Articles for Geoff Kelly

Oct 9

2025

Ryan leads the money race

With less than a month to go in the race, State Sen. Sean Ryan, the Democratic nominee for Buffalo mayor, has more money left in his campaign account than his two rivals — James Gardner, running on the Republican and Conservative Party lines, and Michael Gainer, running on the independent Restore Buffalo line. The most recent campaign finance disclosure forms, due to the state elections board last Friday, paint a picture of a race whose energy and donors’ dollars are largely spent. Meanwhile, Gardner and Gainer have turned to other platforms — particularly social media — to remind voters the[...]

Posted 2 months ago

Oct 2

2025

Judge faults Buffalo cops in overturning jury verdict

Excerpt from Dean Taylor’s Nov. 8, 2019, interview with Police Department’s Internal Affairs Division. Two weeks ago state Supreme Court Judge John DelMonte did a rare thing. He overturned a jury’s verdict clearing two Buffalo cops accused in a civil suit of assaulting a man who was using his phone to take video of a crime scene. The case dates back to Sept. 1, 2019. Police were investigating a report of shots fired near the corner of Kehr and Fougeron streets on the city’s East Side. Dean Taylor, the plaintiff in the lawsuit, stood on the sidewalk across the street[...]

Posted 3 months ago

Sep 25

2025

Overtime straining Buffalo’s budget

Two-and-a-half months into the city’s current fiscal year, overtime for Buffalo’s police and fire departments is on track to run $10 million over budget, threatening once again to push the city into deficit. That’s a smaller cost overrun than the city has seen in previous years, but nonetheless a problem for a city whose growing costs, stagnant revenues, and lack of reserve funds leave officials no room for error as they implement this year’s $622 million spending plan. Police and fire headquarters in downtown Buffalo. Photo by I’Jaz Ja’ciel. Fillmore District Council Member Mitch Nowakowski, who chairs the Council’s Finance[...]

Posted 3 months ago

Sep 18

2025

Zellner, Rivera jockey for state Senate seat

Assembly Member Jonathan Rivera and Erie County Democratic Committee Chair Jeremy Zellner are longtime allies. In recent months they’ve also become rivals. Both are positioning themselves to succeed Sean Ryan in the 61st district state Senate seat in the likely event that Ryan is elected mayor of Buffalo in November. Neither has publicly declared their candidacy, but both are canvassing party leaders, committee members and other Democratic stalwarts for pledges of support. Rivera recently received letters of endorsement from a handful of building trades unions. As if in reply, Town of Amherst Democratic Chair Chuck Eaton used a meeting of[...]

Posted 3 months ago

Sep 16

2025

Shaky math involving Buffalo’s budget balancer

The 52-year-old Charles R. Turner Ramp across from Buffalo City Hall. Photo by I’Jaz Ja’ciel. The City of Buffalo’s current budget and its four-year financial plan rely on $42 million from the anticipated sale of four downtown parking ramps to a newly formed public authority. But how Acting Mayor Chris Scanlon’s administration came up with that number, and whether it accurately reflects the price the ramps will fetch, is a mystery. City officials have refused to share documents showing how they determined what the ramps are worth. The board treasurer of the organization that manages the ramps now — and[...]

Posted 3 months ago

Sep 10

2025

Jemal late in paying millions in bills

Contractors have filed nearly $3.7 million in liens for unpaid bills against Doug Jemal’s projects in Western New York over the past year and a half. It’s another indicator that high interest rates and the diminished market for office and retail space have put the screws to the developer’s business. Jemal called those conditions “a pandemic of real estate” that have made cash flow tight for his company and real-estate developers across the country. “There’s cash flow issues, no doubt,” he told Investigative Post. “But we’re taking care of this. We pay our bills.” The mechanics liens — a legal[...]

Posted 3 months ago

Sep 3

2025

Evans town board settles lawsuit in secret

The Town of Evans in July settled a defamation lawsuit brought against the town and two current town board members by former Town Supervisor Mary Hosler. But you wouldn’t know it from looking through the town board’s agendas, meeting minutes and recordings. There is no record of the town board voting to approve a settlement in any meeting held between June and the end of August. There’s no record of the settlement being discussed in an executive session, which excludes the public from discussions of sensitive matters. There’s not even a record of an executive session being called at the[...]

Posted 4 months ago

Aug 27

2025

Granville case costing city taxpayers

The City of Buffalo has paid more than $200,000 to the five police officers who responded to the Erie County narcotics chief’s hit-and-run accident on the city’s West Side last spring since they were put on leave in April. The total cost to city taxpayers is considerably higher, however, because the city also has to pay officers to backfill the shifts those five cops are missing. And sometimes the city has to pay overtime for that, because the police union’s contract calls for mandatory overtime pay when the department has to call in officers to take the place of colleagues[...]

Posted 4 months ago