Articles for J. Dale Shoemaker

Apr 10

2024

Tesla using Chinese solar panels on Buffalo plant

The Tesla factory in South Buffalo, built to manufacture solar panels, today uses solar panels on its roof made by a competitor in China. That’s a fact state officials have reluctantly confirmed in response to a Freedom of Information request submitted by Investigative Post. Officials initially refused, claiming the identity of the manufacturer was a “trade secret,” but relented after an appeal filed under the FOI Law. Tesla has covered about one-third of the factory’s roof with panels manufactured by LONGi Green Energy Technology, a Chinese firm and one of the world’s largest manufacturers of solar modules. It plans[...]

Posted 6 days ago

Mar 20

2024

Is Tesla using a rival’s solar panels?

Solar panels on the Tesla factory roof. Video via WGRZ. What’s the big secret? Tesla has installed solar panels on about one-third of the roof of its plant in South Buffalo, with plans to cover the rest by the end of the year. This is not surprising. The plant, after all, was built to manufacture parts for solar panels. But one thing doesn’t add up: The solar panels on the factory roof don’t look like the solar products Tesla sells. Most notably, Tesla advertises its products as lacking the white grid lines seen on most solar panels. The panels on[...]

Posted 4 weeks ago

Mar 7

2024

Judge rules in favor of industrial park construction

The Orleans County County Courthouse in Albion. A judge Thursday tossed out a lawsuit that threatened continued development of a massive industrial park in rural Genesee County. Orleans County had sued in an effort to halt construction of a sewage transmission line through its jurisdiction that would route wastewater from the STAMP industrial park into Oak Orchard Creek. Orleans officials contend the wastewater would pollute the creek and potentially damage the county’s fishing industry. State Supreme Court Judge Frank Caruso dismissed the case on procedural grounds. He ruled Orleans County waited too long to file suit. The case pitted neighbor[...]

Posted 1 month ago

Feb 23

2024

OTB wants to expand gambling in Buffalo

After an eight-month delay, Buffalo’s new representative on the Western Regional Off-Track Betting Corp. board of directors participated in her first meeting Thursday and has already taken on a major project: Changing state law to make it easier for Buffalo residents to bet on horse races. Crystal Rodriguez-Dabney, former deputy mayor to Mayor Byron Brown, said she wants to give bars, restaurants and bowling alleys in Buffalo and Western New York the opportunity to install betting terminals, supplied by OTB, as a way to earn more revenue. The terminals, called E-Z Bet, allow gamblers to bet on any horse race[...]

Posted 2 months ago

Feb 15

2024

AG launches probe after inmate death ruled homicide

The New York State Attorney General says that Shaun Humphrey died after he became unresponsive while jailers at the Erie County Holding Center were handcuffing him. Photo courtesy of Humphrey’s family. The New York Attorney General’s Office has opened an investigation into the August death of an Erie County Holding Center inmate that’s been ruled a homicide. Shaun Humphrey, 52, died at Buffalo General Hospital on Aug. 15, one week after an encounter with guards, according to a press release from the attorney general and Ashley Isaac, Humphrey’s daughter. Humphrey appeared to be having a seizure, then became combative with[...]

Posted 2 months ago

Feb 15

2024

Workers protest loophole in state wage law

With the first glints of sun coming up over Kenmore Avenue, slowly burning off the morning’s 22-degree freeze, several dozen construction union members rallied Wednesday in protest of developer Michael Wopperer, hoping to highlight loopholes in New York’s prevailing wage law. Wopperer, the tradesmen and organizers said, had amassed some $17 million in public subsidies for his $23 million renovation of the former Wood & Brooks factory just across the road, yet will not be required to pay prevailing wage to the workers he’s employing on the project. Wopperer told Investigative Post he’s employing some union workers on the[...]

Posted 2 months ago

Feb 9

2024

Labor’s challenges and opportunities

Watch our panel discussion on organized labor. Video by Garrett Looker. Regardless of who wins the presidential election in November, it will be incumbent on workers and union members to fight for better pay, schedules and working conditions. And that’s to say nothing about addressing the effects of climate change and rectifying social injustices. In other words: The labor movement is going to have to save itself. That was one of the big takeaways from Investigative Post’s panel discussion on the labor movement Wednesday night. President Joe Biden may be better for labor than Donald Trump and the Republicans, the panelists[...]

Posted 2 months ago

Feb 8

2024

Minimal discipline for problem Buffalo cop

In the space of 10 months, Buffalo police officer Davon Ottey cursed, wrongly arrested people, used excessive force, lied about brandishing a knife and sprayed hand sanitizer on a man who used a phone to record police, according to the New York State Attorney General’s office. Ottey’s conduct between June 2019 and April 2020 prompted five citizen complaints and was sufficient to warrant a criminal investigation, the attorney general’s office wrote in a Dec. 28 letter to Police Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia. For its part, the department sustained two complaints against Ottey, issuing a six-day suspension in one case and a[...]

Posted 2 months ago

Articles for J. Dale Shoemaker

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