The Time for High Tech has Arrived for Niagara Falls
By Tony Farina
Well paying high tech jobs or low tourism industry bottom-feeder pay? High tech vs. more of the same for poor Niagara Falls. The contrast is stark and the time to step into the future with hope for a better tomorrow is now.
We’ll take a look here at the road ahead and nudge the city to embrace a more forward looking agenda. The pieces appear to be in place to make something happen after years and millions of taxpayer money going over the falls to nowhere.
Niagara Falls Redevelopment is still anxious to build a $1.5 billion data center in the South End on 12 acres about what the city wants. NFR will build on 50-60 acres it owns at John Daly Blvd. and Falls St., a parcel environmentally suited for the project that would bring high-paying jobs and tax money to Niagara Falls even as the city administration continues to push for a publicly funded events center that would cost well over $165-million to acquire and build and bring in lots of low paying jobs. We’re talking mostly low-paying tourism industry jobs that Niagara Falls has lived with for more than 100 years. Think of the old convention center which was a $3 million per year drain on the city’s taxpayers plus operating deficits.
Looking at this situation, we know from a long history that tourism jobs that would be created by the mayor’s Centennial Park plan do not pay well. Tourism industry workers rate their satisfaction with pay at 60 percent as outside of a few manager positions they are mostly low paying by the hour. A tour guide makes less than $22 an hour. Put in small hourly salaries for laundry, dishwashing, cooking, and housekeeping and you get the message.
But the difference between the Centennial Park salaries and data center jobs is certainly noteworthy. Consider this perspective: the average pay for a data center technician is nearly $49,000 a year. The range for a specialist is $52,000 to $87,000 per year. Now what job would a Niagara Falls area resident want, a tourism industry low-paying gig or a data center opportunity with room for growth? No comment needed.
Thousands of high-paying union jobs would also materialize to build a data center and it makes complete sense for the city administration to forget an events center for which it has no major tenant or public assistance and sit down with NFR and its Canadian partner and work out something that makes economic sense for a city starving for leadership that can possibly make something good happen for years to come.
Real estate experts believe the property owned by NFR is worth about $1.5 million- to $2 million an acre. The city should settle with NFR on a path forward and capitalize on an opportunity that still exists despite all the negativity in the air and the city’s reluctance to change course and move ahead with something that will benefit the entire city and region.
High tech or more of the same? The choice now in the hands of the administration.
