BS Summary: This article contains 8 faulty reasoning types, including Biased Writer Voice, Post Hoc (False Cause), and Anchoring Bias, with Negativity Bias as the most egregious example at 15.5% saturation with 219 hits. Analysis detected 427 faulty-reasoning hits from 1,415 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 13.9% and a BS Rank of 5% (27,187 of 28,545 articles). This article is better (less manipulative) than 95.20% of the article peer group.
The heavily subsidized , $225 million development under construction on the site of the former Memorial Auditorium at Canalside will benefit from yet another tax break not previously reported.
That incentive?
A 30-year property tax abatement likely worth millions for the 251-unit apartment building.
Typical property tax abatements in Buffalo are 10 to 12 years long.
Property tax abatements granted by the Erie County Industrial Development Agency range from five to 10 years.
No one will say exactly how much the payment-in-lieu-of-taxes deal is worth.
Empire State Development, which inked the deal with developer Pennrose , refused to say.
Buffalo Mayor Sean Ryan’s administration says it wasn’t aware of the PILOT.
Assessment and Taxation Commissioner Jason Shell said he wouldn’t be able to assess the value of the incentive until his office performs a post-construction valuation.
And Dylan Salmons, the Pennrose executive in charge of the project, refused to return emails and phone calls from Investigative Post seeking comment.
Campaign finance records show Salmons donated $3,000 to Gov.
Kathy Hochul’s reelection campaign one week before the state inked the PILOT agreement with his firm.
Empire State Development and state agency Homes and Community Renewal have also refused, so far, to honor freedom-of-information requests — filed June 26 — for project financing documents that would detail what the PILOT agreement and other subsidies are worth.
The agencies have also not fulfilled a similar FOIL request from a group of local developers opposed to the project.
It adds up to yet another subsidy for a project that’s already received more than $150 million in tax credits, grants and low-interest loans from the state.
“The PILOT wasn’t disclosed.
I never realized that [the state] could just grant a PILOT for local property taxes,” said Lawrence Quinn, former managing partner of the Buffalo Sabres and the city’s commissioner of community development under Mayor James Griffin.
“It’s pretty scary that they can do that.”
“They’re imposing that cost on local taxpayers,” added Chris Jacobs, head of Avalon Development and a critic of the Pennrose project.
Deputy Mayor Thomas Baines, in a statement, said Empire State Development did not inform the city it had agreed to a three-decade property tax abatement for the project.
That incentive also received no mention in Gov.
Kathy Hochul’s recent press release announcing the project’s groundbreaking.
“At this point, the City does not know the full value of the abatement or the amount of tax revenue that may be foregone over the life of the agreement,” Baines said.
“Those are important questions, and we believe there should be a mechanism to ensure the city benefits in some way during the years a project is receiving a tax abatement, such as through a dedicated fund or other financial support.”
In a statement, a spokesperson for Hochul argued that the Memorial Auditorium site sat vacant — and generated no tax revenue — until the state development agencies, at her direction, pushed to redevelop it into apartments and commercial space.
They noted the PILOT agreement predated Ryan but that the Hochul administration has “been in touch” with every mayoral administration about the project since 2023.
The spokesperson added that “campaign donations have no influence on government decisions.”
Philadelphia-based Pennrose won a state bid in 2023 to redevelop the former Memorial Auditorium, which was demolished in 2009.
Original plans called for a mix of apartments — 251 units — commercial space and parking at a cost of $160 million.
In the years since, costs have climbed dramatically, first to $189 million and now to $252 million.
The subsidies have piled up, too.
Last July, Empire State Development quietly approved the 30-year property tax abatement.
In a memo outlining the deal, the state agency said Pennrose had originally sought a payments-in-lieu-of-taxes deal from the city, but noted the city cannot offer a PILOT longer than 15 years per local law.
That, ESD President and CEO Hope Knight wrote, “left the project with a gap in its financial structure.”
The terms of the agreement are sparse.
