Buffalo, N.Y. (WBEN) - The question is not what's included in Buffalo Mayor Chris Scanlon's 2026 Capital Budget, but whether City Comptroller Barbara Miller-Williams will take the $95 million worth of projects to the bond market.
Miller-Williams has yet to take the 2025 $110 million capital budget to the bond market, setting off a nasty and still unresolved legal battle between herself and Scanlon.
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"We can't stop planning for the future because one person is holding us up," Scanlon said.
Both the 2025 and 2026 Capital Budgets were passed by the Buffalo Common Council, yet Miller-Williams has not yet taken the bonds to market, citing concerns it may have on Buffalo's fragile fiscal picture. Under city charter, the comptroller is supposed to follow through on the Council's actions.
Miller-Williams could not be reached for comment.
"No one person should usurp the council's authority," Scanlon said.
The 2026 Capital Budget contains projects in all nine Common Council districts - the first time that has occurred in recent years.
"That equity is long overdue," said Ellicott District Councilwoman Leah Halton-Pope.
None of the work is sexy or headline grabbing. Most is HVAC work at 17 Buffalo schools and several community centers, building new playgrounds, adding new police and fire equipment, road and sidewalk work.
All of the Buffalo Public School work, some $55 million, is eligible for 97% reimbursable state funds, said Jim Barnes, school district CFO.
Scanlon says much of the work in the past two Capital Budgets were taking on projects and upgrades that had been deferred in past years.
"We are now trying to play catch up," Scanlon said.
Lovejoy District Councilman and Council Pro Tempore president Bryan Bollman says all 60 of Buffalo schools "need work and investment."
"Not doing it, will cost us more in the long run," Bollman said.