The Buffalo News editorial staff recently expressed support for Gerry Buchheit’s efforts to have his 20-acre Outer Harbor parcel designated a “Planned Unit Development” [PUD]zoning district by Buffalo’s Common Council. Apparently, no one at One News Plaza took time to educate themselves on the purpose and criteria for creating a PUD district. In fact, it seems as if the opinion writers at our region’s largest newspaper (despite the importance of their role) are caught in a silo where they don’t bother to go beyond the myopic words of the paper’s business reporters when reaching a position on important development matters.
My effort to share a different perspective with BN’s readership (and, the editorial staff) – by way of a letter-to-the-editor – appears not to have been deemed worthy of print. [Although the Sunday Buffalo News did find room for a letter from an individual who refers to opponents of the 20-story Queen City Landing tower as “narrow-minded, blind and ‘my way or no way’ fanatics,” as well as “hypocrites.”]
So, I’m sharing my letter-to-the-editor with the readers of this blog:
January 23, 2019
Outer Harbor “PUD” as ludicrous as “blighted” Gates Circle
Dear Editor,
Migratory birds are disoriented by the bright lights of a stand-alone tower, especially in inclement weather. Perhaps that’s what happened to the Buffalo News editorial staff when Queen City Landing’s proposed 20-story Outer Harbor project found itself in the midst of a seiche of opposition at a recent hearing.
It was last November when a Buffalo News editorial perceived the illogic in designating a portion of Gates Circle, one of Buffalo’s finest neighborhoods. “blighted.” It viewed with 20-20 vision the problem of a city “pushing legal boundaries” to make huge tax breaks available to a financially-strapped developer. And, it called City Hall’s maneuver a “sham” – noting that “words matter,” and praising a court ruling, which had declared the designation as contrary to the law’s intent, “a victory for common sense.”
Three months later, a News editorial appears blind to a similar display of City Hall’s arrogance and willingness to distort the law to help out a developer, Queen City Landing’s proposed “Planned Unit Development” adjacent to Lake Erie’s Small Boat Harbor.
Prior uses of the PUD zoning device in Buffalo involve multiple buildings, on multiple parcels, with a variety of identified uses and architectural styling. They represented, at least arguably, “planned” and “unified” development, as required by Buffalo’s Green Code.
In contrast, Mr. Buchheit is masquerading one mixed-use tower standing on the front 8 acres of a 20-acre parcel, and zero plans for the rear 12 acres, as a PUD. This illogical proposal was not born of creativity and innovation, the objective of a Planned Unit Development, but of Buchheit’s desperate need to circumvent the Green Code’s six-story, 90-foot height limits for his Fuhrmann Blvd. property.
As with Gates Circle, words matter, and common sense and the law’s intent must prevail.
With All Due Respect,
Art Giacalone
With All Due Respect 