By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 17 October 2015 at 12:00 am
Photos by Tom Rivers – Main Street in Medina was blocked off for a classic car show on Sept. 2.
The Medina Business Association is pursuing a $300,000 state grant to assist building owners with projects.
MEDINA – Downtown Medina has enjoyed a rebirth in small businesses in the past decade with many new shops opening and building owners making big investments in their historic buildings.
Caring for an older building brings with it continuous challenges and expenses, from roofs, infrastructure and façades.
The Medina Business Association is trying to assist building owners by pursuing a $300,000 Main Street grant from the state. Those matching funds could be used for a range of projects, including creating residential space in the downtown.
The state is expected to announce the grant winners in December.
The Medina Business Association polled its members and about $1 million in projects were identified. The association considered seeking the maximum $500,000 grant, but opted to scale down its grant request to $300,000 to improve its chances of securing some money in the state program, said Kathy Blackburn, executive director of the Orleans County Chamber of Commerce.
If the MBA is approved for the grant, the Chamber would administer the funds. A committee of community members would review proposals from building owners to determine which ones are approved for the grant. Blackburn said a committee already is in place through Medina’s façade program. The same group would review the downtown projects if Medina is successful with the grant.
Building owners would need to front the money, and then get reimbursed for half the cost. Some owners who expressed interest in the grant may not want to be in the program because of the upfront expense. Blackburn said the Chamber and MBA will see who can commit to the grant projects if the funds are approved for Medina.
Albion and Holley have both received Main Street grants in recent years that resulted in work on several downtown buildings as well as streetscape improvements.
In addition to Medina’s grant application, the Orleans Economic Development Agency is seeking state funds for a downtown rental assistance program that would make rent cheap for businesses in the first six months.
“It helps the businesses get on their feet,” Blackburn said.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 17 October 2015 at 12:00 am
Photos by Tom Rivers
GAINES – Al Capurso is pictured with a new historical marker that was unveiled today by the former one-room schoolhouse on Gaines Basin Road, just north of the Erie Canal. The schoolhouse was built in 1832 and is one of the oldest cobblestone buildings in the area.
It has been largely abandoned since decentralization in 1944. The marker also notes that Caroline Phipps taught at the school. She went on to be a distinguished educator and ran the Phipps Union Seminary in Albion from 1837 to 1875. That spot later became the County Clerks Building.
A swing is pictured next to the former schoolhouse.
The restoration project has been backed by the Orleans County Historical Association and includes a new roof on the building and new windows, as well as the historical marker.
Here is how the building looked last winter.
Here is how the historical site looks today.
Gary Kent led the efforts to trim some of the branches that were hanging across the building. Those branches needed to be removed for the roof work, which was completed by Young Enterprises. Mike Tower fixed the rafters.
Bill Lattin worked on the window sashes, Bob Albanese helped clean up the grounds, and many volunteers pitched in to remove junk from inside the building.
Bob Barrett of Clarendon restored the teacher’s desk and chair that remained inside the school. He even reconstructed the drawers in the desk.
Capurso, who is now the Gaines town historian, would like the site to become a meeting house and museum.
He said that Gaines once had 12 one-room schoolhouses. They were roughly located 1.5 miles apart to make access easier by the students in attendance.
The windows used to be boarded up, but now plenty of light can get inside the old schoolhouse.
Next year, Capurso said he would like to see work on the ceiling, walls and floor. He is pleased with the progress so far, and thanked the community for its support.
Today’s program included remarks from Capurso; Bill Lattin, who is retired as county historian; Matt Ballard, the current county historian; Dee Robinson, former Gaines town historian for more than 30 years; Town Supervisor Carol Culhane; and Ted Swiercznski, who attended the school and has been active in local politics for several decades. Another former student of the school, Angelina Daniels, also attended today’s celebration.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 14 October 2015 at 12:00 am
Editorial
Photos by Tom Rivers – Steve Hyde, president and CEO of the Genesee County Economic Development Center, faces a gauntlet of reporters following last week’s announcement that a high-tech company would be the first tenant in the STAMP site in the Town of Alabama.
Two big economic development projects are coming to the area, and those projects should have a ripple effect, leading to other support businesses and boosting the local economy with more spending money at local restaurants and businesses.
The projects were years in the making, and show the importance of vision and laying the groundwork.
In Orleans County, Pride Pak will build a 64,000-square-foot vegetable processing plant on Route 31A in Medina, across from the GCC campus. Pride Pak is from Canada, and the Medina site will be its first U.S.-based facility.
The Orleans Economic Development Agency has welcomed several Canadian companies to the community in recent years, with Brunner International and Hinspergers Poly Industries among the group that has tackled expansions in Medina.
Medina and other villages have the sewer and water infrastructure that are critical to attracting manufacturing and processing plants. But many villages don’t have the open space for those sites. Medina village officials about 30 years ago, back when Marcia Tuohey was mayor, worked to develop a business park on Maple Ridge Road.
The site drew BMP and the former Trek. The Orleans EDA has worked in recent years to expand the business park, and those efforts are paying off with Pride Pak coming to town.
It can be a slow, expensive process, acquiring land, running infrastructure and access roads, mapping out wetlands, sometimes taking down decrepit buildings with asbestos, and trying to come out with the dollars to do it all.
The EDA deserves lots of praise for getting Pride Pak to the finish line and committing to Medina. The company has a site plan that is under review by the local Planning Boards. It expects to break ground next month and have the new building ready with 85 to 100 employees by next June.
