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Despite public pronouncements from City Hall and the local media, the Aqua Falls project appears to be dead in the water. No work at all has been done on the project during this year's construction season, and it seems highly unlikely the facility will open around Christmas, the latest in a long series of opening dates that have been put forward by developers.
Still, despite all evidence to the contrary,the pronouncements continue.
More than two months ago, a breathless headline in the Niagara Gazette mistakenly proclaimed, "Construction on expanded project to resume within days."
And, just last week, Mayor Irene Elia told city residents that "Aqua Falls is moving forward."
The Aqua Falls project was announced to great fanfare in July of 1999 by an international development company headed up by Gilles Assouline and David Ho.
Gov. George Pataki headed the list of dignitaries at the groundbreaking.
Assouline, 44, is president and CEO of capital Media Group, a French company whose primary business is running Onyx Television, a German VH-1-style operation that broadcasts oldies music videos.
Capital Media also has interests in a computer graphics company and a software development business.
A public company, Capital Media's stock values have caromed wildly over the past year, from a low of 5 cents in November, 1999, to a high of $5 this past May. That price has fallen off precipitously over the summer, and the stock is currently valued at around $1.50, financial sources said.
The company experienced a net loss of $2.7 million during the first three months of this year on revenues of $834,000.
Assouline reportedly earned $250,000 in 1999 and paid his brother, Michel, who serves as the company's chief operating officer, another $200,000.
One local investment broker described the company's profile as "questionable."
"It's certainly not something I'd recommend to my clients," he said.
Described as "multimillionaires" during the summer of 1999 by the local media, Assouline and Ho began digging a hole adjacent to the Occidental Chemical Building on Niagara Street in the hopes of putting their new aquarium there.
The project was described as an oceanographic experience that would be like no other. Spectators would be permitted to view the sea from a "beach" on the first floor to the "sea bottom" some 45 feet below, through a series of glass tunnels.
But the project also caught fire from officials at the landmark Aquarium of Niagara from the outset.
As early as the project's announcement, well-known Niagara Falls businessmen had problems with the proposal. Tax and water bill incentives, Community Development Block Grants and a $650,000 state grant were just a few of of the bones of contention.
"I think it's corporate welfare," said David Fleck, president of Howard Johnson"s on Main Street and a member of the Aquarium's Board of Trustees. "These guys are multimillionaires, they can afford to pay the taxes."
The announcement was a boon for former mayor James C. Galie, whose administration hit the doldrums because of the lack of development prior to the 1999 elections.
But when nothing happened, either with the Aqua Falls or any other of the much- touted downtown developments, Galie's campaign hit the skids.
The Niagara Gazette even used the project it now promotes as a way to snipe at Galie. "We do not like the way Mayor James C. Galie ramrodded the financial incentive package for Aqua Falls," the paper stated in an un-bylined editorial.
Criticism was somewhat muted after Aqua Falls developers signed an agreement with the aquarium board. The pact allowed the developers to lease the aquarium for up to 99 years at $1 a year and also set up a purchase option for the building and 4.2 acres of real estate overlooking the Niagara Gorge.
Still, Fleck characterized the agreement as "a joke.".
"It's a land grab," he said. "I think it's selling the aquarium down the river."
The scheduled opening date, in May of this year, came and went with no significant work being done on the site beyond the massive hole that was dug in 1999.
Sources close to the situation say the excavation, for the most part through solid bedrock, cost far more than had been anticipated, and that the developers are now out of money. Assouline and Ho have reportedly met with Niagara Falls Redevelopment honcho Howard Milstein in an attempt to raise additional capital but, thus far, those talks have not borne fruit.
And, without a "white knight" to provide the needed capitalization, the project is unlikely to be completed, sources say.
On July 7, nearly a year to the day after signing the agreement with the developers, aquarium officials were grumbling again.
Niagara Aquarium Foundation President Steven M. Coen said the announcement of the agreement had seriously hurt the aquarium's fund raising efforts, because donors mistakenly assumed the institution had been privatized.
"After many frustrating months of attempting to successfully bring this project to closure, we find we are no further along than when we were approximately one year ago when we signed a letter of intent," he said.
Assouline countered, stating the delays were caused by a "redesign" that would make the project even bigger and better. Work would resume in "two or three days" he said.
That was two months ago.
The hole is still there.