Send comments to themail@rochester-citynews.com, or post them on our website, rochestercitynewspaper.com, our Facebook page, or our Twitter feed, @roccitynews. For our print edition, we select and edit comments from all three sources. On the waterfront Development plans for the Charlotte port area are drawing comments from both opponents and supporters. A sample of recent submissions: […]
Rochester development
Posted inNews & Opinion
The urban balancing act: residents vs. developers
For many of us, Rochester’s neighborhoods – their character, their collection of old houses, their lawns and trees and sidewalks, their small commercial areas – are a big reason we decided to live in the city. And city residents have been fiercely protective of their neighborhoods, fighting for zoning changes and code enforcement, for police […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
Good news and cynicism
Several friends have been on my case about focusing on Rochester’s problems so often. Can’t I, they ask, write about some of the good things that are happening here? And certainly there are plenty of good things to write about. Last month, at the Rochester Downtown Development Corporation’s “Changing Fortunes” program, a panel of business […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
A place with no vision
I’m trying to pull myself out of my funk here, but I’m not making much progress. I just hate to see a community like this one waste its potential when it has so much. A couple of things set this off. One is that yet again, there’s a little buzz about government “consolidation.” The governor […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
Feedback 1/1
We welcome your comments. Send them to themail@rochester-citynews.com, or post them on our website, rochestercitynewspaper.com, our Facebook page, or our Twitter feed, @roccitynews. For our print edition, we select comments from all three sources; those of fewer than 350 words have a greater chance of being published, and we do edit selections for publication in […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
Lessons from Detroit
Last week was a tough week in Rochester, with the news about Valeant moving the B+L headquarters to New Jersey and laying off hundreds of employees here. And I keep thinking about Detroit’s bankruptcy. There are a lot of differences between us, certainly, beginning with the sheer magnitude of Detroit and its problems. Detroit spreads […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
Possible delay in controversial University Ave. apartment application
Updated Monday, May 13, at 3:20 p.m. The Planning Commission will not be taking up the application for the proposed University Avenue complex during its May 20 meeting. The Preservation board will instead make its recommendation during its regularly scheduled June 5 meeting, and the application will go before the Planning Commission on June 17, […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
City should turn down University Ave. project
For more on this topic: See Christine Carrie Fien’s “Rochester’s apartment boom” in this week’s news section. The owners of Craft Company No. 6 have written a letter in opposition to the project. It’s not an attractive piece of property right now: a blacktopped parking lot and a mid-1920’s stucco house on University Avenue, to […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
Choosing a mayor in a challenging time
For anyone who follows Rochester politics, there was little doubt that City Council President Lovely Warren would run for mayor. The only question was when. Last week we found out: it’s now. And so we will have incumbent Tom Richards, a 69-year-old white male lawyer and former corporate executive, and Warren, a 35-year-old African-American woman […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
Aid the transformation of America’s urban areas
Like most cities, Rochester’s primary source of income is the property tax. But this funding mechanism was created when cities were home to large factories and commercial establishments with vast inventories of real, taxable property.
Posted inNews & Opinion
River views
The temperature inside the meeting hall has risen by several degrees. At least that’s what it feels like at the public hearing when the question-and-answer period — which becomes more interrogation than questioning — begins. “I just wish you would back off on some of the building development,” says one Charlotte resident. “You negate or […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
Partying (and developing) in the Wedge
“We funk-tified it,” says Lyjha Wilton. He’s referring to Boulder Coffee Co. on the South Clinton-Alexander Street intersection. Granted Wilton’s a little biased. He is, after all, the coffee shop’s owner. But the interior is undeniably funky. The walls meet at odd angles; the décor is a mix of antique mirrors, orange-beaded lamps, and overstuffed […]
