Buffalo, N.Y. (WBEN) - News came down this past Friday afternoon that the Fourth Appellate Division of the State Supreme Court ruled in favor of the City of Buffalo with regards to a request to overturn the approval of eminent domain to obtain property from owner Darryl Carr in the city's historic Cobblestone District.
According to the ruling from the Fourth Appellate Division Court, the use of eminent domain in this case was deemed as "proper" for properties at 110 and 118 South Park Avenue.
Fillmore District Councilman Mitch Nowakowski is thrilled the City of Buffalo was able to get a favorable ruling from the courts, calling it a "significant stride forward in our ongoing, intricate legal endeavor to stabilize and safeguard these invaluable historic landmarks."
Nowakowski knows this is just one step forward in acquiring these properties, as the city now waits on a second court ruling to determine the future of the buildings.
"The second court case we have that we're waiting a ruling on is an appeal of a demolition order from housing court," said Nowakowski on Monday in an interview with WBEN. "If the city is successful in overturning that appeal, we'll be one step closer to bringing those properties in the city inventory, and then being able to then go from there to not only structurally save the properties, but be able to give an opportunity to give those buildings a new lease on life."
According to Nowakowski, if the eminent domain process wins out and the appeal for the order of demolition is successful, Carr will get fair market value for the properties from the city.
On the opposite side of this legal battle, Carr, who also owns the Cobblestone bar adjacent to the properties, was disappointed with the overall decision, but plans to take this case to the highest court in New York State, no matter how lengthy the process may get.
"We got the demolition order originally from the city court, and then it was appealed. We're still waiting, and it's been over a year now on the decision for that," said Carr in an interview with WBEN. "If that comes through, it complicates things for the city a little bit more, and I believe they're going to appeal it. And it'll be the same if it's not in our favor, we're going to appeal that too. Everything might end up in Albany."
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For years, Carr has been working to get progress underway with a massive project in the Cobblestone District to bring a 55-story building called the "Unity Tower" that, what he says, will bring the City of Buffalo into the 21st century. According to the project's website, not only will the tower bring an "advanced sustainable building and renewable energy technologies" to the heart of the sports and entertainment district, it will also preserve and incorporate "the original century-old buildings providing health and wellness, as well as retail support for residents and the public."
Carr says if he is able to overturn the decision with eminent domain and win the appeal case surrounding the order of demolition, it would be a huge weight lifted off the project going forward.
"I can't move forward with anything on the project until these buildings are down," he said. "So we deconstruct the buildings, and then you have to dig a four-story hole in there, then the area becomes decontaminated of anything industrial that was there for the past 100 years, because it was in industrial use for over 100 years. And then we start from scratch, then we reconstruct the facades of the buildings that were there, because that's in the project, it was in the whole scope of the project design, and then we go on to build the residential [spaces] and the tower."
Nowakowski still doesn't buy what Carr says he has in store for the properties in question going forward.
"As you see, you can go to the buildings right now, and the property owner has a farce of a project of a skyscraper that's there. But really, I feel he's wanted the building to fall down so they can have a parking lot for the Sabres, to be honest," Nowakowski said.
However, Carr disagrees with Nowakowski on this notion, adding he has yet to speak with the Fillmore District Councilman since he took office in January 2020, despite attempts to reach out to him personally.
"I know he has a lot of hurdles in his district, my family grew up in a district, so I know a lot about the district and have a lot of ties with the district, and it goes on to the East Side from here. He's never once talked to me, and he talks about a parking lot, but that was what they came up with originally, we're talking over 13 years ago. That's what they said, 'I wanted to put a parking lot there.' Not once, ever, did I ever say to anybody about parking. So it really eludes me how this even came into play," Carr exclaimed. "It really makes no sense, because if that's the case, I would've somehow got those buildings down 13 years or 14 years ago. This plan came out 2016 originally, and I've been fighting them in city court since 2016. Finally, after bringing in all the specialists in on my side to prove to the court that you can't save these buildings - that's engineers that told me this. I've never talked to him, so I can't comment on anything he says."
