Buffalo Plans to Replace Aging Broadway Barns DPW Complex With Leased Facility
City would swap its outdated public works barn for a new leased site under the Ryan administration's proposal
Source: WGRZ ↗
Buffalo, New York’s plan to replace its crumbling Department of Public Works complex illustrates how a facility crisis can reshape fleet housing strategy entirely. The city is pursuing a leased arrangement at a new site rather than direct municipal construction, with a local development corporation owning and building the facility and then leasing it back to the city.
The Broadway Barns garage, where the city parks snow removal vehicles and stores road salt, has deteriorated to the point where chain-link fencing has been strung below the eaves to catch falling roof material and structural pieces. “We have chain-link up, below the eaves, so pieces of the roof and the support system don’t fall on workers,” Mayor Sean Ryan said. “So this is another problem that did not go away.”
The previous Scanlon administration bought a roughly 60-acre site on former railroad property at Bailey and Baitz avenues last October for $5 million. The site requires Brownfield remediation, and the projected cost of a new Department of Public Works complex there is $92 million. The plan as originally conceived included a larger salt barn, vehicle fueling and washing stations, mechanics shops, storage space and a snow removal command center. A $10 million state grant was announced to begin the work.
The Ryan administration is now building a three-phase financing structure around that site. Deputy Mayor Benjamin Swanekamp said the city is working with a financial team on a plan in which a local development corporation would own the property and lease it back to the city, WGRZ reported. That structure matters because the development corporation, not the city, would be eligible for Brownfield tax credits. “Those tax credits can then actually be securitized to get a cash flow chunk to help defray the costs on it,” Swanekamp said, “and then moving on to selling bonds by the LDC — not the city — and then the city has a lease payment.”
While that financing plan is assembled, the administration is also considering moving at least part of the Department of Public Works operation out of Broadway Barns in the interim. Swanekamp said the city could “Temporarily move at least some portion of the DPW facility at Broadway to another area for safety and efficiency purposes.”
The financing plan has not been finalized, and no timeline or location for any temporary relocation has been disclosed.
