The East End
garage needs millions of dollars in repairs or it will have to be shut down within
two to three years, said Laura Miller, the City of Rochester’s new parking
director, at a City Council work session yesterday.
The garage
needs approximately $5 million in high-priority maintenance, Miller said,
including repairs to the concrete deck and repair or replacement of the
garage’s drainage system.
“This is
major, not just aesthetics,” she said.
Miller also
outlined $2 million in non-emergency repairs to the garage, including repair or
replacement of the elevators, and sign and lighting work.
The East End
is a thriving area of the city and the garage gets a lot of use. The garage,
which can hold 1,300 vehicles, opened in 1981. An addition was put on in the
early 1990’s.
The garage
came up in discussions about the future of the Cultural Center Commission. The
commission, which is funded jointly by the City of Rochester and Monroe County,
was founded in 1979 to help revitalize the area around the Eastman School of
Music and Gibbs Street.
Mayor Tom
Richards noted that, decades ago, Eastman officials were concerned about the deterioration
in the immediate area and talked about moving the school to the
University of Rochester’s River Campus.
The
commission created a cultural district plan to help control and encourage development
in the area. The East End garage was part of the plan, and since then, the
Sagamore on East, Metro YMCA, and other projects have been built.
But the
commission sold its last property — 1.5 acres across from the Eastman School
known as Block F — in 2011, and is probably no longer needed, officials say.
The city
would take ownership of the East End garage, and the commission’s remaining
assets would be split between the city and the county. The city would get $3.3
million, with the county’s share being $248,000.
City
officials say their share of the money would be used for garage repairs. And a
public hearing will be scheduled on the dissolution of the commission.Â
This article appears in Apr 24-30, 2013.
Have you ever done an expose on who is one the Cultural Commission, what they are paid and what they have spent?
An expose? The members are public appointees and serve as volunteers. They include the Mayor, County Exec., Council President, Legislature President, and city and county appointees.
I wonder how long Richards and the city council have been sitting on this problem? A cynic might suggest that they’ve known for years and could have corrected it for far less but that repairs were repeatedly deferred in order to avoid negatively impacting past city budgets until it couldn’t be hidden any longer. Perhaps City can ask the mayor’s office for details?