B-Roll, Video, Audio, Photos & Rush Transcript: Governor Hochul Announces $250 Million Transformative Redevelopment Underway at Buffalo’s Marine Drive Public Housing Complex

Governor Kathy Hochul today announced that construction is underway at the redevelopment of Marine Drive Apartments, a 70-year-old public housing complex in Buffalo. The $250 million first phase of the three-phase transformation will include the new construction of 254 apartments across four buildings. When complete, the entire $600 million Marine Drive redevelopment will replace the original 616 units with approximately 730 new apartments. Under Governor Hochul’s leadership, New York State Homes and Community Renewal (HCR) has created or preserved more than 11,600 affordable homes in Erie County, including more than 8,300 in the city of Buffalo. Marine Drive Phase I continues this effort and is part of Governor Hochul’s $25 billion five-year Housing Plan, which is on track to create or preserve 100,000 affordable homes statewide.

B-ROLL of the Governor participating in the Marine Drive Apartments beam signing can be found on YouTube here and in TV quality (h.264, mp4) format.

VIDEO: The event is available to stream on YouTube here and TV quality video is available here (h.264, mp4).

AUDIO: The Governor's remarks are available in audio form here.

PHOTOS: The Governor’s Flickr page will post photos of the event here.

A rush transcript of the Governor's remarks is available below:

Good morning, Buffalo. Great to be back in my hometown, and first of all, I want to acknowledge many of my friends who are here today. Our Mayor, Sean Ryan, you'll be hearing from him momentarily. Let's give it up for Sean Ryan. We're joined shortly by Crystal Peoples-Stokes, the Majority Leader of the Assembly, on her way here. April Baskin, our Senator from the State Senate. April Baskin has joined us. Good to see you, Senator. Jeremy Zellner, our Senator as well from the State Senate, Jeremy Zellner. Bill Conrad, our Assemblymember. State Assembly, members of the County Legislature, the Common Council.

You'll be hearing from one of our residents, Barbara Morente, a resident of the Buffalo Municipal Housing Authority right here at home. Barbara had the shortest commute of anybody today, but I'll say I had the second shortest commute because I live around the corner. And all of our partners from Marine Drive and the North Aud Block projects, and the men and women of labor who are here today. Let's give it up for labor.

Every day is a great day to be in Buffalo, but lately, every time I come home, there's something extraordinary to celebrate. Last month it was the ribbon-cutting for, guess what? The new Highmark Stadium. Go Bills. Go Bills, yes. When I'm in New York City, everybody keeps talking about, "What does that new stadium look like?" And I said, "It's magical. It's magic." We're going to have some great victories there starting this fall.

We'll just talk about some of the great things that are happening all across this area. As a governor from Buffalo, first Governor from Buffalo since the 1800s — that guy left and became President, so there hasn't been anybody in a long time. But I made a commitment to this city's future, my hometown, and part of it has to do with making sure that people have the dignity of a home over their head, a place where they feel safe and secure, they can raise their families. And my administration, since I became Governor, has invested over $885 million to create or preserve 8,300 units of housing right here in Buffalo. That means revitalizing neighborhoods, growing our economy, and making sure that Buffalo remains a place where families can live and thrive.

So today, once again, we're seeing that vision come to life on Buffalo's beautiful, beautiful waterfront. And for years, part of Buffalo has held this incredible promise, but as we all know the story, too many sites were underutilized, or aging buildings became vacant, and places were filled with a history, a story, but abandoned with their unfulfilled potential.

But my love of this community could not let that continue. So personally knowing the challenges and the long-overlooked needs, I have been aggressively engaged, tackling project after project after project. And I want to thank all my team from HCR and ESD, who've been at my side, and our local team here in Buffalo, because they know we can do more, and that was my directive.

So projects like the shoreline behind City Hall — how beautiful does that look on Niagara Street now? Beautiful, beautiful transformation. Also, the Perry Street homes — went past there all the time living here and on my bicycle and just, why do people have to live like this? And then it became abandoned. All you saw was the graffiti and the broken windows and boarded up, and that was people's sometimes first impression of Buffalo when they came in on the 190. I knew we had to do better. McCarley Gardens, something I worked on back in my days at M&T Bank for a short time, and countless others that we needed to move ahead.

