Categories for DailyPost

Jan 1

2025

Staying with the story

Published by

When last we spoke in December 2023, I touted my reporting on Black homeownership rates as some of my best work of the year and promised some follow-ups to dive deeper into the issue. I’d like to think I delivered on that promise this year through some in-depth pieces I wrote on the region’s mortgage lenders. In March, I produced a two-part package exploring how banks and non-bank lenders in both Erie County and the City of Buffalo were approving mortgage loans. I scoured tens of thousands of records from Census and Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data to determine where[...]

Posted 10 months ago

Dec 31

2024

Dabney appointed to Buffalo Housing Court

Published by

Buffalo Housing Court, Part 17 of Buffalo City Court. Photo by I’Jaz Ja’ciel After months of speculation, Buffalo City Court Judge Phillip Dabney Jr. has been named the city’s new Housing Court judge. Dabney, 55, was a fill-in judge for Housing Court several times this year and that experience  prepared him for being appointed to the position for the coming year, said Eighth Judicial Administrative Judge Kevin Carter. “I’ve heard that he’s been doing a really nice job. He seems to be serious about it. He also wants to do it, so that’s an important factor,” Carter told Investigative Post.[...]

Posted 10 months ago

Dec 31

2024

Using public records to unlock stories

Published by

Before he retired to the west coast of Mexico this fall, my Investigative Post colleague Bruce Rushton made a salient observation: New York has a particularly weak open records law because it has no teeth. By teeth, he meant that in New York there are virtually no penalties for bureaucrats if they ignore or delay responding to a records request for information the public has a right to see. In other words, there’s no incentive for the government to be transparent despite our Freedom of Information Law saying it ought to be.  That’s a problem I ran into headfirst this[...]

Posted 10 months ago

Dec 29

2024

April Baskin’s results fall short of her rhetoric

Published by

The Buffalo News sure is fond of April Baskin, the outgoing chair of the Erie County Legislature and incoming state senator. In a profile and subsequent editorial, The News portrayed her as an effective champion of social justice.  I beg to differ. The Legislature under her leadership has been a rubber stamp for County Executive Mark Poloncarz. She seems joined at the hip with Democratic Party HQ, which saw to it that she ascended to Tim Kennedy’s vacant Senate seat without serious opposition.   Baskin and her colleagues somehow decided construction of the new Bills stadium didn’t require an environmental impact[...]

Posted 10 months ago

Dec 27

2024

Geoff Kelly’s very busy year

Published by

What did I do in 2024? For starters, I began writing a weekly newsletter called PoliticalPost,  jam-packed with items about local government and politics — patronage hires, electoral maneuvers, the misbehavior of public officials, and much more. It’s free every Wednesday morning. (Though donations to support our nonprofit investigative journalism center are always appreciated.)  If you don’t get it already, you should sign up for it. If you’ve been a subscriber from the get-go, you found out in January — six months before anyone else — that Byron Brown was looking to ditch Buffalo City Hall for the job he[...]

Posted 10 months ago

Dec 26

2024

My tenure at Investigative Post

Published by

After more than a year helping out at Investigative Post, I’m headed back into retirement. I’m certainly happy about that. After more than 40 years in the news business, I truly enjoy my time out of it. But I have to say, working as an editor at Investigative Post this past year-and-a-half has been inspiring. If I was closer to 50 years old than 70 (when did that happen?), I can’t think of a place I’d rather work. I’ve been in a handful of newsrooms over my career. This one defines journalism – expose injustice, hold the powerful accountable, give[...]

Posted 10 months ago

Dec 24

2024

OTB accuses whistleblower of ‘public smear campaign’

Published by

Western Regional Off-Track Betting’s Batavia Downs. Western Regional Off-Track Betting Corp has filed a counterclaim against a former executive turned whistleblower who maintains he was fired after he agreed to cooperate with investigations into alleged wrongdoing at the public benefit corporation. OTB’s counterclaim, filed Nov. 27, alleges that former Chief Operating Officer Michael Nolan breached his “fiduciary duty and duties of loyalty and confidentiality” to the organization while engaging in a “public smear campaign” designed to draw negative attention to WROTB and its outgoing CEO and President Henry Wojtaszek. The countersuit accuses Nolan of conspiring with his attorney, Steve Cohen,[...]

Posted 10 months ago

Dec 23

2024

Scanlon proposes police use of Braymiller

Published by

The now-shuttered Braymiller Market. Photo by J. Dale Shoemaker. Acting Mayor Christopher Scanlon wants the city to rent the former Braymiller Market building for use by the Buffalo Police Department, according to documents filed Monday with the Common Council. Scanlon is requesting lawmakers approve a one-year lease between the city and owner Stuart Green, who has defaulted on a loan from Evans Bank used to buy the property in 2021. City records indicate Green purchased the property for $7 million. He still owes approximately $5 million to the bank, according to Fillmore Common Council Member Mitch Nowakowski. The city’s proposed[...]

Posted 10 months ago
Investigative Post