THE BRAYMILLER FACTOR

Attention Small Business Owners and Entrepreneurs!

If You Are In Need Of Financial Assistance You Are Urged To Attend The July 18 Finance Committee Meeting at 10 a.m. in Council Chambers. Councilmembers, Led by Representatives Darius Pridgen and Rasheed Wyatt Continue to Push Back Against Mayor Brown’s Fight to Fund Braymiller Market With American Rescue Money While ignoring Small Businesses Across the City, Some of Which Are on the Verge of Closing Down! Come Out And Express Your Opinion!

Activist/columnist Betty Jean Grant sounded the alarm in her May 3 op-ed when she wrote: “Please tell me when or if Braymiller Market gets that half million dollar ($563,000) grant (not a loan), they are asking for. That store is privately owned, just like Grant's Variety Shoppe and other struggling, pandemic-affected businesses, especially on the Eastside of Buffalo. The money is supposedly left over from the federal pandemic grant awarded to the City. How is money left over when the Eastside still looks as if it has been bombed and no minority businesses east of East Ferry and Jefferson Avenue received any grant monies from the city even though they applied for loans and grants ...When one considers the level of resources Braymiller Market has already received through tax abatement, sales taxes exemptions and other incentives allocated to it by using monies designated to help poor people and to relieve poverty and blight, one would think the elected leaders would consider the partial, 'can of worms' they are opening by assisting this particular business and not offering that same level of help to other businesses in the same financial boat.”

A few people in high places agreed.

On June 27 the Common Council voted unanimously to deny the mayor’s grant request to Braymiller. Councilmember Pridgen led the charge, supported by Councilmember Rasheed Wyatt and others who agreed that it would be unfair to reward a single business with a half million dollars while others were in need and/or at risk of going out of business.

Most recently however, Brown, fighting hard for this single business, placed the measure back on the council agenda continuing his crusade to fund Braymiller with the half-million-dollar forgivable loan.

This past Tuesday(July11) the Council did not vote on Brown’s request for “immediate passage” to bail out Braymiller and decided, instead to refer it to its Finance Committee for July 18 at 10 a..m. SMALL BUSINESS OWNERS AND

ENTREPRENEURS ARE URGED TO ATTEND AND EXPRESS THEIR OPINIONS!

The majority of the councilmembers, said Pridgen, see the need and an opportunity to get significantly more money for small businesses. They want Brown to reconsider allocating funds just for the Braymiller Market and prioritize financial support for small businesses in each council district, as well.

A Resolution by Councilmember Wyatt was also passed on Tuesday emphasizing the need to allocate American Rescue Plan (ARP) and COVID relief funds in a manner that supports the recovery and growth of small businesses across the City of Buffalo.

The Resolution in part:

•Urges Mayor Brown and the Office of Strategic Planning to reconsider any future plans to allocate funds for the Braymiller Market and instead allocate $62,506.40 for businesses in each Council District, totaling $562,557.57 in funds for COVID-19 relief. The Braymiller Market would be able to apply for this funding along with all other local businesses;

• Further urges Mayor Brown and the Office of Strategic Planning to work with each Council Member to identify small businesses in each respective district that were significantly impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic;

•Requests that the Office of Strategic Planning work with the Council Members to engage with small businesses in their respective districts to identify areas of need and collaborate on strategies to effectively distribute the allocated funds .

"We really wanted to give it to small businesses, because they have been hurting," said Councilman Wyatt, who presented this resolution to the chamber floor. "There are businesses closing as we speak that were affected by the pandemic. Where's our sense of urgency for them? We have this urgency for Braymiller, but not the sense of urgency for these other businesses...I want people to know we're fighting for them!"

-Reminder-

Mayor Brown insists the market is vital to growing the residential population downtown. Although it's a stone's throw away from a thriving East Side community, it's not designed - price wise or otherwise - to serve that community which remains without a major supermarket. Braymiller will undoubtably get something in the end. Brown is fighting like the sky will fall if they don't.

The question - or the elephant in the "equation"- is how hard has Brown been fighting since 5/14 to bring another full service supermarket to Buffalo's East Side which still only has one? The Braymiller issue is a sad reminder of how this mayor operates; where his priorities and allegiances have been for the past 18 years; and why our community continues to suffer under his irreverent watch. -a.b.