Categories for DailyPost

Dec 16

2025

Q&A: Buffalo’s incoming Mayor Sean Ryan

Published by

Sean Ryan, Buffalo’s mayor-elect, said in an interview Friday evening that he’s inheriting a City Hall that’s been “hollowed out” by poor management, with a “demoralized” workforce. Before a live audience at the Burchfield Penney Art Center, Ryan described vacant offices, a lack of communication within and between departments, unspent state grant money, and deferred maintenance of city infrastructure. And, naturally, the incoming mayor talked about the city’s dire financial straits: a structural budget imbalance of at least $50 million, no savings left to cover shortfalls, and escalating costs — especially overtime — exacerbated by stagnant revenues. “We’ve sort of[...]

Posted 3 months ago

Dec 15

2025

Survey: A lot of Bills fans are plowed at home games

Published by

We’re closing in on Christmas, so I’ll start out a little less heavy than usual. A survey of fans attending NFL games found that Bills fans drink more than almost any fan base. Just shy of 16 percent of fans have at least five alcoholic beverages before and/or during games.  Put another way: Some 11,400 fans are plastered for games. Tailgating has something to do with it. Six in Ten Bills fans drink before they enter the stadium, according to the survey. Only the Arizona Cardinals had a higher percentage of fans boozing it up (18.5 percent) than the Bills[...]

Posted 3 months ago

Dec 13

2025

Vote for your favorite story of 2025

Published by

Our best story of 2025? You tell us. Our ballot listing 10 stories is posted below. They’ve been selected from about 230 stories our staff produced this year, in addition to 50 or so appearances we’ve made on Michael Wooten’s 5:30 Voices newscast on WKBW 7 News. Dale Shoemaker has three stories up for consideration, including his piece on U.S. customs officials holding families with children in makeshift cells for up to two weeks at local border crossings. Other stories of Dale’s on the ballot involve allegations of wage theft at restaurants in Niagara Falls and curiously timed campaign contributions[...]

Posted 3 months ago

Dec 12

2025

Cops shouldn’t cooperate with ICE, advocates say

Published by

A panel of law students and advocates presented the report Wednesday. Photo by J. Dale Shoemaker. A handful of local law enforcement agencies turn migrants they encounter over to federal immigration agencies like the U.S. Border Patrol — a practice some now say should end. In a report released Wednesday, professors and graduate students with the Buffalo Human Rights Center — part of the University at Buffalo’s law school — detailed the cooperation between local and federal agencies, criticized the practice and called on state lawmakers to ban it. “Our conclusion across many contexts and many actors is that cooperation[...]

Posted 3 months ago

Dec 11

2025

A double-dipping Niagara Falls defense contractor

Published by

Americarb’s existing production facility. Photo via the Niagara Gazette. A Niagara Falls defense contractor is “double dipping” from public coffers, critics say, after winning a Department of Defense contract, a state grant and now, on Wednesday, local tax breaks. First came the $12.6 million federal contract, announced in September. Americarb, a materials manufacturer, was awarded the funding to develop a process for converting woven rayon fabric into “carbonized rayon phenolic,” a material that the military will use to insulate the rocket nozzles of tactical and hypersonic missiles. The company plans to expand its Niagara Falls factory and hire 40 people[...]

Posted 3 months ago

Dec 10

2025

Interview: Drew Warshaw, candidate for state comptroller

Published by

Drew Warshaw, candidate for New York State comptroller. New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli has been the state’s chief financial officer for 18 years. That’s long enough, according to Drew Warshaw, who hopes to compete the first contested primary election DiNapoli has faced in his long tenure. It’s “one of the most powerful offices in government,” Warshaw said in an interview with Investigative Post this week. And yet “virtually no one has ever heard” of it, many “can barely pronounce” it, and even fewer could name the man who’d held the office since 2007. The office’s power, Warshaw said, derives[...]

Posted 3 months ago

Dec 9

2025

Local police who cooperate with ICE

Published by

The Cheektowaga Police Department heads the list of a half-dozen local law enforcement agencies that are cooperating with federal agencies to detain and deport migrants. So far this year, police in the Buffalo suburb have turned over at least 21 people to federal immigration agents after detaining them for low-level offenses like shoplifting. Sheriff offices in Erie and Niagara counties are also working with U.S. Border Patrol and ICE. So are police in Lewiston, North Tonawanda and Amherst, though to a lesser extent.  Buffalo police do not appear to collaborate with immigration authorities. Mayor-elect Sean Ryan said it’s not the[...]

Posted 3 months ago

Dec 8

2025

Buffalo’s incoming mayor begins to build his team

Published by

Mayor-elect Sean Ryan’s management team is starting to take shape with the announcement Friday of four deputy mayors. Three of the four are present or past members of Mark Poloncarz’s team in Erie County government. That’s a good sign — on the surface, anyway — as the county executive has been a competent administrator, the terrible deal on the Bills stadium notwithstanding. Past mayors have had one, sometimes two, deputies. Ryan’s approach is to give each deputy mayor a portfolio of departments to oversee. The most thankless assignment will fall to Eugenio Russi, responsible for the police and fire departments.[...]

Posted 3 months ago
Investigative Post