Community benefits agreement

You don't have to have that.

Before, you had to have... a CBA, Community Benefits Agreement of some sort.

Now, hey, y'all got property, y'all okayed it with the state, y'all put affordable houses in it, boom.

Bypass everybody and now boom, it's here.

Sorry, don't want to talk in acronyms.

So a community benefit, the simplest terms, a community benefit agreement is a legally binding agreement that basically says if development or this project moves forward, these are the benefits or these are the requirements that the developer will agree to for a community, right? And community benefit agreements have been around for a while also.

They are just recently being discussed in the data center context.

What does that look like for a community? So first off, the community should be involved and engaged in developing that community benefit agreement.

Well, I think what you are realizing is you're seeing a region that's desperate for jobs and desperate for good-paying jobs.

I don't know if they're going to be good-paying jobs, but I do know that at least in Erie County with the stadium, they had a CBA, Community Benefits Agreement.

I don't know if there ever was one developed for Amazon.

I do know that they were talking about providing – at least some sort of help with going to college for people that work there or some tuition incentives.

Still unfocused, Bill's CBA spending would be better with a transparent application process.

For some reason, the Buffalo Bills Community Benefits Agreement has steered away from a clear, competitive, and formalized application process.

Instead, those in charge of this annual spending initiative seem to prefer a piecemeal strategy.

It's not the right answer.