Steve Karr (right), chief executive officer for Pride Pak Canada, last Tuesday meets village officials and others working on the company’s new 64,000-square-foot vegetable processing facility. He is pictured with Mauro LoRusso, vice president of finance for Pride Pak (center); Gabrielle Barone, vice president of business development for the Orleans Economic Development Agency (far left); and Marguerite Sherman, village trustee (second from left).
The EDA also has been working for several years to make other spots in Medina ready for businesses. The agency has about 300 acres that are “shovel ready” with the infrastructure in place.
Those efforts should pay dividends now that the first tenant has committed to the STAMP site just down the road in the Town of Alabama.
1366 Technologies Inc. of New Bedford, Mass., was joined by Gov. Andrew Cuomo last Wednesday at GCC in announcing an initial $100 million manufacturing plant at STAMP, which is about 1 mile south of the Orleans County line.
The company has revolutionized manufacturing silicon carbon wafers – considered “the heart” of solar panels. It looked at 300 sites for its new factory.
1366 Technologies expects to expand and make a $700 million investment in the area, starting with 600 full-time workers and growing to 1,000. The company will use about 100 acres of STAMP, a 1,250-acre site.
Genesee County Economic Development Center officials expect STAMP will draw more companies that that the first tenant is committed. The site will be a big user of the Medina sewer.
Steve Hyde, GCEDC chief executive officer and president, started working on STAMP a decade ago. Back then, the economic development focus was putting new business parks along the Thruway. Genesee County added sites in Batavia, Bergen and Pembroke.
Hyde started talking about a “mega-site” in the Town of Alabama. A lot of folks seemed skeptical. STAMP is about 10 times the size of a typical business park and it is located near a swamp with little infrastructure.
Hyde saw the example in Albany with the Luther Forest Technology Campus, a mega site that has attracted global nanotech leaders, investing billions.
Alabama in rural Genesee County was remote, a “quiet site” like Luther Forest for the delicate manufacturing in nanotechnology. It also is a huge site. The high-tech companies, like 1366 Technologies, need a lot of room to grow. The Thruway business parks don’t have the land.
Hyde and Genesee County officials spent a decade building support for the project in the community, the region and state. New York committed $33 million to bring the infrastructure to the site.
While working on STAMP, the Genesee EDC had major successes bringing two yogurt plants to Batavia, projects that helped the agency build credibility in the region and state, leading to more confidence in STAMP.
Steve Hyde and Jim Whipple, the leader of the Orleans EDA, often say, “Economic development isn’t a sprint, but a marathon.”
Gov. Andrew Cuomo urges communities to develop plans for shaping their future and be tenacious in implementing them.
Too even be in the economic development race, communities need to have an inventory of buildings and land that would be attractive to companies.
If they don’t have the assets in place, they need to work on getting them there, and they could be in for years of effort with lots of upfront costs before they see a nickel of return.
With governments cash-strapped, many municipal leaders may be inclined to pull back of economic development. Who wants to spend $50,000 cleaning up a brownfields site when there are so many other needs in the community? Who wants to build roads through farm fields, especially ones by a swamp?
Twenty years ago, when Vicki Pratt was leading the Orleans EDA, she pushed to create the Holley Business Park, putting together a game plan to extend the village’s low-cost electricity, and water, sewer, and roads to the site. That Business Park emerged with efforts from the Village of Holley, Town of Murray and Orleans County. It was a farmfield. Now it’s the home of Precision Packaging Products and other businesses.
Our communities should take stock of their assets for bringing in businesses, an honest appraisal of strengths and weaknesses.
There is still space at the Holley Business Park and lots of room for businesses in Medina. I worry about Albion. There is 6 acres available in the Albion Business Park by Butts Road. I don’t see a lot of other options.
There is the Route 98 corridor from 31A to the village, but there isn’t sewer for a manufacturer or processing plant. Albion officials should try to make that happen.
It makes sense because Albion has the capacity in its water and sewer plants to serve big users. Other communities don’t have the water or sewer to serve a big user.
Albion has the resource, but it needs options with vacant land with existing sewer for someone to build a Pride Pak-type facility.
I’d also look at the Point Breeze area and what could be done to make that a bigger draw. For years I’ve heard people talk about the need for a big investment in sewer infrastructure in that area. With STAMP bringing hundreds of high-paying jobs, the Point and all of the Orleans County lakefront could be in demand if there was more infrastructure in place.
The governor, while speaking at GCC last week, praised the efforts to prepare STAMP for the next generation of high-tech companies. Those businesses will shape the region for years and decades to come.
The governor said communities that want to succeed need to be laying the groundwork now. It’s a highly competitive environment as cities, regions and states vie to land manufacturers and businesses.
“The future isn’t just going to happen,” the governor said. “The future is what you make of it.”
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 29 September 2015 at 12:00 am
MEDINA – It may be a vacant field now, but come spring, there will be a 64,000-square-foot vegetable processing facility along Maple Ridge Road in Medina.
That’s the goal by Pride Pak, a Canadian company that is building a complex in Medina for vegetable processing, packaging and distribution.
The company has an aggressive construction schedule in order to have the site in operation by next spring, said Marty Busch, the village code enforcement officer. The company will seek approval for its site plan for the project during the Village Planning Board meeting on Oct. 6 at 7 p.m. at City Hall, 600 Main St.
The Orleans Economic Development Agency also is crafting a 20-year tax savings plan for the company. Pride Pak would pay 0 percent of the property taxes the first year, and then 5 percent would be added until Pride Pak is paying the full 100 percent after 20 years.
