The City of Rochester’s Zoning Board will consider an application from Maye Development to demolish a vacant two-story house and a vacant church at 660-668 West Main Street. The company wants to put an unspecified food store on the site. The meeting will be broken into two sections. The section that includes Maye’s application begins at 11:30 a.m. on Thursday, July 17, in City Council chambers at City Hall, 30 Church Street.
Developer Marvin Maye tried to get permission from the city in 2012 and 2013 to tear down the church for a Dollar General store. But the application faced strenuous opposition from area residents and neighborhood groups who said that the store would be a poor fit in the newly revitalized area.
The church is also a Designated Building of Historic Value in the city. It is the one-time home of the German Liederkranz Club, one of only four surviving buildings “associated with the cultural history of Rochester’s large German-American community in the 20th century,” according to the state Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation.
Representatives of Highland Hospital will hold an open meeting tonight (Monday, July 14) on the hospital’s planned expansion. The meeting is at 5:30 p.m. in the Olmsted Lodge in Highland Park, 171 Reservoir Avenue.
Highland plans a two-story, 30,000-square-foot expansion off the back of the hospital on what is currently a hospital parking lot at the end of Bellevue Drive. The addition would house six larger operating rooms and allow the hospital to expand its current, cramped operating rooms, officials say. Observation beds will also be added.
The hospital also planned at one time to use 27 Bellevue Drive, a vacant house, for office space. But that plan met resistance from residents of the close-quarters neighborhood, and the hospital appears to have backed off. BY CHRISTINE CARRIE FIEN
A Hamlin man, also an atheist, will deliver the opening invocation at Tuesday’s Greece Town Board meeting.
Dan Courtney says his invocation will center on the need for local governments to be inclusive and to focus on what brings people together, not what divides them.
Two Greece residents previously sued the town over its practice of opening Town Board meetings with prayer. Most of the prayers are Christian in nature, which gives the appearance that the town is endorsing a particular religion, they argued. But the US Supreme Court sided with Greece and said that the practice is appropriate.
Courtney signed up to offer the invocation immediately after that decision.
“I want to make it clear to the non-Christian community, the minority faiths, and nonbelievers in the Town of Greece,” Courtney has said. “I want them to know that they can participate in the process.”
The meeting starts at 6 p.m. at Greece Town Hall, 1 Vince Tofany Boulevard. BY JEREMY MOULE
This article appears in Jul 9-15, 2014.
We must preserve our historic landmarks. It is what makes our community unique and in a position to attract attention and commerce. Building a “discount grocery store” is another way of saying “dollar store” and should be of great shame to Marvin Maye who seeks money over the communities desires and best interests. Join me in saying NO! Sign my petition and let city counsel and local government know exactly how you feel. https://www.change.org/petitions/help-susa…
It is never too late to be part of the solution.
Malls and plazas throughout Monroe County have some kind of discount store similar to the Dollar General. Some even have a Dollar General. Yet after seeking many vendors including Price Rite and Aldi, the only vendor that showed interest was The Dollar General. Yet Dollar General in this location has become a negative connotative stereotype cliche of a soundbite like others that often is attached to the residents of the Southwest. That is Rochester, New York prior to July 1964 . I remember.
So many zoning decisions have been made to the detriment of residents in the Southwest including blocking access to Genesee Valley Park to the benefit of the rich university students across the river. This barring included the Rochester Music Fest. It was a n anticipated event by the residents of 14608, 14609, 14611, 14619… zip codes in inner city Rochester. Present was entire families sitting in the coolness of the tree shaded Genesee Valley Park. The Rochester Music Fest fell to sabotage and was placed in a hot cement arena similar to the heat in the cotton fields. Genesee Valley Park was handed over to a land grabber for the rich students and their families on the other side of the river. That is Mississippi and Alabama of the 1950’s.
Over 20 years the property has been designated possible historical. Yet not until there was hope of the residents of Southwest Rochester having a grocery store did anyone care about or seek to preserve it as a historical site.
Thus with the residents of the Southwest are in a crisis when it comes to attainable and affordable places to purchase groceries. Even those of us who have cars must drive a distance as to areas like Jefferson Road to purchase fresh food at affordable prices. The Southwest has endured the loss of an A&P, Star Markets, IGA and Wegmans grocery stores. We are left with an out of the way overprice grocer on West Avenue. Yet there is a desire to build more housing and not a grocer, I am a resident, I have a house. I do not have a local grocer.
The success in bringing a grocery story to the area would say Rochester has grown from July 1964. It will tell minority children in the City of Rochester, that they too can be successful. Success with say that they matter more than preserving the history of a social club which has long since moved off South Avenue. Success will say that the City of Rochester is zoned to keep them and not let them fall to re-gentrification as recent decisions suggest. Time will tell.
I was told that the dollar stores tend to have the best prices on candy. Isn’t it great that residents can get the most empty calories for the buck. Well, I guess at least the walk to and from the store is good!