Mayor’s Office Attempts to Hide Rising Costs for Centennial Park

The following was written by investigative journalist Ken Cosentino.

Mayor Robert Restaino has been intentionally misleading his constituents for the past 3+ years by telling us that Centennial Park will cost taxpayers an estimated $150 million. When the Niagara Gazette attempted to uncover the actual projected costs of the project by a Freedom of Information Act request, Restaino’s administration rejected their FOIA.

After appealing the initial rejection, the Niagara Gazette was successful in obtaining the financial information which showed that the projected cost is actually $165 million; or $15 million higher than the mayor has been telling us. Mayor Restaino’s chronic lying was exposed. The cost of Centennial Park is projected to continue its climb every year as inflation continues to raise the costs of both materials and labor.

But the fact of the matter is that Mayor Restaino has no idea how much Centennial Park will cost due to the rising materials cost, which escalate with each passing year. This has even been disclosed by his hired guns with Sports Facilities Advisory LLC.

Mayor Restaino told the Gazette, “We don’t want people to hang on these numbers. These are hypotheticals.” Translation: “Pay no attention to the actual projected costs, or the fact that we lied, or the fact that we tried to block the truth from getting out. We will continue to block the truth from reaching the taxpayers, while calling our lies hypotheticals.”

The ongoing eminent domain lawsuit between the City of Niagara Falls and Niagara Falls Redevelopment is already costing taxpayers an untold sum that is estimated to be well over $1 million. This cost is also expected to continue climbing each year as this nonsensical legal battle progresses.

As a lifelong resident of the Falls, I recall visiting the failed “Aqua Falls” project that turned out to be a large hole in the ground. Centennial Park seems like the sequel to Aqua Falls. Another “magic bullet” flop that falls onto the taxpayer as Mayor Restaino continues the Niagara Falls tradition of empty promises and increased costs.

Our mayor is forcing us to pay for Centennial Park… something we never asked for, something we never wanted, and something we can’t even afford.

Last year, Mayor Restaino bragged about the City of Niagara Falls now having it’s own semi-pro hockey team, the inappropriately named “Niagara Falls Buffalos.” After just one season, the Buffalos have now left Niagara Falls and moved their team to Buffalo. Coincidence?

An insider with the Buffalos told the Reporter that the City of Niagara Falls just isn’t ready for a semi-pro hockey team; “We played like 8 to 10 home games and not a single person from the Falls came to watch. Not a single one. We literally sold zero tickets. None.” All of this despite Mayor Restaino’s repeated efforts to promote the team on his weekly podcasts as well as on his Facebook page.

For one brief season, the Niagara Falls Buffalos played their home games at the Hyde Park Ice Pavilion, which is one of many venues for amateur sports in the City of Niagara Falls and Niagara County.

It appears that Mayor Restaino never learned to finish his dinner before begging for dessert. As the CEO of our city, his focus should be on selling out those venues which already exist before blindly embarking on his own self-serving crusade. Centennial Park is nothing more than a monument to Mayor Restaino’s massive ego.

Let’s take a look at sports facilities that already exist in Niagara Falls and those in Niagara County that are in close proximity to our community. These facilities could be used for tournaments that Destination Niagara should be promoting as part of its destination marketing efforts:

• The Niagara Falls City School District’s athletic fields  include nine synthetic turf fields for football, soccer, lacrosse, baseball and softball; plus six tennis courts and a reconstructed all-weather running track.

• Reservoir State Park offers a variety of sports facilities including: Tennis, pickle ball, cricket, five softball diamonds, roller hockey, soccer and four basketball courts. Many readers will recognize this as a renowned youth sports facility which hosts a variety of tournaments.
• The 121-acre Veterans’ Memorial Park features three little league diamonds, one baseball diamond (all diamonds are equipped with sprinkler and irrigation systems); and two multi-purpose fields for soccer, football and lacrosse.
• Private facilities such as the Niagara International Sports and Entertainment (NISE) also have facilities for training and basketball games. Located in the old Summit Park Mall, NISE also has batting cages and plenty of room for training and running drills. Also, NISE has plans for expansion with more than enough land to build a huge multi-use sports facility. 

• Sal Maglie stadium is already being renovated at a current cost of $1.487 million, approved by city lawmakers at the request of Mayor Restaino. Many local commentators believe that Hyde Park is the best suited location for youth sports, but Mayor Restaino has decided to use this land for a dog pound instead of sports.

• Fort Niagara hosts amateur games and sports tournaments consistently at its soccer field.

• SUNY Niagara’s main gym seats 750, but when standing room is taken into consideration the maximum occupancy is closer to 1,750. The college also rents tennis courts, baseball and softball diamonds, and soccer fields. These rentals provide a major source of much needed additional revenue for the college.

• Similarly, Niagara University enjoys revenue from its rentals. The historic Gallagher Center at NU seats 2,400 and the Dwyer Center Arena (which is primarily used by the NU hockey team), seats more than 2,100. Outdoor athletic fields for baseball, soccer and other sports seat more than 1,200. NU also advertises two swimming pools and an event center space for dance, gymnastics and other sports.

Niagara University is often mentioned as a potential anchor tenant for the Centennial Parks event center. It wouldn’t make economic sense for NU to relocate their events and pay rent elsewhere, when it doesn’t even fill its own buildings. The university rents out its own buildings so, in effect it would be competing with Centennial Park. This would also require the university to rent their own facilities beyond what they already book to make up for their shortfalls.

Another big issue with Centennial Park revolves around marketing needs. As it stands, the City of Niagara Falls would have to hire an outside marketing firm to suit those needs; creating additional costs for our city that it cannot afford unless our taxes are increased. Covering these legacy costs will be a never-ending burden for taxpayers. Future generations will inherit these debts unjustly, which will continue to raise our taxes indefinitely.

The event center would not be able to depend on Destination Niagara to market events properly, because the tourism board is beholden to marketing all of the aforementioned venues in Niagara County, in addition to entertainment venues. As such, the capacity for Destination Niagara to properly market Centennial Park sports and events is greatly insufficient. Keep in mind that Destination Niagara wasn’t able to properly assist Mayor Restaino in marketing the Niagara Falls Buffalos semi-pro hockey team.

Are we as a community satisfied with Mayor Restaino’s proven lying and bullying tactics? Aren’t there any other areas of improvement that should be his main focus instead of spending our tax dollars recklessly?