There will be a public hearing at 9 a.m. on Oct. 6 at City Hall about the tax savings plan or a Payment In Lieu Of Taxes (PILOT). The land for Pride Pak is currently owned by the EDA and doesn’t generate local property taxes.
Pride Pak was looking at the former Worthington Cylinders (Bernz-O-Matic) site, but decided instead to build new in Medina. Busch said the 64,000-square-foot building is just phase one. Pride Pak could expand the complex in three additional phases, Busch advised the Village Board on Monday.
The new building, plus equipment, represents an $11 million investment in Medina, Orleans EDA officials said.
In addition to the property tax discounts, the Town of Shelby is seeking a $734,000 grant through the state Office of Community Renewal to assist Pride Pak with the project. Pride Pak also has been been approved for a sales tax exemption for equipment and building materials, an estimated savings of $280,000.
The company would have 40 employees in its first year, another 40 the second year and would reach about 200 at full capacity, said Gabrielle Barone, EDA vice president for business development.
Besides adding jobs to the community, Pride Pak would benefit the local economy by buying some local produce, and packaging it to be distributed to grocery stores. The company wants to expand its operations from Canada and better serve a large northeastern US grocery chain, EDA officials said.
Jim Whipple, EDA chief executive officer, also asked the Medina Village Board on Monday to help pay for new water and sewer infrastructure for the Medina Business Park. Whipple said it will cost more than $100,000 to have infrastructure in place to serve Pride Pak and other future businesses in the park.
Whipple asked Medina to contribute $50,000 towards the effort. The board said it will consider the request.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 28 September 2015 at 12:00 am
Photos by Tom Rivers
MEDINA Chris Panek, an employee with Panek Coatings, gets in position to paint the Gallagher barn on North Gravel Road in Medina this morning.
Panek Coatings expects to finish the job today after using about 100 gallons of paint on the project.
The barn has been a landmark structure on the northend of the village for about 150 years. It is being repainted white with green trim to reflect its history as WM J. GALLAGHER STOCK FARMS.
Here is how the barn looked a month ago, before it was repainted.
The iconic structure was recently purchased by Martin and Jenna Bruning. They are working to make the site available as a events center for weddings, parties and other special events.
Here is how the barn looked late this morning.
The Brunings have been working in recent months to clean up the property, including the landscape and the building. They have two weddings booked for next year at the site.
The Brunings plan to call the site “The Gallagher” and hope to have it available for events in June. The property also includes a stately brick house that the Brunings said would also be available for dinner parties and other events.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 4 September 2015 at 12:00 am
Editorial – $100K donation, 200th anniversary of farm and several other jobs well done
Good deeds and major milestones deserve some recognition, so let’s consider a few recent examples in Orleans County.
Maurice Hoag and his wife Courtenay gave another $100,000 to Hoag Library. They had already given $250,000 to the new library, which opened in 2012. That was enough to have the building named in their honor.
Mr. Hoag, the valedictorian of Albion’s Class of 1961, worked in the chemical engineering field. He lives in the Baltimore area but comes back to Albion for class reunions.
Photos by Tom Rivers – A plaque at Hoag Library notes the contributions from Maurice and Courtenay Hoag.
In July, the library received a surprise check from the Hoags. They asked that the money be used to pay down the mortgage on the new library.
That will reduce the debt payments and get the building paid off sooner. It could free up funds for programs, staff and supplies, or reduce the library tax.
The Hoags also pay for generous scholarships for two Albion college students pursuing chemical engineering.
Mr. Hoag hasn’t forgotten his hometown. His gifts are appreciated.
George LaMont (right), a desendant of Josias LaMont, unveils a historical marker in honor of the man who started the LaMont farm in 1815. About 200 people attended a celebration on Aug. 15 for the farm.
A local family celebrated 200 years of growing fruit last month. Josias LaMont started the farm that would span six generations.
Roger and George LaMont are both semi-retired from farming. They have made a big impact on the industry and with many local causes.
Roger was co-chairman of the fund-raising effort for the new Hoah Library. George was instrumental in starting the Oak Orchard Community Health Center, which has expanded from care for migrant workers to the entire community. Both men have been key leaders in the apple industry.
They helped establish Lake Ridge Fruit Company, an apple packing and storage business that serves many local apple farms on Route 104 in Gaines. Roger helped organize growers in a partnership with Cornell to breed new apple varieties and make them available to only NY growers, giving New York farmers an advantage over growers from Washington.
The family has done so much for the industry a future apple variety should be named the LaMont.
Matt Ballard, former director of the Cobblestone Musuem, is pictured with a World War I exhibit he helped organize.
Matt Ballard served as director of the Cobblestone Museum for about 18 months. He was a key leader at Orleans County’s only National Historic Landmark, putting on professional exhibits about medicine in the 1800s and the local involvement with World War I.
Ballard resigned last month to take a full-time position with Roberts Wesleyan College. He will continue to work part-time as the Orleans County historian.
Ballard is only 27 and brings a passion and expertise to local history. He certainly raised the profile of the Cobblestone Museum in the community and region, and partnered with several local groups on heritage projects, including refurbishing a fox “stuffed” by legendary taxidermist Carl Akeley, a Clarendon native. The museum owns a fox that Akeley worked on when he was 16.
Ballard feels so committed to the Cobblestone Museum he has agreed to stay on in a volunteer role as a board member. He has proven an asset to the county, especially with preserving and promoting our proud heritage.
