Categories for In-Depth

Sep 12

2022

Harborcenter fails to meet its jobs goal

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When state and county officials agreed nearly a decade ago to give the Buffalo Sabres and the Pegula family $57 million in tax breaks for downtown’s Harborcenter, the money came with a promise. Jobs. In its application for public assistance, a subsidiary of Pegula Sports and Entertainment promised 205 full-time and 160 part-time jobs. In a subsequent press release, the Sabres upped the ante to 350 full-time positions. Those jobs were supposed to be in exchange for $37 million in tax breaks from the Erie County Industrial Development Agency and $20 million from the state to remediate the brownfield the[...]

Posted 2 years ago

Sep 2

2022

Inside Amazon’s massive subsidy in Niagara

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Robert Taylor, a lifelong Niagara County resident, is thinking about moving south. Probably Florida. But Taylor isn’t chasing the warm weather and low property taxes that have drawn tens of thousands of other Northerners to the South. Rather, he’s running away from something.  Amazon.  The online retail giant plans to open a 3-million-square-foot warehouse less than a mile from his Packard Road home in the Town of Niagara. Amazon plans to employ 1,000 people at the warehouse and hundreds of cars and trucks will travel to and from the facility daily. The warehouse will be a “first mile” distribution center[...]

Posted 2 years ago

Aug 8

2022

City ethics board out of business

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Last September, 140 people signed a formal complaint filed with Buffalo’s Board of Ethics. The complaint alleged city workers, including police officers, were campaigning for Mayor Byron Brown on city time, using city resources. Almost a year later, there has been no response — not even an acknowledgement the complaint was received.  Little wonder, as it turns out: The ethics board hasn’t met in two and half years. According to the Office of the City Clerk, the ethics board — charged with monitoring compliance with the city’s code of ethics — hasn’t met since Covid struck, “due to lack of[...]

Posted 2 years ago

Jul 27

2022

Byron Brown’s campaign debts

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Mayor Byron Brown’s campaign committee owes vendors more than $185,000 for goods and services they provided to his re-election effort last year. That’s according to the committee’s latest filing with the state Board of Elections, which covers all financial activity between Jan. 15 and July 11. Brown for Buffalo owes more than three times as much as it has cash on hand, according to that report. It owes more than four times what the mayor reported raising over the past six months. The mayor’s campaign committee lists the debts as “outstanding liabilities/loans,” but most appear to be unpaid invoices. According[...]

Posted 2 years ago

Jul 25

2022

Buffalo is slowly losing its trees

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 Buffalo is cutting down twice as many trees as it’s planting. And residents are noticing the loss. “It’s nothing like when I was a child,” said Catherine Faust, a Highland Avenue resident in the city’s Elmwood Village.  From 2016 through 2020, the city cut down more than 4,300 trees. They only planted about 1,900 new ones.  An Investigative Post analysis found the rate of tree loss is greater in parts of the East Side. Masten District, for example, lost four times as many trees as were planted. “It is one of the most despicable things that I can imagine[...]

Posted 2 years ago

Jul 18

2022

Monday Morning Read

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Below is the “What I’m Reading” section of WeeklyPost, our Sunday email newsletter. You can subscribe here. Buffalo has a new school superintendent with the appointment of Tonja Williams. I’ve got to admit I was a little stunned when I heard the news.  As we reported in May, she’s never taught at the elementary or high school level. She has little experience as a principal and her tenure at Futures Academy was a failure: academic achievement at the struggling elementary school actually got worse during her time there and she was eventually removed as a result. Sources told us that[...]

Posted 2 years ago

May 31

2022

Buffalo superintendent’s mixed track record

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Tonja Williams has some things going for her as she seeks the permanent appointment as superintendent of Buffalo public schools. They start with her people skills. Williams, who has been interim superintendent since Kriner Cash resigned in March, is a good listener and a realist in telling people what she can deliver. She’s familiar with the city and district, having lived in the Buffalo area her whole life and worked in city schools for 32 years.  “She seems to listen to all sides of an issue and doesn’t seem to get drawn into any personal conflict, any ulterior agendas that[...]

Posted 2 years ago

May 19

2022

Radical right makes school board inroads

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Eleven newly elected school board candidates in Erie and Niagara counties are only two degrees of separation away from Western New York’s radical right. That is to say, they were endorsed by Western New York Students First, which portrays itself as a non-partisan organization but has extensive ties to some of the area’s most radical figures and groups. For example, David DiPietro, considered one of the state Assembly’s most right-leaning members, hosted a fundraiser for them in September; security was provided by the New York Watchmen, a quasi-militia. WNY Students First teamed with the Constitutional Coalition of Western New York,[...]

Posted 2 years ago
Investigative Post

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