Officials gathered at the former Midtown Plaza site on Tuesday to welcome the first new business to locate at that location.
More than 50 years after Midtown Plaza first opened in downtown Rochester, local, state and federal officials gathered at the location to welcome Windstream. That telecommunications company, based in Arkansas, bought out locally-based PAETEC, and is now moving many of its employees downtown. Up to 335 of the 800 workers that Windstream has in this area will eventually be based at the Midtown site, in the former Seneca Building. That building was completely renovated as part of a 19 million dollar project.
Windstream CEO Jeff Gardner says his company is glad they decided to keep PAETEC operations in Rochester.
"At the end of the day it was the quality of the people who ultimately made our decision to locate in downtown Rochester, an easy one "
About 80 people from Windstream are at the Seneca Building now, with the rest expected to move in by sometime in October. Windstream will fill two of the three floors, and the third floor will be leased to another business.