Carr says he has only heard back from two members of the Buffalo Common Council in the past regarding his properties - former Council President Darius Pridgen and University District Councilman Rasheed Wyatt. He adds he's also reached out to Mayor Byron Brown's office with no response.
With the two structures being some of the oldest structures in the Cobblestone District that date back to the Civil War, Nowakowski explains that Carr, or anyone who owns historical buildings like this, can get excess tax credits from the state to rehabilitate their properties.
"When you go throughout cities all over the world, people take pride in their history, their landmarks, and beautiful old structures. We need to start putting an emphasis on that in the City of Buffalo, because we don't need to just build a city with new builds. We need to appreciate historic structures that we have that really continue the fabric of the City of Buffalo," Nowakowski said.
"I really take pride in Buffalo's heritage, and I think we all should. I think sometimes with my preservation tendencies, some of my friends like to pick on me and say, 'Why are you saving these old buildings? Why are they important?' Because our heritage is important. If you go down through Philadelphia or other cities, you see beautiful historic structures that their cities take pride in. They generate revenue, they generate tourism, and they fit in to the identity of the city in which they belong. I think those structures don't deserve to be languishing, but they deserve to be contributing structures."
Nowakowski feels the revitalization of a space like that can bring back density and vibrancy to the Cobblestone District.
"I think those two large structures are a significant role in the entire district as a whole," he said. "I could see the Cobblestone Historic District really taking more of an entertainment venue. We have a comedy club, we have the Sabres, there's concerts that happen down there, so I would like to see that actually flourish. And nightlife is a part of life, and it's a part of the economy. So, to me, I'm always happy when people can recreate, have fun and seek entertainment, and not disturb their neighbors."
Meanwhile, Carr's vision for the entire district going forward is to create new spaces not focused so much on the historical aspect.
"It's nice to have the old, but we need more new," he said. "We have parking lots owned by the city, you can develop those parking lots into ramps and buildings. I thought everything should have been tied in the underground, which makes sense because our weather is six months of the year, pretty much. It'd be nice to have some underground [development], as in Toronto when they designed most of everything in Downtown Toronto. I have all kinds of ideas on what this could be, and it's nice and I like what's going on.
"When we came down here, all we did was get broken into three times a week. We were the pioneers of this area, of the Cobblestone District. Swannie House has been here longer than us, and great people over there, fantastic, but everyone else is gone. The Cobblestone District really was only these few streets in this block, [but they've] expanded it, what they call the Cobblestone District now. But we were the pioneers and we're still here, and anything I say goes on deaf ears. I've seen everything develop, and I like the developments that went on and things that hopefully are coming in the next decade. But we've waited a long time."
In the meantime, the Cobblestone District site has continued to deteriorate for quite some time since the eminent domain process began. For Carr, if he prevails in this fight, he says it'll be immediate action taken to get his long-awaited project in the works.
"The first stage would be, regardless, to get the property clean," Carr explained. "The demo is important, the cleanup of the property is important. And then at the same time, we wouldn't be going for approvals on the plan, in general. I mean, it's all costly. Everything you do is very costly. So the timeline would be almost immediately, we would do the demolition and the cleanup of the property. And then from there, we would go on to get approvals on the rest of the project."
As for Nowakowski, he says the second the city is allowed to move forward after the battle for eminent domain and the appeal to the order of demolition has been settled, they will move quickly in an attempt to salvage what they can.
"There's a lot of developers that have taken on tough projects. There's one developer who even fixed a historic structure and a tree was growing in the middle of it," Nowakowski said. "Maybe 100% of the buildings will not be able to be saved, but I do think a significant portion of them can be saved, and be adaptively reused for a new lease on life."
"I think the city's role should be just to quickly stabilize it, and then put it into an RFP to have developers submit plans of what they would do with the structures, how they would redevelop it, and then we go from there to almost let the market decide where these buildings can fit for a new future in the Cobblestone Historic District. The Cobblestone Historic District is adjacent to Canalside and downtown. It's a big part of the revitalization of the City of Buffalo, and I believe in the Cobblestone Historic District."