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NIAGARA FALLS' FUTURE TAKES A SHARP 'DHIP'

By Shellene Reich

Mayor Paul  Dyster and his Community Development chief, Seth Piccirillo recently trotted out a plan to lure college grads into the city by helping them pay off their student loans. 

The Reporter received a copy of the Downtown Housing Incentive Program (DHIP). We aren’t impressed.

 We do have some observations:

·While the mayor and Piccirillo said the plan costs $200,000 over two years they failed to note the $200,000 breakout: $139,680 for award to applicants, $60,320 for “CD administration.” How much of the staggering administration fee gravitates to Piccirillo who is “Program Manager?”

·Large amounts of bureaucratic babysitting will occur with city inspectors regularly examining the properties, on-going meetings between Piccirillo and the cash recipients, meeting with landlords and Piccirillo, and of course there’s the application, certification process, monitoring of payout, credit checks and on and on.

·The DHIP document reads, “If the City discovers that the applicant was fraudulent at any point during the term of the agreement, he will not be eligible for reimbursement of future participation. Further penalties may be developing during the project planning.” Fraud and penalties? Looks like more work for Buffalo attorneys.  

The Mayor and Piccirillo have said the program will target Niagara University and NCCC students. And yet they’ve referred to inquiries they’ve received from students from Florida and California. Is this a local program or is it a program to import college grads from Timbuktu?

·Page 3: “Knowledge professionals are the difference between any city’s success and failure as a living destination.” So there you have it in a nutshell. Blue collar, salt of the earth worker/residents have become undesirables. Dyster and Piccirillo are going to pay college types from around the nation to bring smarts to Niagara Falls.

If the overall goal is to grow Niagara Falls and attract  “college grads” then improving the quality of life by lowering crime rates, controlling taxes,  cleaning streets; and demolishing dilapidated buildings must come first.

Dyster and Piccirillo are gearing up to pay 20 debt-ridden college grads to move into distressed areas of Niagara Falls in order to swell the population by 20 people. You see, if the city population dips below 50,000 it will lose federal funding opportunities. To Dyster and Piccirillo, the thought of losing access to all that federal largesse must be distressing.

Who is the author of this plan? How long had it been under wraps before being sprung on the City Council?  Why was it passed by the Urban Renewal Agency instead of being tabled for study, as requested, by two Council members? Why was the plan given to the media before the Council? 

This latest government handout has had media coverage that was nothing short of astounding. Some are asking how the proposal got so far so fast. This being Niagara Falls politics, one suspects there’s a private sector wizard behind the DHIP curtain.

Is it a good proposal? No, we think it’s a foolish use of taxpayer money. In a city where we build courthouses that cost 40% too much, design train stations with no projected riders and promote an Underground Railroad interpretive center with no history,  DHIP is par for the course.

Still, give credit to Dyster and Piccirillo. Their plan is a masterful continuous loop where federal money under the control of the City goes to college graduates to pay off federally subsidized Stafford student loans so Niagara Falls can keep its population above 50,000 in order to remain on the federal dole. It’s a thing of bureaucratic beauty from which other bureaucrats can learn valuable self-serving lessons. 

 

 

Niagara Falls Reporter www.niagarafallsreporter.com July 10 , 2012