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Apr 26

2018

iPost elects Biehl board president

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Investigative Post has added two members to its board of directors and elected Jody Kleinberg Biehl as president. Biehl, an original member of the board dating to 2012, will fulfill the balance of the term of David Cay Johnston, who resigned citing a daunting workload as a best-selling book author, lecturer and teacher. Johnston, a former Pulitzer Prize winner with The New York Times, praised Investigative Post for its “superb work … first-rate reporters … and success in raising money.” Biehl is a faculty member in the University of Buffalo English department and director of U.B.’s journalism program.  She also serves[...]

Posted 8 years ago

Apr 13

2018

IBM subcontractor stiffs employees on pay

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Former employees of Career Connection Inc., until recently the largest employer at IBM’s Buffalo office, were told Thursday that the company cannot afford to pay them for their final week of work. In response to our report on WGRZ, IBM said the company has “promptly taken action making sure the employees receive all the money they are owed for their work on the IBM account.” The affected employees will be paid by IBM. “My goal is to accumulate sufficient cash to fund the payroll for the week ended March 30, 2018,” Career Connection Inc.’s CEO, Jessica Killgore, wrote in an[...]

Posted 8 years ago

Apr 7

2018

Pegula abandons controversial fracking project

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A hydrofracking company owned by Terry Pegula walked away Friday from a controversial project in Coudersport, PA, that has generated a lot of community opposition. A company called Epiphany Water Solutions has proposed building a plant to treat fracking wastewater, a portion of which would be released into the Allegheny River. Pegula’s fracking company, JKLM Energy, was going to be a major customer of the treatment plant. Pegula owns the Buffalo Sabres and Bills. Opponents argued that the plant’s treatment process is not proven and that the project ran the risk of releasing effluent into the Allegheny with unacceptably high[...]

Posted 8 years ago

Apr 6

2018

Staffing shakeup at IBM Buffalo Billion project

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Until recently, staffing agency Career Connection Inc. was the largest employer at IBM’s Buffalo office. But, last week, CEO Jessica Killgore told employees – including roughly 85 in Buffalo – they would be abruptly transferred to other companies, also IBM subcontractors. The move followed “a series of painful business challenges and unfavorable events encountered during the last two years,” Killgore wrote in an email to staff last Monday. “We feel it is imperative to take extreme action.” Gov. Cuomo lured IBM to town with $55 million from the Buffalo Billion. In exchange, state officials promised, the company would create 500[...]

Posted 8 years ago

Apr 5

2018

Neighbors contest bid to expand Niagara landfill

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A hazardous waste facility in the Town of Porter with a history of spills and regulatory violations is seeking state permission to construct a new landfill, which one nearby resident has decried as “insanity.” CWM Chemical Services is one of only a handful of hazardous waste facilities in the Rust Belt. Before CWM ran out of space in 2015, it accepted toxic materials such as PCBs, lead and asbestos, from industrial plants, brownfields and Superfund sites across the United States and Canada. The company has tried for over a decade to obtain a permit to construct another landfill on their[...]

Posted 8 years ago

Apr 2

2018

Judge shutters a neighborhood nuisance

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A State Supreme Court judge has at least temporarily shut down Battaglia Demolition, long a plague on the Seneca Babcock neighborhood. The plant, located about one mile south of downtown, crushes and otherwise processes concrete, bricks, asphalt and other construction and demolition debris. Residents have long complained that the plant and trucks that service it are the source of dust, noise – even rats. Two years ago the state filed suit against the plant owner, Peter Battaglia, contending the facility was a “public nuisance” and lacked necessary permits. On Monday, Judge Deborah Chimes issued an injunction that ordered the plant closed until[...]

Posted 8 years ago

Mar 30

2018

UB students rally to demand divestment

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Dozens of University at Buffalo students rallied Thursday, calling for the university’s foundation to divest from fossil fuels. UB has positioned itself as a leader on green initiatives, even as the private and technically separate UB foundation has invested in funds that back fracking companies, according to documents leaked as part of the Paradise Papers, Investigative Post reported last year.  The Fossil Free UB campaign, which organized the protest, has earned support from the representative bodies for both both the faculty and professional staff, as well as student government. In response to the divestment campaign, the foundation has said it is “actively looking”[...]

Posted 8 years ago
Investigative Post