Last winter, more than 400 people, including Buffalo and East Side residents, members of the UB community and local leaders, gathered at UB to discuss and launch a grassroots movement creating a bold, new vision for the Black East Side.

Now, the group led and inspired by Henry-Louis Taylor Jr., professor of urban and regional planning in the School of Architecture and Planning and director of the Center for Urban Studies, is ready to announce the first neighborhood that will undergo this transformation as a pilot project. The goal is to make the neighborhood a great place to live, work, play and raise a family.

The announcement will take place from 6-8 p.m. March 10 at the King Urban Life Center, 938 Genesee St., Buffalo.

The event had been originally scheduled for Feb. 17 but was postponed until March 10 due to inclement weather.

It is free and open to the public; registration is limited and available at this link.

At the meeting, Taylor will formally announce the site of the pilot East Side Transformation Project: U.S. Census tract 166, the northern area of Broadway-Fillmore. He will explain why the site was selected and give a brief overview of the project. Team members will be introduced.

In addition to Taylor, other speakers include:

• Essence Sweat, director of the East Buffalo Development Corporation, and Christopher Kennedy, of Habitat for Humanity, who will discuss the housing strategy, including a program that provides grants to rehabilitate vacant homes into rental units.
• Rick Folger, director of strategic initiatives for Habitat for Humanity, who will discuss the organization’s role in the housing initiative headed by Sweat.
• Tim Murphy, SUNY Distinguished Professor in the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences and director of UB’s Community Health Equity Research Institute, who will discuss the health impacts of the project.
• Pastor James Giles of Back to Basics Outreach Ministries, and Digna Saad, executive director of the King Urban Life Center, who will discuss a mini-grant program to involve residents in neighborhood redevelopment strategy.

Rev. George F. Nicholas, convener of the Buffalo Center for Health Equity and pastor of Lincoln Memorial United Methodist Church, will moderate.