Jamestown City Hall on Third St. is surrounded by Tracy Plaza, which is undergoing another renovation phase following action by the Jamestown City Council on April 27, 2015.

Jamestown City Council will vote on a settlement to end litigation between the City and the company hired to renovate Tracy Plaza.

The City of Jamestown hired Patterson-Stevens in 2017 to renovate Tracy Plaza, which sits above and also serves as the roof for the city police and fire departments along with the city parking garage.

A lawsuit was filed in February 2019 by the city and New York Municipal Insurance Reciprocal, claiming Patterson-Stevens Inc. was responsible for not properly securing the area, which allowed rain water to pour into the police station during a heavy rain storm in September 2017.

The lawsuit sought $2 million in damages.

According to State Supreme Court filings, on September 11, 2020, that lawsuit was discontinued by both parties.

However, a few months earlier on July 17, 2020, Patterson-Stevens sued the city for breech of contract, claiming the city owed over $306,000 in back payment for work that was done at Tracy Plaza in 2018.

The lawsuit also claimed that former Jamestown Mayor Sam Teresi had said the departments were susceptible to water damage and flooding even before work began.

According to the lawsuit, Patterson-Stevens said, “The City has breached the contract by delaying the start of the project, issuing an improper stop work order, interfering with Patterson-Stevens’ performance of the contract, improperly withholding payment or failing to pay or reject invoices as required by the Contract, and improperly delaying completion of the project well beyond the June 30, 2018 completion date.”

The settlement has the City paying Patterson-Stevens $155,000 with Patterson-Stevens paying the city $75,000. The resolution filed said the agreement would “discontinue the litigation and resolve the matter.”

Solar Liberty Energy Systems

Solar Liberty filed an application with the town in December 2020 to build a solar panel system at 1255 South Main Street Extension. Following that, the town Planning Board issued a positive declaration under the State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQR) on September 27, 2021.

In March 2022, the town board approved a resolution accepting the positive declaration despite communication from Solar Liberty urging them not to. According to Solar Liberty’s filing in Chautauqua County State Supreme Court, the town of Busti was then required by state law to publish the Positive Declaration in the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation Environmental Notice Bulletin, but that never happened.

Solar Liberty said a letter was received in March 2023 from the town board withdrawing the company’s application due to the company not submitting a draft scoping document nor taking any other steps to proceed with the application.

In their filing, Solar Liberty said there was never any deadline provided by the town for which to complete the South Main Street project and that the company had intended to complete the SEQRA process once the approvals for another solar project in the town of Busti on Orr Street was received.

The company is asking the court to void the letter from the town that ended the special use permit application for the South Main Street Extension project, saying that the town’s action is in “violation of lawful procedure and due process.”

AFSCME New York Council 66, Local 418, which represents employees in the City’s Department of Public Works, had filed three grievances, which Arbitrator Douglas Bantle found the city failed to respond to or set a meeting in the time period required in the union’s contract.

Following a meeting between the union and city with the arbitrator in July; the arbitrator made a determination on August 8, 2022 that agreed with the request from the union that the city provide back pay for the three grievances and that the “City’s arguments were contractually and legally without merit.”
Under the Arbitrator’s ruling, both the city and union then had 20 days to request a modification of the award.

The lawsuit in State Supreme Court contends that no modification requests were received and that the “blatant refusal by the City to honor and implement the Award of Arbitrator Bantle is being done with no legal basis and contrary to the process negotiated by the Union and the City in their collective bargaining agreement.”

Judge Grace Hanlon confirmed the arbitration award set by Arbitrator Douglas Bantle and ordered the City of Jamestown to comply with the award, including following seniority rights when assigning employees to equipment.

AFSCME New York Council 66, Local 418, which represents employees in the City’s Department of Public Works, filed the suit in Chautauqua County Supreme Court.

The union had filed three grievances, which Arbitrator Douglas Bantle found the city failed to respond to or set a meeting in the time period required in the union’s contract.

The filing said Corporation Counsel Elliot Raimondo cited various scheduling and health issues on the part of both parties for why meetings were not scheduled or had to be canceled.

Following a meeting between the union and city with the arbitrator in July; the arbitrator made a determination on August 8, 2022 that agreed with the request from the union that the city provide back pay for the three grievances and that the “City’s arguments were contractually and legally without merit.”
Under the Arbitrator’s ruling, both the city and union then had 20 days to request a modification of the award.

The lawsuit in State Supreme Court contends that no modification requests were received and that the “blatant refusal by the City to honor and implement the Award of Arbitrator Bantle is being done with no legal basis and contrary to the process negotiated by the Union and the City in their collective bargaining agreement.”

The lawsuit had been filed in State Supreme Court on Wednesday, September 7, 2022. Council President Tony Dolce confirmed that Council was previously aware of the arbitration proceedings, but not of the litigation.

The summons filed in Chautauqua County Supreme Court on Friday, September 9 cited the desire to recover damages for the contamination of wells supplying the Village’s public water-supply system. The summons said the contamination was caused use of by aqueous film forming foam during certain training exercises held in the Village.

In February 2021, then County Health Department Water specialist Bill Boria reported to the village board that a state investigation said the fire training foam that was used near the former Mayville school between 2014 and 2018 appeared to have leached into the village water supply. He said this resulted in the high levels of perfluorononanoic acid (PFNA) being discovered in three of the village’s water wells.

The discovery led to a do-not-drink advisory being issued for two weeks in December 2020 and ultimately forced the village to shut down one of the wells.

After the old well was shut down in December, the village brought online the new Well #4 located in a different aquifer that did not contain any PFNA.