This statue of Mary is part of the Catholic parish in Holley.
A church in Holley is marking its 150th anniversary in the next 12 months. St. Mary’s Catholic Church has been a focal point in Holley since 1866. The parish has one of its biggest community events on Sunday with the annual St. Rocco’s Festival in Hulberton.
The church members have been good stewards of a church built in 1905 of Medina sandstone. It replaced an earlier wooden structure. The congregation also has had an infusion of young families in recent years with the leadership of Father Mark Noonan, the parish priest. It looks like the parish will stay strong for years to come.
Gary Withey tends to a customer during the final days of Fischer’s News Stand.
Many Albionites are sad to see a long-established business close. Fischer’s News Stand sold its last newspaper, magazine and Lotto ticket on Sunday.
Gary Withey and his late wife Denise became owners of the business in January 1995. They kept it going long after news stands in other much larger communities shut down.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 16 July 2015 at 12:00 am
Photos by Tom Rivers
A warehouse on McKinstry Street in Albion, which has sat mostly vacant for more than a decade, has been repainted with extensive renovations as the site is upgraded for electronics recycling.
This photo shows the warehouse in April 2013.
ALBION – For about a decade, a warehouse on McKinstry Street sat vacant as local economic development officials tried to find a user for the site.
A Canadian company bought the property about two years ago and BOMET Recycling, Inc. has given the building a major transformation, with more work to come, including a new roof.
“It’s like a renaissance,” said Jim Whipple, chief executive officer for the Orleans Economic Development Agency. “They’ve really put a lot of effort into it.”
BOMET Recycling bought and upgraded the warehouse with plans to turn it into a base for recycling electronics. The company painted it to blend with the site next door used by CRFS.
Whipple shared photos of the offices and interior of the building with the EDA board of directors last week. He praised BOMET for all of the work at the 52,000-square-foot building.
BOMET has three people working from the site now, Whipple said. When the company bought the site in Albion, it said it planned to have 30 employees at the site when it was fully up in running.
The EDA purchased the warehouse and adjoining parking lot for $527,000 in February 2002. At that time Washington Mutual was in expansion mode in Albion. The company needed lots of parking, and some local officials hoped WaMu would quickly run out of space at the former Dime Bank complex on East Avenue.
But that never happened. WaMu was acquired by JP Morgan Chase, which left Albion in 2013.
The EDA sold the property for $176,000 to BOMET, which is based in Cambridge, Ontario. The sale returned the property to the tax rolls in the Village of Albion.
The EDA is hopeful that Zhan “Bo” Zhang, leader of BOMET, will provide testimonials about the work of the EDA with the company, which the EDA could use to help recruit other Canadian companies to Orleans County.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 15 June 2015 at 12:00 am
MEDINA – A developer is interested in building a new 49-room hotel in Medina on Maple Ridge Road, west of the Bates Road intersection, Orleans Economic Development Agency officials said.
That developer is currently working on a project in Pennsylvania. Once that is complete, the developer could commit to the project in Medina, perhaps in September, said Jim Whipple, the Orleans EDA chief executive officer.
EDA officials have been courting developers for a Medina project in recent months. The EDA had a consultant study the market in Medina to see if a new hotel would be financially sustainable.
The consultant, Interim Hospitality Consultants, said Medina could support a small hotel with 41 to 49 rooms. A hotel that size would see at least a daily occupancy rate of 60 percent, according to the report from Interim Hospitality.
Whipple said this morning there is interest in developers in the project. The EDA wants to submit the hotel project through the Finger Lakes Regional Economic Development Council, seeking that group’s blessing for state funding to help with an access road off Maple Ridge Road for the hotel.
Besides the usual $750 million state-wide in funding for economic development, this year the state has added $1.5 billion in the “Upstate Economic Revitalization Competition.” The $1.5 billion will go to three regions in the state that submit the best plans for economic development projects. Whipple said the hotel would be a boost for Orleans County.
Orleans could boost its sales tax and visitor spending with the hotel. Orleans County ranked last in the state among 62 counties with visitor spending, according to a state report in 2012. The state report, prepared by Tourism Economics, put the total visitor spending in Orleans at $21.13 million.
Currently the county is limited to many day-trippers because it doesn’t have a chain hotel, EDA officials said.
The EDA has been talking with Cobblestone Inn and Suites about the project in Medina. That company has built many hotels in small towns, typically working with investors in the host community.
The report from Interim Hospitality Consultants said about 30 percent of the Medina hotel visitors would be on business-related trips, while the others would be people visiting family, or in town for class reunions, weddings and other special events.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 3 June 2015 at 12:00 am
File photos by Tom Rivers
MEDINA – The Landmark Society’s Young Urban Preservationists plan to be in Medina on June 13 to see the renovation efforts at the former R.H. Newell Shirt Factory on West Center Street. That building has been renovated the past decade by local attorney Andrew Meier.
He has made first floor space available for a coffee shop, a meadery and a performance venue out back. The second floor includes law offices and the top floor has loft apartments and hotel rooms.
The Young Urban Preservationists have visited many preservation success stories in the City of Rochester. The trip to Medina is the first outside Rochester for the group, said Caitlin Meives, a preservation planner with the Landmark Society of Western New York.
“We want to showcase all the cool stuff going on in Medina,” Meives said today.
Chris Busch, president of the Orleans Renaissance Group, is pictured in the main performance hall of the Bent’s Opera House. ORG is trying to restore the building, a dominant structure on Main Street.
The young preservationists will look at the Newell building, tour the Bent’s Opera House and get an update on that preservation effort, and visit other spots in the community.
