City Hall: No more money for Braymiller Market

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Braymiller Market in downtown Buffalo. Photo by Garrett Looker.

The Buffalo Common Council is sending a new message to Braymiller Market, downtown’s struggling grocery store: If the business is going to fail, it better fail within the next year. 

That way, University Common Council Member Rasheed N.C. Wyatt said, the city can recoup the $561,000 it loaned the business last year. Under the terms of the forgivable loan, the store must stay open for two years to avoid repaying the city.

“If we can get our $561,000 before he closes, let’s get our $561,000 back because I think that can be better used in the City of Buffalo,” Wyatt said. 

Wyatt had another message, too: The city is watching.

In comments Wednesday, Wyatt noted that the city’s looming budget deficit and the election of Donald Trump as president mean the city must become more protective of its funds.

“We’re not going to get any more bailouts. That’s over,” he said. “We really have to be very fiscally minded … it’s going to be tough sledding for us going forward.”

Wyatt’s comments came during a meeting of the Common Council’s Finance Committee and was the first time city lawmakers have demanded an accounting of how Braymiller Market spent the federal pandemic aid it received a year ago. The hearing followed an Investigative Post report that Braymiller Market has continued to lose money and was late paying its city property taxes. 

In October, Wyatt told the news outlet he would ask Mayor Christopher Scanlon’s administration for an accounting of how the business spent the city’s money. Wednesday’s hearing was a result of that pledge.

Lisa Hicks, director of development in the city’s Office of Strategic Planning, said owner Stuart Green spent city aid on three primary costs: Payroll, paying overdue bills to vendors, and stocking up on inventory. She said the city will continue to monitor the store’s finances. 

Hicks noted that owner Stuart Green has put personal funds into the store to keep it open. She credited him for employing 37 people at the store, even though the loan requires him to employ 7.

Hicks, Wyatt and other Council members said Wednesday they would like to see Braymiller Market succeed. Hicks explained that when the city first planned the Ellicott block project where the store ultimately located, officials did not anticipate a pandemic and expected more residents and workers to be downtown daily.

The stalling of residential projects and the loss of foot traffic impacted the store significantly, she said.

Wyatt said he was sympathetic to that reality, but said the city wouldn’t be offering any more aid to the struggling store.

“Nobody’s going to come back to us and say, ‘Hey, we need more money,’ ” Wyatt said.

“No, that’s not the intention,” Hicks replied.

In addition to the $561,000 forgivable loan granted last year, Braymiller Market has also benefited from $765,000 in tax breaks from the Erie County Industrial Development Agency. Those funds were on top of $7.5 million in state grants and loans used to construct the store, though those funds primarily benefited developer Ciminelli Real Estate.

Hicks and other administration officials have argued that Braymiller has struggled because downtown has as a result of the pandemic. When downtown begins to rebound, so could the store.

“Things are not recovering,” Hicks said. “There’s very little change in the number of people who are coming back into work on a full-time basis, and that has such a significant impact.

“I don’t know if folks really realize the true impact of people coming into downtown, and how much that supports not just the downtown business ecosystem, but [the] city-wide ecosystem.”

Green, the owner of Braymiller Market, did not respond to a request for comment for this story. In late October, he told The Buffalo News that his business was “doing great,” and did not appreciate the public scrutiny. 

“It’s my private company,” he told the paper. “It’s nobody’s business.”

Wyatt on Wednesday made note of those comments.

“I want to tell him it is our business, because the taxpayers have put up money for his business, and now he thinks that he should go private,” Wyatt said. “Well, if he wants to go private, he should have come up with his [own] money to do what he needed to do to keep that business going.”

J. Dale Shoemaker