The Economic Development Corporation for Erie County (ECIDA) voted unanimously to purchase about 150 acres of the former Bethlehem Steel site.
The Buffalo and Erie County Industrial Land Development Corporation (ILDC), an affiliate of ECIDA, proposed the purchase to the board Wednesday morning.
The ILDC will purchase the land in Lackawanna for $5,700,000 from Tecumseh Real Development Inc.
Money for the purchase will come through a partially refundable grant from the Urban Development Action Grant (UDAG).
In the proposal, ILDC wrote that the property "has historically been both a blight on, and a challenge for, the community."
The purchase has been a long time coming for Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz, who said he pledged to redevelop this site when he took office.
"What were doing is taking what once was the most important economic sites in Western New York and taking it from being nothing and really generating no revenue for either the City of Lackawanna or the county to a site that is going to be a productive site that businesses are going to want to go to," Poloncarz said.
The ILDC stated its goal is to create "one of the largest commercial/industrial parks, with tri-modal access and with pre-certified New York State tax incentives, in New York State".
But for some living in Lackawanna, they hoped for something else. Linda Rice who lives just across Route 5 from the purchased land said stores are needed.
"We don't hardly have anything back here," Linda explained. "They took everything and put it on the other side or closed it down. You gotta go shopping, everything, everything is over the bridge."
The Lackawanna Mayor weighed in on the purchase Wednesday. Mayor Szymanski said that though it is an exciting purchase for the city and county, it comes with a new problem.
Szymanski estimated a reduction of possibly $340,000 in tax revenue since then can no longer tax the land.