So today, we celebrate two more: the long-awaited redevelopment of Marine Drive right behind us here, and the transformation of the North Aud site from an empty lot for a long time into hundreds of new homes. So we're building on an improved Buffalo waterfront that is now worthy of my hometown.

Just look behind me. What's going to change here — behind me this way. You're looking there. That's the old. This is the new.

And when the Marine Drive Apartments opened in the 1950s, they did represent a bold vision for public housing. But generations have passed through those doors, and thousands of families have called this their home. But after 70 sometimes brutal winters, these buildings have taken a beating. And I believe — to the 600 residents who call Marine Drive home — I believe they deserve better, and that is exactly what we're doing here today. We're not just slapping on some Band-Aids and trying to fix up a couple projects here and there and calling it a day. We're replacing them completely. The new buildings will feature bright, energy-efficient homes with the modern amenities that every New Yorker deserves. And this isn't just a glow-up, it's a major makeover, and we're building more than 400 new homes that are affordable for our residents, to serve the working families who make sure that they have the opportunity to grow and thrive in this very community.

Now, we couldn't have done this project without the support of the community. This is disruptive. It changes their lives. A lot of questions: "Will I still have a home here? What's going to happen?" And it had to be built with the community’s support. And that's why I want to thank the development partners, but also the residents who stepped forward and made sure that we talked about where they fit into this and how important they are — that they're central to this.

So we want to make sure they felt that they are taken care of. And I want to let people know that current residents will remain in their homes until their new apartments are ready. That's as good as it gets, to just literally go from one day to the old, into the new, with a very smooth transition. They can move into their new homes before the older buildings are even torn down. That is how you revitalize a neighborhood without abandoning the people who are the backbone of this community and this neighborhood.

It's also an ambitious project, but thanks to the men and women of labor who got it done, nearly $200 million in state funding, we're already seeing the beams come up, and they're ready to sign today. And Marine Drive is just the beginning. Because if we're serious about our housing shortage — and it's not just Western New York, it's not just Buffalo, it's all over the state — the only answer is so simple: We have to build more housing.

Lenny knows what I'm talking about. How many projects have you overseen, Lenny? Well, there's a book to be written about Lenny. Lenny Skrill has been the driving force behind so many of these projects. I want to give him a special shout-out as well. We need to build more. And that's what happened at the North Aud Block, where the legendary Buffalo Aud used to stand. Anybody ever go to games there? You're showing your age, but that's okay.

I remember sitting up in the nosebleed section because my parents couldn't afford the good tickets, and we couldn't afford the professional tickets the Buffalo Braves and the Sabres at the time. But we always went to Canisius — Mayor, I see the Mayor, former Mayor of Buffalo, Tony Masiello's here. Canisius, Bonnie and Niagara all played right here. So I remember being a little kid spending countless, countless hours there with my family. And also, remember the French Connection? Okay, let's bring that dominance back. We were almost there. Got really close this year. How exciting was that to see just across the way. But anybody who bleeds blue and gold remembers those great memories. But since the Aud was demolished in 2009, 2009 — that prime real estate has just been vacant. I'm sure people thought that there was a plan, something magnificent would happen immediately after, maybe 2010, '11. It's taken this long, and this is maddening. So what becomes is a failure. It's a failure of ambition, a failure of a vision, and it leaves communities frustrated and sometimes just giving up hope. Will anything ever happen there?

Well, my friend, as your Governor, those days are over. In my direction, thank you, the construction has now begun on a project that'll create 250 new homes with $155 million in state investment. We'll build homes [for] people who work in the city, the teachers, the firefighters, our police officers, nurses, young professionals and families will be able to afford there as well as welcoming anyone who wants to be there because Buffalo's future depends on giving people the opportunity to able to live in the home, in the community right where they work.