Meives wants to highlight the young entrepreneurs in Medina who are leading the preservation efforts in the community, as well as a resurgence in the downtown business district.
810 Meadworks is one of several new businesses to open in downtown Medina.
The group from Rochester plans to be in Medina from 2 to 10 p.m. The schedule includes a stop at the 810 Meadworks, the new meadery in the Newell building.
The group will also take in a concert at the open air venue in the building. Meadworks owners are offering live music in the former Boiler 54 performance space this year. Meadworks is calling the venue “The Beegarten.”
Meives said the Medina trip is part of the “Backroads & Byways,” a series of day trips to small towns in the region that are promoting preservation.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 27 May 2015 at 12:00 am
Photos by Tom Rivers
HOLLEY – The dominant church tower in Holley’s Public Square hasn’t told time for many years. But that changed last week when the four clocks where fixed.
The clock faces had been bare in recent years, but Glenn Hughson, owner of the former United Methodist church building, put back the clocks and their mechanical systems.
“People are real happy,” said Mary Ellen Ridley, Holley’s deputy village clerk. “Many residents really missed the clock.”
Hughson used a state Main Street grant to help pay for the $17,310 project, which included new front doors for the former church, which is now used for apartments. The state funds covered 75 percent of the costs.
Jonathan Ross, owner of Jonathan’s in the Public Square, has one of the best views of the church tower and clock from his bakery and coffee shop.
Ross said many of the long-time residents appreciate seeing the functioning clock tower.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 11 May 2015 at 12:00 am
Heritage Hero: Andrew Meier
Photos by Tom Rivers – Andrew Meier is pictured inside the second floor of the Robert H. Newell Building, which is now home to the law offices of Webster, Schubel and Meier. The building’s reuse and preservation is one of several reasons why Meier was awarded a “Heritage Hero” award on April 25 by Genesee Community College.
MEDINA – It was 2004 and Andrew Meier had a new law degree from Syracuse University after earning his bachelor’s at the University of Rochester.
Meier was 24 then and many of his law school friends settled into jobs at law firms in the big cities.
Meier returned to his hometown, working with David Schubel and Norris Webster at their law firm on Main Street. Meier bought a house in Middleport, renovated it and sold it.
He liked that challenge, of bringing life back into an old building.
“I love architecture and I really love old buildings,” Meier said.
The Robert H. Newell Building is now home to several different businesses and uses.
Meier had long admired the Robert H. Newell Building at 113 West Center St. The building for 86 years was home to the Robert H. Newell Shirt Factory, which manufactured custom-made shirts, including for many famous customers, including Winston Churchill and Bob Hope.
The Newell company left the historic building in 2004 and moved to Maple Ridge Road. The business closed in 2007.
The Village of Medina acquired the building after years of unpaid taxes. The three-story site had been neglected and was in disrepair. It was put up for sale in 2005, and Meier bought it. He was 25 at the time.
“It had great bones and potential,” Meier said about the building. “I knew the risks going in. It was an opportunity that came up that I could not pass up.”
He set about the task of methodically renovating and preserving the 14,000-square-foot building that opened in 1876, a site that was a hotel for its first 14 years before it becoming the Newell building.
Meier is pictured at the check-in for the Hart House, a hotel with four rooms plus two lofts for extended stays.
Meier first worked on preparing the Shirt Factory Café in part of the first floor. That business opened in September 2006 after 18 months of renovations.
Meier believed the café fit in nicely with the Newell building, given its close proximity to the Post Office and other downtown sites that are popular with the public.
“I thought it was a quality of life issue and the type of business the community needed,” Meier said. “I thought it would thrive off existing foot traffic and hopefully generate some new foot traffic.”
The café remains in operation today, with Richard Sarrero now owning and running the Shirt Factory.
Bryan DeGraw, back left, talks about mead with people on the Ale in Autumn tasting event in September in Medina. 810 Meadworks is owned by Bryan and Larissa DeGraw and their friend Morris Babcock.
While Meier was working on the space for the Shirt Factory, a yarn store and barbershop moved into storefronts at the building. Meier knew it would take many tenants, with different types of businesses, to make the building viable.
He envisioned the second floor for professional offices and he found a tenant in the law offices of Webster, Schubel and Meier. The attorneys would move from Main Street to the second floor of the Newell building.
For the third floor, Meier wanted to honor the building’s original use as a hotel. He would create the Hart House with four hotel rooms and two extended stay loft apartments. The Hart House opened in 2012. Meier owns that business which is managed by Kyle Zunner.
The building has space in the back that has hosted outdoor concerts as part of the Boiler 54 performance venue.
Dave Kimball and Dee Adams perform in August 2013 at the Boiler 54 in the back of the former R.H. Newell Shirt Factory.
“That space is one of the most awesome outdoor venues anywhere,” Meier said. “I love it.”
When the barber in the building retired last year, a meadery serving alcohol moved in. 810 Meadworks has proven a draw for people who like alcoholic drinks made by fermenting honey with water and often fruits, spices, grains and hops.
Cindy Robinson, president of the Medina Business Association, marvels at Meier’s transformation for a building that was empty a decade ago.
“He is a visionary on what’s doable in a small town,” Robinson said. “He knew it would take an eclectic mix.”
Robinson owns two historic building on Main Street. Both have been full of surprises, the same with most older historic structures, she said.
“You don’t know what’s under the dropped ceilings and the plasterboard,” she said.
