Metroplex should be a major player in revitalizing the city’s neighborhoods, mayoral candidate Roger Hull said Tuesday in the second of his three major initiative announcements.
Hull promised to negotiate with Metroplex if he is elected mayor, saying he would persuade the economic development agency to spend millions demolishing deteriorated and abandoned buildings.
Hull, the founder of the new Alliance Party who is also running on the Republican line, made his announcement in front of 2033 Broadway, the burned-out shell of Tony’s Meat Market. The building has been vacant since a fire in late 2009, so long that a tarp stretched across the roof has fallen apart. Frayed fragments drape the sides of the building.
“For two years it’s been boarded up,” Hull said. “It harms the businesses on both sides of it.”
A hair salon and an attorney’s office bookend the site.
They, and other property owners, have waited too long for relief, Hull said, noting that the city first set aside money for demolition of the 50 worst properties in the city in 2008. That fund was drained by the demolition of the former Brandywine School, after a fire set by teenagers gutted it.
In 2009, city officials pursued the idea of tax increment financing — a system that financially links the city and a developer — to fund demolition, but it still hasn’t been approved by the state Legislature. Last year, council members took part of the summer off to tour the city’s deteriorating properties, but that did not lead to new solutions.
“How long do we have to talk? When are we going to start acting?” Hull said. “We need to start getting into neighborhoods. The point is to do something rather than just talk about how bad it is.”
But Metroplex Development Authority Chairman Ray Gillen said the agency is unlikely to demolish many buildings, even if Hull negotiates a demolition contract.
“There’s a couple of cautionary notes,” Gillen said. “You knock down buildings, you’re going to be knocking down your tax base. You’ve got to be cautious about that.”
The owners of 2033 Broadway haven’t paid taxes since 2008 and now owe the city $16,000.
The city was able to sell another $7,000 in city and school tax liens to American Tax Funding, as it has for many abandoned properties. In those cases, the city still gets paid a percentage of the taxes owed, even when the property owners refuse to pay.
But ATF has increasingly backed away from those liens, deciding not to buy them or to only buy them for cents on the dollar because company workers can’t find the owners or persuade them to accept a payment plan.
Since the city is still required to pay the school taxes owed on those properties, those buildings are a drain on the city’s finances.
However, it’s not clear which are which. “You’ve got to be careful,” Gillen said. “The vast majority of those structures are still paying taxes.”
He also said Metroplex is opposed to demolition in most cases. “We’re always trying to preserve structures. We don’t rush into demolition. That is how Schenectady lost a lot of important structures, like the train station,” he said. “We understand when buildings reach the end of their useful life, demolition can be a tool.”
But then, Metroplex generally doesn’t knock down the building until a developer is ready to rebuild.
Hull said Metroplex should stop waiting. He wants Metroplex to spend $1 million to $2 million, which he estimated would be enough money to demolish 50 to 100 buildings. Metroplex is allowed to demolish commercial buildings, and can take down residential buildings in commercial corridors for economic development purposes, including the creation of a parking lot.
But acting Mayor Gary McCarthy, who is running for mayor on the Democratic line, said Hull’s idea doesn’t go far enough.
“I’m trying to line up a package. It’ll be a more comprehensive citywide program,” he said. “Metroplex is restricted. It cannot do it in the residential areas.”
He said he will announce his plan in the end of June or early July.
“I’m trying to do things that are comprehensive,” he said, adding that his plan doesn’t involve Metroplex. But he said Metroplex could play a part.
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