As usual, she got it wrong.
USA Today reporter Rick Hampson on Tuesday quoted Mayor Irene Elia calling Niagara Falls "a city decaying." The mayor went ballistic, shoving her face in front of seemingly every news camera within a 100-mile radius to say that her words were taken out of context.
"I never said that! I might have told him that we've had problems in the past, but we're on the rebound," the diminutive mayor said from behind a sea of microphones.
I hope she didn't say those words. The proper phrasing -- as my seventh-grade English teacher, Mr. Malakowski, could have told her -- is "a city decayed." Past tense, old news, done deal.
Why do we get our feathers in a ruffle whenever the national media comments on something that is obvious to everyone? The first step of every12-step program is to admit that the elevator has reached the basement.
I'd like to walk you through an exercise to exorcise the communal demons that have been riding roughshod on our backs since a man named E. Dent held the office of mayor. Lock hands with your neighbor, close your eyes and repeat after me.
We are at rock bottom. The only shame is in denying it to ourselves. It took a lot of work to sink this far; it will take much more to rise back up to the surface. Let the first step to recovery be mine.
There, now don't you feel better?
In fairness, that exercise wasn't for everyone, but was intended for those holding down (feel free to translate that literally) a public office. The people of our community understand where we're at: ground zero! The main reason this newspaper was so well received right out of the chute three years ago was that we dared to hold up a mirror to the empress to show that -- save the mouse ears -- she had not a stitch of the colorful clothes so deliriously described by the daily rag.
Jane and John Q. Public suffer no illusions about our predicament. All they ask is that someone in charge realize that we are neck-deep in quicksand and formulate a plan to get us all back on dry ground.
A drive around town the day after the USA Today piece ran showed signs of a city that passed decaying eons ago and is in the later stages of becoming full-fledged compost.
Among the not-so-pretty sights taken in were:
David Fleck -- who operates the Howard Johnson hotel on Main Street -- said in a published response to the USA Today story that he disagreed with Hampson's claim that the average tourist only stays four hours on the American side of the falls.
"I don't believe the average visitor's stay is four hours. Many of my people stay two days and they do more than just look at the falls," said Fleck.
Now, I've had the pleasure of meeting David Fleck and found him to be a bright man who has genuine concern for the well-being of his community. So I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt and assume that he was the one misquoted. A simple check of the math proves Hampson's figures have to be accurate. Niagara County has approximately 5,000 hotel rooms. At an average of 2.5 people per room, that means a maximum 12,500 people per night could be housed in the area's hotels. If every hotel filled to capacity for the six months of the tourism season -- something that is not even remotely close to happening -- that would account for about 2.25 million people or just over 28 percent of the total 8 million visitors to the region annually. It's safe to assume then that the 72 percent of people in our ideal scenario who do not stay overnight bag it after a few hours viewing the falls, thus making the four-hour estimate a generous one.
As regular readers of this column know, I have spent much of my adult life in local tourism and can tell you that when we reach the point of leaving the "No Vacancy" sign turned on at properties like Fleck's, columns like Hampson's will become a thing of the past.
What to do now? Recognizing that Hampson was right on the money is a good start. Baby steps would seem to be in order.
Let's start by getting city crews to pull the weeds along John B. Daly Boulevard and pick up the trash along Main and Niagara streets. A good first impression is crucial. You can complain all you want about your position in life but, if your hair is uncombed and your fly unbuttoned, you've no one but yourself to blame.
How about erecting signs on the boarded-up buildings along Main Street that say "Soon to be redeveloped as part of the city's Master Plan"? Saying it is the first step to doing it.
Making sure that the city's main developers -- Niagara Falls Redevelopment, David Cordish, et al. -- stay true to their timetables to reopen Niagara's landmark buildings is a must. So is capitalizing on the new casino downtown before the novelty wears off and it becomes just another part of the barren landscape.
It is imperative that every business in Niagara Falls take responsibility. For example, how many downtown hotels employ a concierge staff to tout the county's many attractions and points of interest to their guests, potentially extending their stay? Answer: zero. How many Canadian-side hotels have concierge staffs? Answer: too many to count.
I'd like to thank Rick Hampson for doing nationally what we at the Niagara Falls Reporter have been doing locally: splashing cold water into the faces of the disillusioned. Maybe, if just a few of our leaders removed their rose-colored glasses, rolled up their sleeves and got down to the task of turning around our fortunes, a national writer might one day do a story about Niagara's bright future, not its dismal past.
Until that day arrives, thank God for Frank Amendola. Only he had the courage to speak for the people when he told the Niagara Gazette, "It's not unfair about our city. This is the way it is."
Is it any wonder we at the Reporter love having this guy as a landlord?
| Niagara Falls Reporter | www.niagarafallsreporter.com | July 22 2003 |