This week was the Regular Meeting of the Buffalo Common Council. Each week, the full council meeting is preceded by a Caucus Meeting. Because all nine members of the council are Democrats, the caucus is effectively the decision-making group. The Caucus Meeting is where the council members hear reports from City Hall’s department heads and where they “mark up” the agenda, meaning that they confirm how they will vote on each item. 

The first item before the council was a new capital budget, amended to pay for $250,000 in roof repairs on the King Urban Life Center on Genesee Street. This was supposed to have been covered by American Rescue Plan funds, but the project fell by the wayside. However, at the end of last year, Council Woman Everhart and Majority Leader Halton-Pope began agitating for it. Now, $100,000 will come from the Ellicott District capital budget, Erie County will contribute $100,000, and Raymour Nosworthy, Acting Commissioner of Administration and Finance, said that the city would be able to find the additional $50,000 needed.

Five new members were appointed to the Arts Commission. These appointments were sent to the Civil Service Committee for their meeting next week. A proposed new schedule of licensing costs and fees for keeping chickens was sent to the Legislation committee for discussion on February 11th.

Council members also heard about a big planned development on the East Side. The Crimar Group is looking to build between 30 and 60 single homes on 53 contiguous vacant lots on Detroit, Townsend, and Wilson Streets, at a cost of $11 million.

The council members voted to approve a law creating, staffing, and guiding a charter review commission. This commission is empowered to revise or replace the city’s entire charter. The charter defines the powers and duties of all City of Buffalo officials and departments. 

PPG had submitted some recommendations for the charter review commission law to the council. We’d suggested that the number of mayoral appointments to the commission be reduced. Under the council’s proposal, Acting Mayor Scanlon gets four appointments; he gets two as mayor, one as the South District council member, and one as the common council president. We’d also asked that the law include a clear start date for the commission. Right now, the start date is not clear. Last, we asked for public input sessions and open meetings to be required.

Unfortunately, the council did not make any changes to the legislation. In the approved law, the Acting Mayor gets to appoint four of the thirteen commission members–nearly a third of the commission. There is also no mandate for open meetings, and there is no start date.   

The council also adopted a resolution, put forward by Council Member Wyatt, to ask the Administration and Finance department for a full accounting of previous In-Rem surplus funds. In addition, the resolution asks for accounting of any funds used to pay property tax debt. The council has asked representatives from the Assessment and Taxation department, as well as Corporation Counsel, to attend the next Finance Committee.