lost to the cheap labor and lax environmental regulations of Mexico’s borderlands. Trico assembles wipers in Matamoros. Trico is dead. Oishei so loved Buffalo that they moved the wiper business – which employed people and created local wealth and economic activity – and set up a foundation. 

Battle lines have been drawn, and the forces of “preservation” have selected an old building as a “must-save”, and will go to every length to prevent even the Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus from demolishing and replacing the dormant Buffalo factory building. This despite the fact that BNMC is driven by innovation and knowledge, and employing people in something other than piddling service jobs or anachronistic assembly positions. This despite the fact that much of what BNMC has built in recent years has been architecturally as innovative as the work done within the buildings. 

Sure, I could point out that the work that BNMC and its people do is today’s version of building wiper blades, but that doesn’t matter. Trico must be saved! I could point out that the cavernous Trico building’s design could just as easily be described as an eyesore as it can be held up as an example of a factory design that was innovative 100 years ago, but that doesn’t matter. Trico must be saved! Even hypothetically – if a company was saying it wanted to move to Buffalo and create a zillion jobs at $50,000 per year, but wanted to be downtown on a large plot of land and build something designed by Frank Gehry on the site of the mothballed Trico site, and it wouldn’t matter. Trico must be saved!

This despite the fact that Trico has been sitting there for a century, and it is so significant and historical and historically significant that there exists nothing on the books that would legally prohibit its demolition. 

There is no winning in this argument. Only headaches. Buffalo’s activist class have temporarily united to combat anything but Trico’s adaptive reuse. Even Rocco Termini – whose entire business model is based on (a) being friendly with Byron Brown; and (b) using subsidies to render adaptive reuse economically feasible shamelessly says he has a dollar in his pocket to buy Trico and then save it – using government subsidies to do so. 

There seems to be a belief that because Trico can be adapted and reused, it must be adapted and reused. I don’t think that’s true, but it doesn’t matter. Trico must be saved!

Usually, when populations and stakeholders have some sort of disagreement, political leaders will step in and show some leadership on the issue. Not here. Anyone know where Byron Brown stands on this controversy? With whom will he side – with jobs and innovation, or with the defenders of a “daylight factory”, which was innovative in its use of windows?

Buffalo Rising’s April Fool’s joke involved Trico “saving itself”, and flying away because the city is so mean to it. I wish it were true. I wish we could ship our unused industrial detritus elsewhere, but we can’t.  We can either turn it into the “Trico lofts”, or tear it down. But a vocal and well-organized minority has decided that Trico is important and must be saved – not because it’s in any way attractive, but because of its “good bones”. Because of a leadership vacuum in City Hall and no one much caring, BNMC will be bullied into submission. There will be no peace until the state subsidizes cut-rate rental apartments, maybe offices, and vacant street-level retail space in that massive building.  Or perhaps BNMC will decide to put its 21st century people in a century-old factory. 

In inadvertently picking a fight over historic preservation, the BNMC – the future of Buffalo – never had a chance. 

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