TOWLER: Pinching MCC, connecting the Ren Square dots

August 6, 2009 at 1:39pm

Well, well, well.

The most popular part of Ren Square was the new downtown home for Monroe Community College. And now we learn from the Democrat and Chronicle that MCC needed more space than it was going to get in Ren Square.

With Ren Square dead at last, MCC - whose downtown student population is growing - is looking for a new site, one that will let it expand.

Brian Sharp's front-page piece in this morning's D&C contains this delicious tidbit: lack of growing space was "a shortcoming of the Renaissance Square location that MCC President Anne Kress said the college would be ‘foolish' to repeat this time around."

And for the record, let's review the MCC downtown-campus history one more time. One of last year's big scandals was the attempt by local Republicans to install former County Legislator Bill Smith as president of MCC. But that's not the first time there's been a connection between the college and local Republicans.

MCC has been renting space in the Sibley Building, but since the late 1990's, it has been planning to build its own downtown complex. The first site selected was property on the southeast corner of Main Street and Plymouth Avenue - owned, perhaps just coincidentally, by Peter Formicola, a former County Legislator with long ties to the Monroe County Republican Party. Buildings on that site were demolished, and the county initially used the space as a staging area for the jail expansion.

The county later abandoned the Main and Plymouth plan, in favor of the Ren Square location. Again, perhaps just coincidentally, there were connections between the owners of the site and the Republican Party.

At the beginning, the college was to have occupied two Ren Square parcels: the Granite Building - a historic office building at the corner of Main and St. Paul - and the glass-fronted Gateway Building, formerly the home of Blue Cross-Blue Shield and, in another lifetime, the old Edwards Department Store.

The Granite Building is partially owned by Harris Beach, a law firm whose partners include well-connected Republicans (among them, for a brief time, Bill Smith). Harris Beach has long wanted to get rid of its interest in the building, and Ren Square could have taken it off of its hands. During the down-sizing of Ren Square, the Granite Building was excised from the plans.

The Gateway Building was owned by developer Max Farash, yet another well-connected Republican. He donated it to the county, taking a substantial property tax load off of his shoulders.

Is there anything wrong with a big public project being built on land owned by well-connected Republicans or Democrats? Nope. It's just one of those interesting little threads in this story that has dominated local news for so many years.

Also for the record: Nostalgia led me to look through my drawer-full of files on Ren Square and its predecessor, Central Station, the original proposal for the bus station.

County and transit-authority leaders have made a big to-do about the mayor and City Council coming up with objections "at the last minute." OK: The mayor should have spoken out sooner, or louder, or something. And he did indeed vote for "conceptual plans" and "moving to final design" resolutions that I bet he wishes he hadn't. The fact is, though, city officials and downtown neighborhood leaders had been fighting the bus station component for years.

Among my collection of Ren Square artifacts is an April 2000 letter from then-City Council President Lois Giess to then-Representative Tom Reynolds. Reynolds had just announced he would seek $13 million in federal funds for Central Station. In his announcement, Reynolds said it was clear to him that "local community leaders" wanted the bus station. But, Giess wrote, City Council - "the elected leaders in Rochester" - hadn't been consulted, and Council members had a good number of concerns about the project.

Among those concerns: loss of taxable properties, the negative impact on nearby developable properties, traffic flow, "and most importantly," land use.

"There are several major land-use plans for this area of our City Center," wrote Giess. "None of them envision a transit center."

"We have consistently urged R-GRTA to consider another site," wrote Giess.

Eventually, Council and then-Mayor Bill Johnson agreed to the�bus station�as part of Renaissance Square. But they insisted that the bus station be put underground, to protect nearby properties. In the end, Ren Square officials decided they couldn't afford an underground station, and after architect Moshe Safdie designed a camouflaged above-ground station, the officials decided they couldn't afford it, either.

Now, they have to start from scratch with the bus station. They insist that they'll simply move the station 80 or so feet north. But that puts it right next to a residential building. And that - as Ren Square officials know full well - simply ramps up the city's concerns.

Are they mad enough to try to do it anyway? Maybe. But city officials won't be quiet this time. And this time, County Executive Maggie Brooks and transit authority chief Mark Aesch can't say they weren't forewarned.

Comments for "TOWLER: Pinching MCC, connecting the Ren Square dots" (5)

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Harry Davis said on Aug. 06, 2009 at 3:17pm

The fact that ren square is dead is good. The process stunk and it needed to be put out of our misery. Now we must begin to deal with the politics of what is next. Neil Bauman is not happy. I am not happy. Neil feels he cannot build on his property at Main & Clinton without the MCC student base. Neil was not pleased with the behavior of city council. Tony Dimarzo is not happy with the prospect of bus fumes filling his new Warner Lofts.

