Last weekend, Governor Cuomo attended the Bills game at the Ralph – the first home game under the new 10 year lease agreement. It was an open event, and lots of people came to see the governor, maybe get a picture, some grub, you know – hobnob.
One of the hobnobbers who came up to Governor Cuomo was notorious political shit-stirrer Steve Pigeon.
The Pigeon/Max/Mazurek “Mark Hamister is a con man” lit debacle in support of Sam Fruscione had just hit the news, and the copious volume of resultant stirred shit was actively hitting the fan by about September 6th – the Friday before that Bills game. It got so bad that Hamister had a press conference scheduled for that Friday to announce that the deal was dead, but an 11th-hour intervention by Governor Cuomo gave the hotel project a temporary reprieve. Whatever Cuomo said to the city council, Fruscione was claiming now to be in favor of the Hamister hotel – that he was just “asking questions”.
Fruscione is one of a very special troika of city councilmembers in Niagara Falls who simply detest Mayor Paul Dyster. For example, in March of this year, they famously rejected a proposal that Niagara Falls join a binational, interstate consortium of Great Lakes cities with money donated by a Buffalo-based philanthropic foundation. Fruscione explained that the city is on a river, not on a Great Lake, ignoring the fact that the river connects two of them.
So, on Sunday, Steve Pigeon – the man who set up and funded the PAC that sent out the “Hamister is a con man” mailer – went up to Governor Cuomo. I have heard from four sources who overheard the exchange that Pigeon approached Cuomo and apologized – I’m really sorry – to the governor for that mailer up in Niagara Falls. Cuomo shook Pigeon’s hand and shot daggers out of his eyes at Pigeon, and calmly but forcefully told him, “I just want that hotel built – stay out of my way.”
A correspondent snapped the exact moment this happened.
The Buffalo Record 