VIDEO: Greenway plan gets final approval

By Aaron Besecker/beseckera@gnnewspaper.com

BUFFALO — A regional economic development plan to guide 50 years of new parks, greenspaces, trails and waterfront access points along the Niagara River received the last necessary approval from the state’s top parks official on Thursday.

Carol Ash, commissioner of the Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation, signed the Niagara River Greenway Plan during a signing ceremony in a Buffalo waterfront restaurant.

“There are very few communities that have the opportunity that this community has now,” Ash said.

All 13 communities in Erie and Niagara counties within the once-contentious greenway boundary voted in support of the plan earlier this year. The commission was created through a state law passed in 2004 by former Gov. George Pataki.

The commission hired a team of consultants led by Wendel Duchscherer to assist in the planning process. The consultants were paid more than $400,000.

Future projects, which must meet the standards established by the commission in the plan, have access to $450 million in funding from the New York Power Authority over the next 50 years.

The commission itself will have not have the power to distribute greenway funds. That task lies with entities called standing committees. Each committee will control a specified pot of money.

Funding from the power authority, which officials say should be used to leverage other grant monies, is set to flow later this year.

Ash said she believes the process of proposing projects should remain open to the public, no matter what group or government body sponsors a proposal.

“They have to have the complete buy in of their own communities as they go to put projects forward to the commission,” she said. “...It’s got to be open. We know throughout the state the projects that have been the most successful have been those that are open. Bring in the community from the ground up and then move forward.”

Commissioner Paul Dyster, who chairs the commission’s Citizens Advisory Committee, said he believes there will be “a lot of hands reaching for the funds” and the public needs to be a watchdog over the greenway money.

“I think it’s a great accomplishment anytime you have 13 communities come together ... to try to do something positive for their future,” Dyster said. “But the one piece of bad news we have to keep reminding people out there in the community, their work isn’t done because now that we’ve planned it we have to build it and we need the same grassroots support that we got in drafting the plan to make sure that the greenway gets done properly.”

The Niagara Power Coalition, which includes seven entities in Niagara County, recently spent most of a recent three-hour, closed-door meeting discussing their ideas for the standing committee application process.

Coalition members take up seven of the eight spots on the standing committee in charge of an annual $3 million greenway fund for Niagara County projects.

The greenway commission’s Executive Committee will discuss a draft funding application when it meets Tuesday in Beaver Island State Park, Grand Island.

Commissioner Paul Leuchner, a Grand Island resident, said he thinks the final approval of the greenway plan will allow communities to start to look at the future in terms of what’s good for everyone, and not just one community.

“Getting this process moving along now so that things start to hit the ground is very important,” Leuchner said. “So we’re not going to stop where the plan has been signed and approved, but continue on.”

Before the signing ceremony, greenway commission members, along with other representatives of state agencies, toured three Western New York sites officials called “prototypes” for future greenway proposals.

The tour stops consisted of East River Marina Complex on Grand Island; the village of Lewiston waterfront; and the Ontario Street boat ramp in Buffalo.

Contact reporter Aaron Beseckerat 282-2311, ext. 2263.