Falls City Council members said they would wait and consider the opinions expressed at a Wednesday night public hearing before taking action on a series of proposed amendments to the city’s zoning code that would further restrict “group living arrangements” in residentially zoned neighborhoods in the city.
The zoning code changes have been recommended to the council by the Niagara County Planning Board. A divided Niagara Falls Planning Board also recommended that the council adopt the proposed zoning code amendments.
At a city planning board public hearing in February, residents of the city’s DeVeaux neighborhood pleaded with board members to recommend the changes intended to address what has been described as “years of conflict over the widespread use of single-family residences (primarily in the DeVeaux neighborhood) as housing for students attending Niagara University.”
Wednesday night, DeVeaux resident Bill Kennedy told city council members that it was hard to describe the chaos created in his community by some NU students.
“You have no idea what it’s like to have 200 kids running up and down your street, carrying on like crazy people,” Kennedy told the council.
He said the students sometimes start large bonfires and once “the house next door to me burned down with a kid inside it.” Kennedy also told council members to “check out the building permits for the extra rooms being put into (single-family homes that house students).”
The zoning code amendments are modeled after legislation created by the city council in Binghamton which had wrestled with issues between residential homeowners and students at the State University of New York campus there.
The proposed changes would more strictly define the terms “family,” “group living” and “Duplex/Semi Detached.” Those definitions have been modified to drop the word “traditional” in reference to family groups.
The zoning amendments would prohibit student housing in R1 and R2 zoned residential districts. Group homes, rectories, and specially permitted bed and breakfast uses would still be allowed in R1 and R2 neighborhoods.
The code changes would take effect on May 1, 2025.
Falls Mayor Robert Restaino’s administration has said that it is working with Niagara University officials on a plan to encourage new targeted student housing development in the North End/Main Street corridor of the city. At least one prominent Buffalo-based developer is in the early stages of planning to convert the former Jenss’ department store building into student housing.
Niagara University Vice President of Students Affairs Christopher Sheffield told the council that the university “whole-heartedly” endorsed the zoning code changes.
“While the overwhelming number of students (living off-campus) are respectful, we recognize a minority of students have caused disruptions in the DeVeaux neighborhood,” Sheffield said.
Sheffield said the disruptions have “persisted for decades and, in recent years, escalated.”
“Such behaviors are entirely inconsistent with the values of Niagara University and will not be condoned,” he said.
But City Planning Board member Frank Handley, who voted against recommending the zoning amendments to the council, told members the changes would only “shift” the student housing problem.
“You can’t control (the students) in DeVeaux,” Handley told the council, “and you’re gonna put them in a block where drugs already exist. It’s not a wise choice.”
Handley said there needed to be “more due diligence” on how to handle student housing issues.
NU officials have said that roughly 3,000 students are currently enrolled at the university, with 50% living in on-campus housing and 50% in off-campus housing.
City officials have called the rise of student housing and “group living” in the DeVeaux area “inconsistent with the residential character of the neighborhood.” Those officials have also said that the increase in the amount of student housing there has led to “pressure on the city’s residential home market (as) students are now occupying homes that would otherwise be available for rent or sale to families.”