NYPA kills chance to bring 200 good jobs to WNY

Posted by Howard Owens on March 21, 2009 - 11:06am
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OK, Medina is outside of our coverage area, but the Daily News has a story this morning that concerns all of us, because any chance to create 200 good paying jobs in Western New York is an issue that impacts the entire region's economy.

Google wanted to build a server facility Medina, but the New York Power Authority would not help Google get low-cost power to the plant, which is a prerequisite for any of Google's hosting facilities.

The Daily's story fully captures the frustration over the situation.

State Sen. George Maziarz blasted NYPA for denying Google and other companies that have wanted to build in Western New York. Maziarz lambasted NYPA officials Thursday in Albany during a public hearing to raise electric rates by 12 percent.

“I personally worked over two years with a small company headquartered in San Francisco called Google that wanted desperately to locate in Western New York and were told there was no power available to them,” Maziarz said during Thursday’s hearing.

He blamed NYPA “for killing the deals and the jobs that go along with them.”

Maziarz went on to call NYPA officials liars and thieves.

If Niagara power can potentially  be acquired cheaply, as Tom Rivers points out in the story, to spur business growth, how does it possibly make sense for NYPA to thwart business expansion in a region that desperately needs that job growth?

Posted by Gabor Deutsch on March 21, 2009 - 11:41am
I havent got my Saturday paper yet but this kind of crap shouldnt be happening right now. I wonder exactly how many other businesses have been "turned off" to our area.
Posted by Lincoln DeCoursey on March 22, 2009 - 11:43pm
My guess is that our state's current administration won't make a rate concession for Google because it shortsightedly prefers to reap full-market value from that power in order to fund entitlement programs downstate. Meanwhile communities in proximity to Niagara Falls which probably should enjoy the greatest benefit from that resource get nothing but a a rate hike.

Google is a leader in Internet search and is one of the most influential companies on the Internet. If Google had successfully built in Medina, many other tech companies would've noticed and Western New York would've been highlighted on the map. Instead the message which goes out to the industry is "New York State is insanely dysfunctional, don't even waste your time looking there."

Computer data centers employ various information technology workers, telecommunications workers, electricians, air conditioning workers, security guards and other white and blue collar workers.