Meier showed faith in the community when he invested in the Newell site, and Robinson believes that example encouraged others to take a chance on Medina, and has been a big part of the downtown revitalization the past decade.
“He was one of the original risk takers,” Robinson said. “He has been a catalyst for the downtown.”
Civil War re-enactors march down Main Street in Medina in April 2013, when the Main Street was closed to traffic for the parade. Meier and village officials have supported many heritage efforts and community projects.
Meier would join the Village Board in 2008 when he was elected as a trustee. He became mayor in 2011. He worries about neighborhood decline and rising tax rates for the Medina community. He pushed for a dissolution of the village, which failed in the public referendum in January.
“Being mayor and serving on the Village Board is a thankless job,” Robinson said. “You do it out of your hearts and your concern for the community.”
As mayor, Meier has been receptive to heritage projects in the community, most notably Genesee Community College’s Civil War Encampments the past three years. Medina closed sections of Main Street to traffic for re-enactment programs and parades.
He is active with the Orleans Renaissance Group and its effort to bring back Bent’s Hall, a three-story structure on Main Street that includes an opera house.
Meier plays the church organ at Trinity Lutheran Church and the Presbyterian Church. He heard about a Cincinnati church, Christ Episcopal Cathedral, that was dismantling an 1968 Holtkamp pipe organ with 1,800 pipes. Meier helped orchestrate bringing that organ to Trinity Lutheran, replacing a much smaller one. The relocated organ debuted on Easter.
Some of the pipes in a Holtkamp pipe organ at Trinity Lutheran Church are pictured in March while the organ was put together inside the Medina church. The organ was moved from Cincinnati.
Meier said he’s grateful to see so many people working on projects in the community, preserving the downtown and promoting many other heritage initiatives, efforts that set Medina apart.
“We got it and few other places do,” Meier about the community’s historical assets. “If you look at Buffalo, Buffalo is on a huge economic upswing right now, and it’s not because of a huge amount of new employment or because Buffalo’s economy has fundamentally changed. It’s because Buffalo has given new life to historic districts and marketing. People want to come to Buffalo. The tourism market is so much stronger in Buffalo right now because of all the preservation activities going on.”
Preservation can draw tourists, and investment, Meier said, and preservation is also the “highest form of green building out there. Building a new building requires harvesting new resources from the Earth whereas preservation is already using those resources that have been harvested and reusing them. The carbon footprint for preservation is very small compared to new builds.”
One of the rooms in the Hart House includes a picture of Bob Hope, one of the prominent customers of the former Newell company.
The older buildings are also “an art form,” Meier said.
“They will stand for centuries if water is kept from them and they are simply maintained,” he said.
Bent’s hosted wine-tastings in its basement
In regards to Bent’s, Meier said many people are working on a plan to revive the building.
“There are people toiling everyday to bring that project to life and it will come to life,” he said. “It takes a few with the vision to see the potential, and we have those people here. That project could be a real turning point for the village and put us on the same trajectory of what Buffalo is seeing now. It will be a venue unlike anywhere else.”
The Tree Board, Medina Business Association, Orleans Renaissance Group, Medina Sandstone Society and many other groups and citizens are working to better Medina.
“As a village we’ve embraced participation from the community to get projects off the ground, and let them have ownership of them,” Meier said. “There are so many people doing so many things around here.”
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 8 May 2015 at 12:00 am
Editorial:
Photos by Tom Rivers – Lewiston is home to the Freedom Crossing Monument, which was dedicated in 2009 along the bank of the Niagara River. It shows runaway slaves trying to flee into Canada with help from some locals. A baby is being passed to a mother, who appears desperate to keep moving, to head for freedom. The monument tells an important part of the area’s history.
There was no pomp and circumstance locally. No trumpets were sounded, no speeches from the dignitaries, no blessing of the water.
The Erie Canal opened for a new navigational season today, the canal’s 191st season. It didn’t get much notice. I didn’t see any boats out, either, except for the fleet of tugboats and tenders in Albion.
The Erie Canal was hailed as a wonder in American ingenuity, daring and determination when it opened in 1825. It took eight years of construction, carving a path 363 miles through dense forests, linking Buffalo on Lake Erie to Albany on the Hudson River.
The canal gave birth to numerous communities – Albion, Holley, Medina and many more. It brought industry and people. We were boom towns and the legacies of those eras remain in grand residences, churches and downtown districts, and the many descendants of immigrants who worked in quarries and other industries during the canal’s heyday.
It’s a rich history, but the New York State and the communities along the canal do a poor job of telling it. There are a few interpretive signs at rest areas along the canal and some glossy brochures in Thruway stops. It’s not an engaging campaign.
If the canal heritage – the immigrants, the engineering, the indomitable will – were celebrated and proclaimed, people would show some enthusiasm at the dawn of each new canal season.
The canal boat, “Cayuga,” tied up in Albion on June 16, 2014, between the Main Street and Ingersoll Street lift bridges on the Erie Canal.
In two years it will be the beginning of an 8-year bicentennial of the canal’s construction. (Hopefully the state and canal communities will celebrate that 200th anniversary.)
There are 16 counties along the canal, including Orleans. The state should commemorate the canal legacy by picking two counties each year for heritage sites that talk about the people behind the canal and the industries that emerged from “Clinton’s Ditch.”
Every year from 2017 to 2025, two new sites should be dedicated and celebrated along the canal, until there is a rich tapestry complete on the 200th anniversary of the canal’s opening.
