Mayor Robert Restaino has selected a new company to take on a state-assisted $2.5 million housing rehabilitation project that stalled more than two years ago following a Niagara Gazette investigation into the background of his administration’s previous preferred developer.
In a resolution on the agenda for today’s city council meeting, Restaino is asking city lawmakers to authorize an agreement to sell 10 city-owned properties for a single, lump sum payment of $50,000 to Restore Niagara Falls, LLC. The company is managed local realtor Renee Moran and has the same address on Michigan Avenue as her employer, Red Door Real Estate WNY, LLC.
Approval of the sale would position Restore Niagara Falls, LLC to be eligible to receive up to $1 million in reimbursable funds obtained by the city in a grant from New York state’s Restore New York program, which provides municipalities with financial assistance for the revitalization of commercial and residential properties.
Under the proposed arrangement, Restore Niagara Falls would be expected to use the state grant funds and its own money to renovate the properties located on Memorial Parkway and Ferry Avenue as well as 8th, 7th, 6th, 5th and 4th streets in what is described as the city’s South End Gateway Revitalization District. The deal calls for the redevelopment of the blighted and condemned units as residential properties or short-term rentals.
Restaino’s administration previously received council approval to enter into a similar agreement more than two years ago with a different company called Power City Ventures, LLC.
The Buffalo-based developer withdrew from the project in February 2023 after a Niagara Gazette investigation determined that its owner, Rod Davis, had been accused of failing to pay contractors and was named as the defendant in a lawsuit filed by a business partner who questioned the handling of his investment into the redevelopment of a residential property on Cedar Avenue in the Falls.
Under the prior agreement, the city council had unanimously approved Davis as the developer for what was described as the Power City Landmark project after finding a proposal submitted by Davis through an entity called RJ Davis and Company Development was “consistent with the municipality’s local revitalization/urban development plan.” The council also determined that the proposed financing was appropriate for the specific project and that the project would facilitate “effective and efficient use of existing and future public resources so as to promote both economic development and preservation of community resources.”
Today’s council meeting begins at 6 p.m. and will be held inside city council chambers at city hall, 745 Main St.