Audit: Buffalo City Hall business owes more than $100,000 in unpaid rent

BUFFALO, N.Y. (WIVB) – A local business owes tens of thousands of dollars in late rent payments to the City of Buffalo while it was using space at Buffalo City Hall, an audit shows.

This audit was carried out by the city comptroller’s office. It says the operator of Buffalo City Hall’s cafeteria owes the city more than $100,000 in back rent payments.

Sue’s NY Deli serves breakfast and lunch to many city employees in the basement of City Hall.

According to the audit, the city is supposed to receive $2,150 a month in rent from the grocery store. But auditors say rent hasn’t been paid for more than four years, since March 2020, when the pandemic hit. Sue’s is operating under an expired contract with the city and owes more than $103,000 in unpaid rent.

“Late last year when staff looked at other contracts, particularly revenue generating contracts, it was simply a request to hold. We did not receive payment. We noticed that we hadn’t received payment for this particular account for quite a while,” said Buffalo Comptroller Barbara Miller-Williams. “No doubt, I was surprised because it is. a large sum of money and the delay is excessive, because a contract which had been executed had been renewed and there was no authority to renew it. I was really surprised.”

Miller-Williams says this audit does not reflect the quality of the deli meats. She says she would rather see if there is another vendor who could take over the cafeteria. And it appears the process is already underway: A city spokesperson said a request for proposals was issued two weeks ago to see if a new food service provider would be brought on board.

The Ministry of Public Works has still not made a decision on what will happen to these unpaid rents.

News 4 called Sue’s NY Deli for comment on the unpaid rent, but we did not hear back.

Statement from Council Member Mitch Nowakowski:

“The operators of Sue’s are great people, but there is a missing contract. Nothing is free and there are also concerns and we need our Department of Public Works to be accountable to ensure that City of Buffalo contractors, like the marina audit last year and NY Sue’s Deli in city ​​hall, pay their part of the contracts for the taxpayers and the city.

I look forward to this item being discussed in more detail at my Finance Committee meeting on July 2 at 10 a.m. and want to thank the Comptroller and her office for their work on this audit.