Gov. Cuomo likes competitions and I’d encourage him to offer $500,000 per site or $1 million annually for the two best sites. These heritage places should become outdoor museums, teaching the history of Upstate New York.
Bill Koch of the Stone Art Memorial Company in Lackawanna designed a statue and heritage site for the quarrymen who worked in the quarries in Orleans County. This is just a concept at this point, but some community members would like it to become a reality.
The Medina sandstone quarries along the canal in Orleans County were our dominant industry that emerged soon after the canal’s opening. Those quarries employed thousands of people for about a century and the work of the Italian, Polish, British and Irish immigrants remains in some of the finest churches, mansions and public buildings in the state – and beyond.
There should be a heritage site for the quarrymen somewhere in the county. If the state offered $500,000, that would pay for bronze statues immortalizing the workers, interpretive panels and other features to celebrate the sandstone industry and the people who did the work.
Niagara County might consider a site to engineers, surveyors and the construction workers who pulled off amazing engineering feats, building a canal with steep elevation changes in some places. Or Niagara County might consider a site to the Underground Railroad. Many of the runaway slaves were in the last leg of their journey to Canada and freedom while walking along the canal in Niagara.
In Buffalo, Irish immigrants worked as scoopers in the giant grain silos. The eastern terminus, the start of the canal, might be a good spot for a bronze statue of a scooper.
This statue of Grover Cleveland stands next to Buffalo City Hall. Cleveland married a Medina woman, Frances Folsom, when she was 21. Cleveland was U.S. president from 1885-1889 and again from 1893-1897. While president in 1886, he married Folsom, the only time the ceremony was held in the White House for a president. The Clevelands had five children. It would be nice to have statues of Cleveland and Folsom, holding hands and waving, at the Canal Basin in Medina.
DeWitt Clinton, the governor who pushed the state to build the canal, also should be depicted with a statue in Buffalo or maybe at the other end of the canal in Albany.
Other counties could celebrate abolitionists, women’s rights advocates, and the circuit riders who spread religion.
If I was the governor I would tell each canal county to look into your past, look at what you’re most proud of, and let’s celebrate that with fitting heritage sites, enduring places that will make the canal a bigger draw and build community pride.
Those sites would enliven the canal and draw tourism dollars. They might be a springboard for the communities to add heritage trails and push for more preservation projects.
I like the big apple in Medina, the sculpture created 15 years ago by Richard Bannister of Barre. It gets your attention if you’re traveling down the canal by boat or bike. It lets you know you’re in apple country.
I’d like to see other spots along the canal that highlight local culture and pay homage to the past. There could be large-scale public art sculptures of axes (used to take down trees), fiber-glass oxen (the tractors and brawn of the day), mules and perhaps other canal features – maybe some “retired” tugboats or recreated wooden canal boats could be set to side of the canal in a permanent display. There could be playgrounds along the canal with tugboat-themed slides and other equipment.
That 200th anniversary is only two years away. The canal communities and the state need to be thinking how to celebrate the canal and position the historic waterway to be a big asset in the future for the canal towns.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 29 April 2015 at 12:00 am
ALBION – The firm hired for $60,000 to help Orleans County have better success with state grants has already helped the county begin developing a game plan for advancing its interests in Albany, Legislature Chairman David Callard said.
He was asked by Al Lofthouse, chairman of the Orleans County Conservative Party, about the lobbyist and how the firm will help the county.
Callard said county officials have already been meeting with a representative from Park Strategies, LCC, an Albany-based lobbying firm founded and chaired by Al D’Amato, the former U.S. senator who represented New York. The Legislature voted March 25 to hire the firm.
“We’re approaching this very positively,” Callard told Lofthouse during last week’s Legislature meeting. “We have outlined a plan of action we intend to take to Albany.”
Among the county priorities:
State funding to expand broadband Internet access in rural pockets in both Orleans and Niagara counties without the service.
State funding for upgrades to the county’s emergency radio communication system to include better coverage in large buildings, including the five school districts, the Orleans-Niagara BOCES site in Shelby and Medina Memorial Hospital.
A plan for the state to better maintain its canal bridges and other infrastructure in Orleans County, including the Lake Ontario State Parkway.
A collaborative proposal for the county to team with the state on some infrastructure projects. Callard said a team approach may be the best long-term answer for keeping bridges and roads in good shape.
The Park Strategies representative is working with the county to develop a five-year plan of priorities and projects to bring to the attention of state officials.
A delegation from the county intends to go to Albany before the legislative session ends in June to meet with state legislators and agency leaders to discuss the plan. Callard said the county will be reaching out to more than the local legislators – State Sen. Robert Ortt of North Tonawanda and Assembly members Steve Hawley of Batavia and Jane Corwin of Clarence.
Callard said the Legislature in about a year will assess the contract with Park Strategies and gauge if the $60,000 expense has been fruitful.
“So far they have been very helpful and broadened our thinking,” Callard said. “Other counties do this as a regular course of business.”
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 7 April 2015 at 12:00 am
New art show, fall festival join wine tasting, other events
File photo by Tom Rivers – Scott Sackett of Batavia, a vendor at the Downtown Browsery, pours Blanc d’Orleans from Leonard Oakes Estate Winery on Aug. 9 during the a wine-tasting event in downtown Albion. About 200 people tried wines at several spots on Main Street and in the downtown.
ALBION – Last year the Albion Merchants Association and village government worked together to add a concert series and wine-tasting event.
Both the concert series and wine-tasting will be back this year, and the Merchants are planning more activities as well, including an art show and a fall festival.