We must all come together soon to figure out: 1) The politics of our current situation. 2) We must consider what is the best way to bring Rochester into the 21st Century with a state-of-the-art, green, LEED certified, comprehensive development for downtown that we all will feel is our "place". Moving a bus garage 30 feet north and making it 20 feet shorter is not the way to develop a city. We must build on our history & current needs. We can romance the wonderful past Rochester once had, the RKO, a junior Grand Central station for our train depot, but we must use our young people now with their honed skills to build a better tomorow. I strongly think we need all of our transportation based at the current Amtrak station, an inter-modal design, with a high speed rail stopping in Rochester on it's way to Buffalo or Albany or NYC.

Specifically, on my web site, Harry 2009, I posted a letter I wrote to Mayor Duffy in May. The Mayor called on city council to hire a consultant & I feel we must use the talents of local experts such as Evan Lowenstein, Roger Brown, Heidi, Joni Monroe and my pick, Bill Reed to hold a city wide charette with everybody's input to help figure out the politics and the green, sustainablity prospects of what we build, if we can build anything at this point.

It must be "Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design" (LEED) certified. http://tiny.cc/WVntG Bill Reed is a longtime associate of mine who helped create the LEED principals back in the mid-1990's. He is currently at work in Dubai.

I want to bring my life long high school friend Don Jeffries of the Rochester Broadway Theatre League (RBTL) in to lend his input. Just this past weekend, Don & I were together again for our high school reunion. If we can get together in mutual support, then the rest of Rochester should be able to come together.

I also think it is time for a CHANGE in the make-up of our current city council.

High speed rail is the biggest economic development for upstate New York in 150 years, since the Erie Canal.

Carlene Woodward said on Aug. 06, 2009 at 7:53pm

Thank you, Marianne for reminding everyone of the ongoing opposition and rational questions that have been raised since 2000. Having attended every presentation and incarnation of the Transit Plan then the "RENAISSANCE SQUARE PLAN" and the last Associates Plan over the years, I have heard and seen the following: Plans presented that would never work with a high rise office building an 3 theaters and an underground garage, housing and parking, (4.5 mil). TOO EXPENSIVE TO BUILD! d. Plan two: above ground station, MCC, two theaters and not one parking spot (8.9 mil).TWO EXPENSIVE TO BUILD! Plan three 2008: MCC, HUGE bus station and NO MONEY TO BUILD ONE THEATER!!! and takes all the parking for the adjoining properties.

The public spoke out over and over, (citizens, architects, financial planners) about the very real concerns regarding the project and RGRTA and the County refused to listen. So here we are. MCC has most of the money to build, let's look at Midtown or even the Edwards Building and Gateway which the County already owns. Plan two;
shows MCC built on this site and we already have the Safdie plans. Let's dig out the Sibley Station plans (city archives) and see if we can't build the transit center for the & to 10 million quoted.

rochester99 said on Aug. 06, 2009 at 10:07pm

Let me toss out a rather controversial observation or thought about the planned downtown MCC campus. Why is Monroe County so ”interested” in building a downtown campus. Is it truly to help city students or is a plan to separate city students (mostly poor and ethnic) with suburban students (more wealthy and mostly white)?
The main Brighton MCC Campus is a fantastic facility…probably among the best Junior college campus in the country. It has a state-of-the-art , up-scale student union, a fantastic, recently built indoor sports complex, acres of sports fields and access to the best educational facilities in the region. In contrast the current or even the planned downtown campus will always be significantly less quality campus than at Brighton. It appears that the leadership of MCC is trying to create a “sort of equal” but separate education facility for city students…while creating the best environment/services for the suburban students at Brighton. Is this fair to city students?
Maybe it wasn’t a plan to separate city/suburban students…but its effect would create a distinct disadvantage for city students. To eliminate this disparity, maybe we should discuss a new plan for MCC. Don’t build a downtown Campus but further expand the Brighton Campus to allow for city students to attend at a full size and high quality college campus. Such a plan would rely on constant bus shuttles from downtown or other city transfer points to the Main campus in Brighten. This would also save substantial capital dollars and yearly maintenance costs trying to maintain two separate college campuses.
With the death of RenSquare, it creates a new opportunity to discuss a new plan which is truly beneficial to ALL students…from the city and suburbs!

Doug Midkiff said on Aug. 07, 2009 at 8:08am

For whatever its worth, I support the ideas expressed by Harry Davis in his comment, especially the recommendation that Mayor Duffy use local professionals for making downtown bloom. In a separate comment, I have urged the Mayor to use the expertise of Roger Brown, Joni Monroe, and Evan Lowentein, whose charette of the St Paul Boulevard is an eye-opener. These lovers of the city have brought speakers and others to the city with a host of ideas. There is no need to go outside for talent. As I have said before, I believe the true renaissance for downtown has begun. We need to keep at it.

Steve said on Aug. 07, 2009 at 4:48pm

Wouldn't the old Main Post Office (adjacent to the Amtrak Station and right off the inner belt and at one time connected to the station by underground walkways and parcel tunnels) make a wonderful multimodal (rail & bus) station with a historic flavor?

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