Story by Tom Donahue | Photos by Danny Bush
Two St. Bonaventure University alumni played pivotal roles in the aftermath of the race-motivated May 14 mass shooting at a Buffalo supermarket that killed 10 people and injured three others.
Catherine M. Roberts, who earned her MBA from St. Bonaventure in 2018, was just a year into her new job as president and CEO of the Resource Council of Western New York when the shooting occurred at Tops Friendly Markets’ Jefferson Avenue store on Buffalo’s impoverished East Side. The store is just a few blocks away from the council’s home in a former YMCA building.
Catherine M. Roberts sits in the newly created East Side Resiliency Center at the Resource Council of Western New York.
Her team would spring into action.
Partnering with Tops and FeedMore Western New York, and utilizing donations from across the region, the Resource Council set up a free outdoor food and essentials distribution program that would run for nine weeks and serve more than 78,000 residents.
The Resource Council also became the hub for numerous law enforcement and government agencies investigating the shooting, as well as a one-stop shop for residents to get grief counseling and access the many other services once available from the Tops store, which closed for two months following the shooting.
The Resource Council would later be named the tragedy’s official Resiliency Center — a federal designation following every mass shooting in the U.S. As such, it will receive funding for three years for the establishment of a safe place for anyone impacted by the shooting to come for ongoing counseling, financial assistance and other needs.
Joe Spino, special projects coordinator in the office of Erie County District Attorney John Flynn, was one of those who called on Roberts and the Resource Council immediately after the shooting.
“We reached out to Catherine to ask if she’d be willing to open her building for a victim assistance center and she graciously agreed,” said Spino, who earned a bachelor’s degree in accounting from St. Bonaventure in 1999 and his MBA in 2008.
“The Tops store in that community wasn’t just a supermarket, it was like a community center, a place where people paid their bills and did their banking. A lot of things were happening there,” Spino said.
Tops was indeed a treasured community resource and gathering spot, Roberts said.
“It’s the hub of the community in terms of making sure that people not only have food, but that they can take care of things like paying utility and cable bills, applying for home heating assistance, or getting a money order. It was also a place where people went to run into friends or catch up with neighbors,” she said.
Roberts, whose family roots are in the area, remembers the East Side of her youth, when it was known as the Cold Spring community.
“It was a walkable, thriving community of homeowners who loved their village, where homes were manicured and businesses abounded. You could truly borrow a cup of sugar,” she said.
“Unfortunately, as I got older the community got older. People moved away, people passed on and businesses closed. The homes that were once so beautiful started to decline. Over time this community was left behind.”
It’s one of the reasons she “stepped out on faith” and accepted the Resource Council position deep into her professional career. Roberts was previously a senior vice president for the Community Action Organization of Western New York, where she worked for 15 years. Prior to that, she worked for 15 years in promotions and public affairs for WBLK radio in Buffalo.
“It was a very difficult decision, leaving a job that I so loved and a work family I’d been through the trenches with, but I knew this facility needed me more,” Roberts said. “I feel as if I’m on assignment, and my charge, working with our community partners, the city of Buffalo and all those who believe in this region, is to bring back our once very vibrant community.”
Joe Spino sits in Friedsam Library on a recent visit to campus.
The Tops Supermarkets shooting heaped more despair on a community that has long suffered from poverty and neglect, Spino agreed. “Many would say that the East Side community has been neglected. There’s been little reinvestment in the area and the people living there now have really suffered from a lack of services,” he said.
That need was glaringly evident in the aftermath of the shooting and the Tops closing, when the Resource Council saw a steady stream of people seeking food or services that they could not get elsewhere.
“While the center was initially for victims — those in the store or parking lot at the time of the tragedy — it became clear early on that it needed to serve the whole community, since Tops had provided so many services. We pivoted so that the center was playing more of a community center role, offering help with utilities, food, banking and other services,” Spino said.
“One of my roles was to coordinate staffing from victim assistance programs throughout the state who wanted to assist here in Buffalo. Any victim of this tragedy could come in and receive services, whether it be counseling or just being able to talk to somebody. We had more than 1,000 people come in during those first few months. The tragedy brought to the forefront the needs that this community has had for a long time.”
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul has committed $50 million for the revitalization of Buffalo’s East Side, which holds a disproportionate number of the city’s dilapidated, vacant and abandoned homes.
Roberts exudes an unshakeable confidence that efforts to help restore the community’s charm and economic vitality will succeed.
“It’s going to happen,” she said. “We’ve always been resilient, but because of this tragedy we’re now laser-focused on a strategy to finally say we deserve better than this. We want to look like other communities that are thriving, with businesses that have jobs for teenagers, a community that people want to believe in again.”
Roberts is grateful for the outpouring of support that has come to the council and the neighborhood.
“I can’t thank this community and our partners in government and law enforcement enough. It’s just been amazing to see our community come together this way,” she said. “It’s unfortunate that it had to come together for this particular reason, but this community is no longer one that’s on the back burner.
The Resource Council of Western New York, just a few blocks from Tops’ Jefferson Avenue store, became a hub for East Side residents seeking resources as well as police and government agencies investigating the shooting.
“The promise of what’s to come is very encouraging. Now is the time when we can really make a difference, that we can do some things that are impactful for this community, not only today, but for future generations.”
The council’s designation as the official tragedy Resiliency Center has provided funding for the hiring of additional staff and for the opening of a satellite location on Jefferson Avenue, near the recently reopened Tops store, where those affected by the shooting can access counseling in a more private and confidential setting.
“We’re going to be here, our doors are going to be open, and we’re going to continue to serve this community as best we can,” Roberts said. “When people walk through our doors for whatever they may need, we try to make sure that when they leave they are in a better place.”
She trusts that history will not repeat itself.
“I always tell individuals I encounter, who know our story and are familiar with what we’ve been through as a community, just don’t forget about us,” she said. “Think about this community and what we had to go through, what we survived.
“Now that the cameras have gone away, now that people are starting to shop at Tops again, now that we’re getting back to normal — if that’s what you want to call it — don’t forget that the pain is still very real. There is still great need.”
(Tom Donahue, ’76, is the content webmaster in the Office of Marketing & Communications at St. Bonaventure.)
Editor’s note: Payton Gendron, 19, pleaded guilty on Nov. 28 to 10 counts of first-degree murder and other charges in the May 14 racist attack at a Tops Friendly Markets store. The charges come with a mandatory sentence of life in prison without the chance for parole.