We keep hoping the dream that is the hotel/conference center will somehow bloom into reality.
After all, the City of Warren has been watching the fits and starts of the thing for nearly three years with nothing to show but the faded memory of a ceremonial groundbreaking, the only visible signs of construction that have occured.
Periodically, the city is assured by the lead developer that all is well, these things take time, and your patience is appreciated.
The news that one of the organizations involved in the development has filed for Chapter 11 protection from creditors (principally, Manufacturers and Traders Trust of Buffalo) as a way to halt a sheriff's sale doesn't cause our confidence in the project to soar, despite the assurances from the developer.
He tells us that this was all a pre-planned move backed by Warren Development Group to acquire said assets with the backing of an investor.
The machinations of big business are sometimes complicated, even convoluted, and none more so than this one.
In the time it has taken for the conference/convention center project to go from zero to zero, a snazzy new hotel was erected and is apparently flourishing in North Warren, and without the integral involvement of state and local governments.
If the magic happens, if a hotel appears and people start conferring in a conference center, we will be the first to sing the praises of those who have persevered on the epic journey to success.
But, with each new revelation it gets more difficult to conjure that picture. And, it's not just the current exercise in bankruptcy law, but the several other economic still-births attributed to the same developer: The Black Window Project, the boarded-up Allegheny Center for the Arts, the empty lot at the corner of Liberty and Pennsylvania where the "core educational element" was envisioned.
Can Chapter 11 of the federal banking code be the catalyst for success? Yes, it has happened. And, yes, it has also been the next to the last step to liquidation.