The events are intended to draw people to the downtown and support the local businesses, said Debbie Grimm, vice president of the Merchants Association and a vendor at the Hazy Jade Gift Shop.
Some of the events for 2015 include:
Stained-glass window tour on April 18, starting at 11 a.m. at the Pullman Memorial Universalist Church. The tour will highlight the seven historic churches in the Courthouse Square. Many businesses will also offer sales for the day.
The new “Art in Bloom” features art submissions from the community, from children to senior citizens. Their artwork will be featured on 5-by-7-inch canvasses that will be displayed inside the Hoag Library.
File photo – The Dady Brothers, shown performing last June 19 in Albion, will be back again this year to kick off the second season of Albion’s “Concerts on the Canal.” In this photo, Joe Dady pops the penny whistle in his brother John Dady’s mouth during the performance while John continues playing guitar.
“It can be of anything you want as long as it’s on a 5 by 7 canvas,” Grimm said at this morning’s Merchants Association meeting.
The canvasses are available at Hazy Jade Gift Shop, Bindings Bookstore and the library. The submissions should be returned by May 11. The show will run from May 16 to June 13. An opening reception is planned for 5 p.m. on May 16.
The artwork can be purchased for $10. The proceeds will be used to fund flowers and other events in the downtown.
The “Concerts on the Canal” will be on Thursdays from 6 to 8 p.m. from June 18 to Aug. 13. The series kicks off with the Dady Brothers.
The village is managing the concerts, which have been moved from Bank Street to a park on the canal at the end of Platt Street. A grant from the Genesee-Orleans Regional Arts Council is helping to pay for the series.
The 400 to 500 cyclists who ride the Erie Canal are expected to pass through Albion on July 13 between 8 and 10 a.m. The Merchants Association urges the community to welcome the participants for the annual “Cycling the Erie Canal.”
The second annual “Sip & Stroll Through History” will feature wine tastings at many local businesses and stops in the downtown from 3 to 7 p.m. on Aug. 15. Grimm reported that 11 wineries have already committed, as well as farm vendors, BAD-AsH-BBQ and the local musical group, the Sophisticats.
The Merchants will continue a shopping tour on Oct. 9-10 that will include deals and raffles at local businesses.
File photo – Gary Deiboldt of Albion plays the keyboards for the Sophisticats during a performance in downtown Albion last July. The group will play during a wine-tasting in Albion on Aug. 15.
The shopping tour will include a Fall Festival on Oct. 10 from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. and will includes many children’s activities and games, a quilt display, baking contest, scarecrow auction, entertainment and a beer-tasting or beer tent.
Beggar’s Night will be at 6 p.m. on Oct. 30 when kids in costume visit local businesses for treats.
Nov. 28 will be Small-Business Saturday when residents are urged to shop at local businesses.
The 4th Annual Hometown Holiday is planned for Dec. 12 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and will include games, raffles, pictures with Santa and other activities.
The Merchants welcome community support in helping to plan and fund the events.
For more information on the Merchants, click here.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 27 February 2015 at 12:00 am
Companies invested $30M-plus, added 108 jobs
File photos by Tom Rivers – A 48,000-square-foot addition takes shape at Brunner International in this photo from September.
ALBION – Last year was a big year for the Orleans Economic Development Agency with three companies collectively investing $32 million in expansion projects and committing to 108 new jobs.
This year looks even more promising, said Jim Whipple, Orleans EDA chief executive officer. Whipple told county legislators this week that the job creation numbers could top 2014’s “by six or seven times.”
He expects state officials to soon make announcements about two big job creation efforts in the county.
He outlined the highlights from 2014 with legislators on Wednesday. Those EDA projects include a $14.5 million expansion at Brunner International in Medina. Brunner produces components for heavy-duty trucks and trailers. It constructed a 48,000-square-foot addition with new equipment.
Brunner is keeping 363 existing jobs in the community and adding 33 more as part of the expansion at the corner of Bates Road and Route 31.
Intergrow Greenhouses built 7.5 acres more of greenhouses in a $14.5 million company investment that added 15 jobs.
The company has grown to 55.5 acres of greenhouses since its first 15-acre greenhouse in the Town of Gaines in 2003. Intergrow now has 100 employees at the site.
Claims Recovery Financial Services in Albion also increased its workforce by 60 people last year as part of a continued expansion at the former Chase building on East Avenue. CRFS now has about 600 workers at the Albion location.
Intergrow Greenhouses started another big expansion last year at 2428 Oak Orchard Rd. in Gaines.
It spent $2,660,000 as part of the expansion in 2014, according to the Orleans EDA.
Several projects are expected in 2015, Whipple said, including a new hotel in Medina at a $4 million company investment that will add four new jobs.
Helena Chemical also is expected to invest about $2 million in a new complex in Ridgeway, moving from a site in the Village of Albion.
Whipple didn’t detail two large projects that could be announced very soon. He said Precision Packaging Products in Holley also is working on a vertical integration project, while Snappy/Acme is looking at a project in Medina.
In addition, Apex Clean Energy would like to build 60 to 68 wind turbines Yates and Somerset, structures that could tower nearly 600 feet in the two rural lakeshore towns.
The Orleans EDA has stepped up its marketing efforts by hiring Mindful Media Group to develop a new website, push social media and also send news releases to American and Canadian markets.
The economic development agency also secured a $34,000 document storage grant to scan in documents from the past four decades. The EDA also is seeking a $200,000 EPA brownfield assessments grant to identify sites in the county that may be contaminated and need remediation.
