Jim Heaney

Jim Heaney is editor and executive director of Investigative Post. He was an investigative reporter with The Buffalo News from 1986 to 2011 and a reporter and editor with The Orlando Sentinel from 1980-86. His coverage over the years has focused on economic development, local and state government, politics, education, housing and transportation, and he was an early practitioner of computer-assisted reporting. Heaney has won more than 20 journalism awards and was a finalist for the 1993 Pulitzer Prize for investigative reporting.

Apr 15

2024

Taxes are for us, not them

Pfizer, the pharmaceutical giant, took in more than $27 billion in revenue last year. It didn’t pay a dime in federal taxes. It’s not alone. As reported by Jacobin: “More than one hundred of the country’s most profitable corporations paid zero federal income taxes in at least one year since the Trump tax cuts were enacted.” The story was based on a report generated by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. You’ve got to read the tables that names names. Many a president and Congress have passed tax laws that have enabled corporations to pay a much lower effective[...]

Posted 3 days ago

Apr 8

2024

Everything OK with Buffalo Bills sale of PSLs. Yeah, right.

The uproar over the cost of personal seat licenses the Buffalo Bills are charging season ticket holders continues to generate a lot of press. The Buffalo News published a full-throated defense of what many fans consider indefensible. The story quotes unnamed sources – presumably employees of the Bills and/or Legends Entertainment – who contended the PSL rollout has been flawless and that the public outcry is much ado about nothing. Yeah, right. The story prompted a sharp rebuke from Neil deMause, author of the Field of Schemes website that reports on stadium projects. He termed the story “a flagrant violation[...]

Posted 1 week ago

Apr 2

2024

Roundup of Buffalo Bills stadium coverage

Image courtesy of WGRZ. Now seems like a good time to review our reporting on the Bills’ new $1.7 billion stadium, slated to open in 2026. Most of the following stories were reported by J. Dale Shoemaker and Mark Scheer. Taxpayer subsidies: Subsidies will top $1 billion between construction and maintenance and go well beyond what New York State typically spends on stadiums and arenas or what taxpayers spend in most other states. The lease will not provide Erie County taxpayers with any relief for maintenance and other ongoing stadium costs. Economic impact: Stadiums typically generate little new economic activity,[...]

Posted 2 weeks ago

Apr 1

2024

Pegula aided and abetted by Poloncarz & Hochul

Erie County Executive Mark Poloncrz says he’s hopping mad at the Buffalo Bills for the way they’re treating season ticket holders. Says the team should be more transparent in its roll-out of personal seat licenses and that Gov. Kathy Hochul shares his concerns. Sorry, but Poloncarz and Hochul are enablers. They capitulated to Terry Pegula’s demands that the new stadium be located in Orchard Park and that taxpayers foot most of the bill. Along the way, Poloncarz took the ridiculous position that the stadium didn’t require an environmental impact statement and bargained a weak community benefits agreement with the team.[...]

Posted 2 weeks ago

Mar 29

2024

OTB considering hotel expansion at Batavia Downs

The board of directors for Western Regional Off-Track Betting Corp. agreed on Thursday to hire two companies to help explore the possible expansion of the 84-room hotel at Batavia Downs in Genesee County. Approval of the agreements came over the objection of one board director — Erie County’s representative Tim Callan, who said he still has questions about how management arrived at the two vendors chosen to do the work. “Management did not answer my questions to my satisfaction,” Callan said following Thursday’s meeting. The board, minus Callan, authorized one contract for $76,000 with Bammel Architects, an Orchard Park firm[...]

Posted 3 weeks ago

Mar 25

2024

Terry Pegula’s assault on Bills fan base

Terry Pegula wasn’t satisfied just picking the pockets of state and county taxpayers in demanding they pick up most of the cost of building the Bills a new stadium. He’s now playing “stick ‘em up” with his season ticket holders. We knew the Bills intended to charge fans for personal seat licenses, which gave them the “right” to buy season tickets (for an additional charge, of course). The team was hush-hush about what it intended to charge, but last week it began to inform fans holding the most expensive seats what it would cost to keep them: Up to $50,000.[...]

Posted 3 weeks ago

Mar 18

2024

Pepper spray and f-bombs got a Buffalo cop fired

Warning: This video contains graphic content. On March 25, 2020, Buffalo police officer Kevin Murphy pepper sprayed and arrested Lakisha Neal. Viewer discretion is advised. The Buffalo police union is asking a judge to overturn an arbitrator’s decision upholding termination of an officer who doused a woman with pepper spray and repeatedly swore at her. It’s rare litigation. Erie County Supreme Court documents dating to 2013 show no other cases of either the city or the police union asking a judge to reverse an arbitrator’s decision on whether an officer should be fired. Lakisha Neal, 42, filed an internal affairs[...]

Posted 1 month ago

Mar 4

2024

Julian Assange’s prosecution is an assault on journalism

Julian Assange of WikiLeaks fame is locked up in a British prison and fighting an effort by Joe Biden’s Justice Department to extradite him to stand charges here of violating the Espionage Act. Hearings related to his deportation were held last week in London. Assange was a hero to many for exposing leaks from Chelsea Manning and others involving U.S. military conduct in Iran and Afghanistan and U.S. diplomatic cables. Others have villainized him for releasing the emails of Hillary Clinton and files and emails of the Democratic National Committee during the 2016 presidential election. Suffice to say, Assange has[...]

Posted 2 months ago

Jim Heaney

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