Pennrose, according to the memo, will pay $115,460 in payments in the first year of the agreement, which begins when the building is complete.
Three-quarters of that total ($86,595) will go to the city and one-quarter ($28,865) to Erie County.
In each subsequent year, the payment amount will increase by 3 percent.
Annual payments at the end of the deal will be around half a million dollars.
The ESD memo contains no other financial information.
It includes nothing on the projected assessment of the building, the building’s estimated tax bill or the tax savings to Pennrose.
Other PILOTs, inked by the city or an industrial development agency, always include such information.
In an email, ESD spokesperson Laura Magee said the agency doesn’t collect that information.
“Empire State Development does not calculate or maintain assessed property values or tax savings projections for PILOT agreements,” she said.
“Standard municipal assessments are determined by the local assessor upon completion of a project.”
Magee suggested Investigative Post contact the city assessor or Pennrose to find out the building’s estimated assessed value and value of the PILOT agreement.
Pennrose representatives did not return requests for comment.
And Shell, the city assessor, said he didn’t have enough information to estimate the building’s assessment.
He said he would need to see, at minimum, a full budget for the project to do so.
What the deal could be worth
Recently opened downtown apartment buildings of similar sizes offer some clues about what the PILOT could be worth.
Ciminelli Real Estate’s project at 201 Ellicott St. has 202 affordable apartments and is valued at $15 million.
That project received a 15-year payments-in-lieu of taxes agreement from the city based on the building’s annual rent income.
Project budgets obtained by Investigative Post outline the terms of the deal, which currently saves Ciminelli more than $150,000 annually in tax payments.
The firm will save about $2 million over the course of the agreement.
The Krog Group’s redevelopment of the Trico building at Ellicott and Goodell streets into 243 market-rate apartments, meanwhile, carries an assessed value of $45 million.
That building also has a PILOT through the city for a 12-year term.
Data obtained from the city shows that deal will save the developer about $7.4 million in tax payments over the course of the agreement, or an average of $616,000 per year.
An ESD spokesperson said Pennrose’s PILOT payments, like the Ciminelli project, will be based on the annual rent brought in by the apartment building.
That revenue could factor into the building’s assessed value but additional information is needed to determine what the building is worth, how much its full tax bill would be and how much the PILOT deal is saving the company.
“Typically, a [project budget] would be used to derive an estimated value,” said Shell, the city assessor.
“We have not seen any plans, [budgets] nor made any valuation estimates for this project.
At this time, without any of those documents, we would not be able to speculate what an assessed value for this project would be.”
Timing of campaign contribution
Just before the state approved the PILOT deal, Pennrose executive Salmons made a $3,000 donation to Hochul’s reelection campaign.
The gift came July 11, 2025, from Dylan J.
Salmons to Friends for Kathy Hochul.
ESD approved the PILOT agreement for Pennrose six days later, on July 17.
The listed address on Salmons’ donation is 250 South Quince St., Philadelphia, a three-story row house near Center City.
Salmons owned the house from 2012 through 2016.
He attended the University of Pennsylvania from 2011 to 2012 and began working at Pennrose in 2013, according to his LinkedIn page .
Salmons no longer lives there and sold it in October 2016, according to Philadelphia property records.
As of 2020, the house is owned by Russell Procopio and his parents, who live in Florida.
Procopio said he’s never heard of Salmons.
“No clue,” he said in a brief phone call.
State elections law does not explicitly prohibit donations from old addresses.
The law simply requires contributors to list their name and address, according to Kathleen McGrath, a spokesperson for the state Board of Elections.
A person or campaign could be penalized for listing a false name, but that section of the law does not mention addresses.
Ryan Radulovacki, a spokesperson for Hochul’s campaign, provided Investigative Post a statement that did not address a question about Salmons’ donation or the PILOT.
Speakers
5speakers13%attributed speech1,235writer words
Selected voice
18%flagged-word coverageLawrence Quinn
44 attributed words24% of attributed speech27% writer coverage
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