But housing alone doesn't create a neighborhood. A neighborhood needs parks, it needs transit, it needs restaurants, small businesses. It needs places where children can play and neighbors can get to know each other. That's what we're creating here, and this is so special. As a grandma who took my granddaughter to the carousel a couple months ago and took her to the children's museum, did not want to — she would not leave. She rarely throws temper tantrums, but that was one, because she did not want to leave this magnificent site. That's why we do this. This is a generational shift. We never came down here was when I was a kid. My grandparents worked at the steel plant. They saw what was happening to our waterfront after the steel plant left and left it to decay, and no one cared or did anything about it.

My friends, you're part of the generation that stood up and says, "No, we can and will do better for our children and our grandchildren." So we're creating a vibrant neighborhood that'll be 24/7. And that's why as I think about how we execute that, last month I launched a strategic planning initiative to devise an even bolder vision for Canalside. And I see some members of my team, and Joan Kesner, who's the Chair of the Erie Canal Harbor Development Corporation, want to give her a shout-out and all the team there as well. We want to incorporate the new ideas, the new opportunities, the Golisano Institute for Business and Entrepreneurship — that is going to be phenomenal.

But tie that in with the residents and the retail and the sports and the entertainment, and all the venues that are congregating right here where there had never been life just a few decades ago. More housing products like finishing up Heritage Point development. Finishing up. And more projects and success stories like the Commodore Perry projects which, if you go by there, just look and remember what it used to look like before. That is what progress looks like, and it feels so good. In that very space, we're creating over 400 new affordable homes. And I'll never forget the moment last year when I had the opportunity to greet an overjoyed mom and her children, give her a hug at the door, hand her key, and just — how she felt in that moment, that she mattered, her family mattered and this was their home.It was beautiful and powerful. Moments like that make this all so worthwhile, and that's what I want to do for so many others. People never dreamed of having a home or those who lived here, grew up, went away, come back, want to make this their home because they see this is where the future is. And if we give people the security and dignity of a roof over their head, everything else settles in.

And so, as we continue to transform underutilized properties and buildings and neighborhoods, this can be an economic engine for our city. Like, just like we breathed new life into the Buffalo Harbor State Park. Have y'all been down there to get your picture taken in front of the big buffalo? Okay, that's where you're going next. It's not that far. Take the bike ferry over, have a nice walk, because it is amazing what's happening down there as well. And also, I'll close with this description of what I find so exciting: we're going to be building a major build-out for the cruise ship terminal at the Outer Harbor. That is a vision that began years ago. Joan's clapping.

I was up at a conference in Quebec of Governors, Lieutenant Governors and Premiers, and there was a company, a couple cruise lines, they were showing maps on the wall of how they can take tours through the Great Lakes, come down the St. Lawrence through the Great Lakes, and they went right from Port Colborne to, to Erie, Pennsylvania. It's like, "Excuse me. Let me show you my map. There's a place called Buffalo right here. It's very big. It's bigger than Erie. Bigger than Port Colborne, and we can welcome you." So I am so excited that this is changing.This is going to put people in the — Buffalo in the forefront of people's tourism plans, something you probably hadn't thought about in a long time. But the people who've been here, if you talk to anybody who came here, they are just shocked. Shocked at the experience they're having here in Buffalo, and it is proof that Buffalo, once again, can be one of our great destinations on the Great Lakes. And even later today, I think we have one of their smaller ships coming in because they just couldn't wait to get started.

So everybody, you're all my appointed ambassadors. Go over there. Give them the Buffalo hug, show them Buffalo love, and just tell them we want to welcome them and all their friends in the future. So that's what it's all about. Today marks a brand-new beginning on Buffalo's waterfront from the Outer Harbor State Park to where we are today, building spaces that reflect the very best of Buffalo. As I said, years from now, children, your grandchildren, will all know that this is the year — 2026 is the year when broken promises finally became promises that were kept.

Thank you very much, everyone.

With that, let me introduce up the Mayor of the city of Buffalo, Sean Ryan.