Better Cooperation Between City and School District Long Overdue

The most recent project I’ve been involved with was helping select a new operator for Sal Maglie Stadium. Needless to say, I think the City of Niagara Falls has hit a home run with the new group currently making major aesthetic improvements to the ball park – including plans to erect a new scoreboard and playing host to major youth baseball tournaments.

To make this a true success story, however, will require a serious commitment of cooperation between the City and the School District. And for that, I will need your help on May 17th in this year’s election for Niagara Falls School Board. In short, we need to make sure the new baseball diamonds at NFHS are going to be made available for youth baseball tournaments.

We are finally seeing the pieces fall into place. New hotel construction throughout the city means that families traveling to our city for baseball tournaments will have increased access to local accommodations. Our biggest problem for years has been tourists bypassing our city and heading straight into the State Park for an afternoon before leaving town for dinner and family entertainment.

With Sal Maglie Stadium once again being a major city attraction, its location on Hyde Park Boulevard will draw visiting families away from the State Park and into our local restaurants and businesses. Most immediately, I would expect a rejuvenation of our Pine Avenue business corridor as traffic at our local restaurants and shops increases.

The local youth baseball leagues are excited as well and have begun to make improvements to their diamonds in anticipation of the summer tournaments. By utilizing baseball diamonds at Hyde Park, Midtown and NFHS, Sal Maglie Stadium would become the showpiece for tournaments of substantial numbers of teams – most of which will be traveling from outside the region.

The highlight of my term on the Niagara Falls School Board was the successful completion of the $66.7 million capital improvement plan – carried out at no-cost to local taxpayers – that resulted in the creation of the amazing turf athletic fields at Niagara Falls High School and LaSalle Preparatory School. The public was told that they would be used for the community. It’s time to make good on that promise.

Another important issue I want to move forward on is the Veteran’s exemption authorized by NYS in 2014. We’ve seen other school districts act on delivering this important benefit to those who served in our armed forces and it is time to put this measure up to a vote once and for all for the Veterans of Niagara Falls who honorably served their country.

There has never been a more important time to elect dedicated and competent leadership to our board of education. In addition to being an attorney, I am currently pursuing my School District Business Leader certificate at SUNY Brockport. My commitment to education and financial accountability places me in the best position to help make sure that we allocate the renewed and restored NYS school funding where it will do our children the most good: in the classroom.

I am asking for your support on Tuesday, May 17th to represent you on the Niagara Falls School Board.

Thank you.