Tagged: syracuse

Updated, 8:06 p.m. with statement from Destiny USA.

For the first time in Bill Ryan's 10 years of public service, Syracuse and the owner of the Destiny USA mega-sized shopping mall are not facing legal action.

Ryan is a former common councilor and now chief of staff for the mayor and chairman of Syracuse Industrial Development Agency (SIDA), the city's development arm.

SIDA and the developer behind Destiny USA, Robert Congel's Pyramid Companies, reached a settlement Monday to avoid up to three lawsuits.

Syracuse will formally commence the foreclosure process on a long vacant downtown church, aiming to turn the historic building into another part of a downtown residential boom.

The Common Council voted Monday to seize the former First Baptist Church, commonly known as Mizpah Tower, with the plan of selling it to a new developer.

This isn't the first time Syracuse has tried to see the nearly 100 year-old church become something more than just a vacant structure, which it's been for a quarter-century.