City of Auburn, NY - Empire Zone Minutes 05/09/2001

Empire Zone Minutes 05/09/2001


	Auburn Economic Development Zone Board Minutes May 9, 2001 Present: Steve Vincent, Michael Trapani, Arlene Ryan, Tom McNabb. By Proxy: Tom Ganey, Ann Kubarek. Board Guest: Marcia Whiley anticipates appointment to the board at the May 10, 2001 City Council meeting. Absent: Peter Greene, Jeff Delbel. Staff: John Salomone, Vijay Mital, Cynthia Aikman. Guest Speaker: Kevin McAuliffe, atty with Greene and Seifter. __________________________________________________________________________ Steve Vincent called the meeting to order at 4:15 PM. Mike Trapani made a motion to approve the minutes of the April 24, 2001 meeting. Tom McNabb Second. Motion was approved by unanimous consent. CNYZCC Kevin McAuliffe started by introducing himself and his involvement with the Statewide Zone capital Corporation. The program has raised $30 Million for use by Zone Certified businesses. The goal was $50-80 Million. Each Zone, including Auburn committed $500,000 in credits for the initial offering. Because not all of the credits were used, $250,000 has been returned. He is working to establish a central New York ZCC and hopes that it will be able to raise $14 Million with a commitment of $250,000 in credits. Kevin reviewed the current allocation of credits and suggested that $1.5 Million for ZCC Steve Vincent made a motion to re-allocate the distribution of Zone Credits as follows: FROM TO $1.5 M for ZCC $500,000 for Statewide $250,000 for Statewide $1,000,000 for CNY $250,000 for CNY $500,000 for Direct Equity $500,000 for Direct Equity $500,000 for Community Development $1.5 M for Community Development $2.5 M Total allocation $2.5 M Total Allocation Motion was second by Arlene Ryan. Board members requested the opinion of staff. Staff recommended approving the motion. Motion passed by unanimous consent. Kevin McAuliffe went on to outline the WCNY project. All PBS stations are required to convert to digital signals by 2003. WCNY is in a situation were they need to accomplish the change by May 2002 at a cost of $12.5 Million. This project meets the criteria of a community development project because it retains jobs and maintains a special service to the area that receive the WCNY signal. The exciting part of this project is that once the digital conversion is completed, WCNY will be able to broadcast 6 shows during the day and two in the evening. They plan to make broadcast time available for distance learning, to vocational schools, unions. As a digital signal it can be inputted into a digital TV and from TV to computer. Steve Vincent said that he would like to support this programming. He said that this request is a out of the norm for the Zone board. Tom McNabb made a motion to put the approval of the WCNY project back on the table (tabled at the April 24, 2001 meeting). Second by Mike Trapani. Motion passed with unanimous consent. Board approved allocating $150,000 in tax credits to the WCNY project. Leaving a balance of $1,099,500 of credits available for Community Development project allocation. Empire Zone Boundary Amendment Cindy Aikman presented the draft map of the proposed new Zone. She mentioned that the area available for re-allocation allows for the requested parcels within the City to be added to the Zone. Cindy said that the new method for defining zone boundaries based on tax map parcel to be has been used to describe the zone as depicted in the map. She called attention to the portion of the resolution that directs staff to initiate a subsequent boundary amendment process upon conclusion of the 2001 New York State budget. Disposition of the budget will determine if an additional 2 square miles of zone area will be made available to the Auburn Zone. Tom McNabb made a motion to approve the resolution as presented. Arlene Ryan second. Motion passed with unanimous consent. Mike Trapani made a motion to adjourn. Second by Tom McNabb. Motion passed unanimously.