Boria said that lab testing on animals has shown that high doses of PFNA have caused adverse effects on the liver, thyroid, and immune system, and also contributes to high blood pressure and high cholesterol. There’s also some evidence that it delays growth and development.

Boria added that because the fire training was only done during a five-year period, it’s unlikely there was a legacy contamination, meaning residents weren’t exposed for a significant period of time.

The chemicals that were used in firefighting foam, which caused the higher PFNA, have since been removed and are no longer used today.

The Village had previously filed a suit against 3M for contaminating the municipalities water supply in Jun 2021, but that filing was removed in July 2021.

Doubletree by Hilton Hotel in downtown Jamestown

The Doubletree by Hilton hotel has filed in Chautauqua County Supreme Court to have its tax assessment lowered for its facility in downtown Jamestown.

According to the petition, the hotel located at 150 West Fourth Street has an assessment of $1.725 million on one parcel with the main parcel’s assessment at $16.275 million.

The Hotel attorneys are seeking to have that assessment reduced to $528,000 and $3.52 million.

The current total assessed value of 381 Fairmount Avenue is $9.26 million. Washington Prime Group attorneys argue that the assessed value should only be $827,500 with a full market value of $1 million.

According to the Jamestown Post-Journal, this is now the fourth attempt by Washington Prime Group to reduce its taxable assessment in state Supreme Court, having previously filed in 2020, 2021, and updated a filing in March of this year.

Washington Prime Group had emerged from a Chapter 11 bankruptcy last year following its CEO stepping down, completing the company’s financial restructuring and the implementation of its plan of reorganization.

Target Corporation is also petitioning in Supreme Court to get the assessment lowered on the former Kmart store it purchased on Fairmount Avenue.

The current assessed value is $3.4 million. Attorneys for Target are petitioning to reduce to assessment to $1.7 million, saying the assessed value of the property is higher than other similar properties.

Target purchased the property at 975 Fairmount Avenue for $3.15 million in October 2021. The former Kmart in that location closed in October 2019.

115-121 West Third Street

The owner of the building that housed the former Jamestown Brewing Company is facing foreclosure.

In a filing in Chautauqua County State Supreme Court on Thursday, May 19, Evans Bank issued a complaint against G Patti Enterprises LLC, George Patti, and the Chautauqua County Industrial Development Agency for failure to pay the mortgage on the building located at 115-121 West Third Street.

GPatti Enterprices LLC has a $1.5 million mortgage with Evans Bank that was executed on July 27, 2018. The complaint said it was determined on September 15, 2021 that following several events that would be considered a loan default, Evans Bank demanded the full re-payment of the loan in the amount of $1,522,913.90.

The foreclosure filing in Supreme Court seeks to get that loan repaid.

Evans Bank previously filed a lawsuit against G Patti Enterprises LLC, on June 11, 2021 claiming misappropriation of funds connected to the Jamestown Brewing project. That case was closed following a payment on the loan in question.

The Lodge Condominium project

This is according to a lawsuit filed by Lake Shore Paving in Chautauqua County Supreme Court against The Lodge at Chautauqua Lake, The Estate of James K. Webb, Sally Webb, Executrix and Webbs Harbor Restaurant & Bowling Lanes, Inc. for lack of payment.

The lawsuit states in the complaint that when Lake Shore Paving Controller Ryan Rambacher spoke with Benjamin Webb on or about February 25, 2022, Webb informed him that the Bank of Erie would not be issuing a loan for construction and, therefore, would not be moving forward with the project.

Lake Shore Paving is suing for $127,155 for work they had completed related to the condominium project.

The Webb Hospitality Group, headed by Ben Webb, held a groundbreaking ceremony in July 2021 for The Lodge condominiums which was to have included 21 units.

The project had received $450,000 in Altech Revolving Loan funds as well as IDA tax lease program benefits such as mortgage tax rebate and sales tax relief on the construction from the Chautauqua County Industrial Development Agency. It also had received from the Chautauqua Region Economic Development Corporation a $217,000 term loan and $217,000 deffered loan.

WRFA reached out to Webb Hospitality for comment but did not receive a response.

A map highlights the BPU Substation property proposed for annexation, with the red line illustrating Tiffany Avenue, the border between the city and the town of Ellicott/Village of Falconer.

The Fourth State Appellate Court has ruled in favor of the City of Jamestown in regards to appeals filed by the Town of Ellicott in the Jamestown Board of Public Utilities’ annexation case.

Attorneys for the town of Ellicott argued in Appellate Court on January 4 that the city property assessor’s certificate for the Dow Street substation property did not satisfy state law for annexation. They argued that the property isn’t adjacent to the city line because a road separates the property from adjoining to the city boundary. Under state law, municipalities can only annex properties that are adjacent to their own boundaries.

This was an appeal of the ruling in Chautauqua County Supreme Court by Judge Lynn Keane in November 2020 that the property did meet state law requirements.

Jamestown Mayor Eddie Sundquist said the Fourth Appellate Court dismissed all the appeals on the matter and is now sending the case back to State Supreme Court, “And we are hopeful that once that happens a referee panel will be picked and the case will continue in its normal manner.”

Sundquist said the referee panel will hear the entire case for annexation.

City officials have argued that by annexing the property into the city limits, the Board of Public Utilities would save an estimated $160,000 each year in property taxes, thus saving money for all utility customers in the service area. They also claim such a move is in the overall public interest due to the city having a professional public safety department that could better respond to any safety emergencies that occur on the property.

Ellicott, Falconer, and the Falconer School District are all opposed to the annexation.