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Imagine for a moment, if you will, that you woke up one morning and found yourself the head of the Niagara Falls Convention and Visitors Bureau. The good news is you have a couple of million dollars to throw around during the coming year in order to promote convention business here.
The bad news is that you don't have a convention center, since some lunkhead from Albany promised it to the Seneca Indians, who don't seem too keen on taking possession.
What would be your top priority?
Stevie Wonder could see that finding a place to hold conventions and getting it up and running as quickly as possible would be the correct answer.
The point seems to be lost, however, on rookie CVB Chairman Bob Belue. According to a March 22 memo sent out to CVB members and made available to the Reporter, Belue's first order of business is to form eight committees apparently intended to address everything but where to hold conventions during the coming year.
Some longtime CVB supporters are shaking their heads.
There's the Advertising and Marketing Committee, for example. Exactly what will be marketed?
A convention center that may or may not be available in six months?
Then there's the Personnel Committee.
CVB personnel are in place to attract conventions to Niagara Falls. How do you do that without a viable place to hold conventions?
Nine months ago, Gov. George Pataki effectively killed the convention business here. The casino he promised then was to have been up and running this month. His promise turned out to be as empty as the convention center itself, and he should be held accountable.
But that doesn't let the CVB off the hook.
More than anyone else, CVB officials should have taken immediate steps to ensure that the city's most viable industry was protected.
They didn't do it then and they're not doing it now.
The only workable proposal we've seen has come from local hotelier John Prozeralik, who has a plan for the former Nabisco warehouse on Buffalo Avenue.
The CVB should be jumping on board big-time, and thanking their lucky stars there's someone in town with more sense than them.
| Niagara Falls Reporter | www.niagarafallsreporter.com | April 2 2002 |