Apr 3
2013
Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz decries “multi-multi-millionaires who feel they are entitled to do a project without paying one red cent in tax.” The expanded interview will air Saturday on WGRZ’s Daybreak. The full interview and transcript will post to this website over the weekend.
Apr 2
2013
Apr 2
2013
One of the nation’s biggest environmental trials wrapped up last week in federal court in Buffalo against Tonawanda Coke, almost a month after the state Department of Health released a report that found elevated levels of cancer and birth defects in neighborhoods that surround that industrial corridor. Gov. Andrew Cuomo was at University at Buffalo this morning to talk about the recently passed state budget and afterwards the press was ushered behind a black curtain in a tight corner to shout out questions on a range of topics. Someone may not have gotten the governor up to speed on how[...]
Apr 2
2013
As if we needed more evidence that New York’s “Three Men in a Room” way of governing doesn’t work, there is this year’s legislative session. First there was the wham-bam bill to toughen gun control laws. Among other things, it limited magazines to no more than seven rounds of ammunition. Turns out that few such magazines are actually manufactured and sold. O0ps. The mistake was fixed – in more secret deliberations, of course. Then there is the budget passed last week that included two provisions that are looking worse with each passing day, now that they are actually seeing the light[...]
Apr 1
2013
Apr 1
2013
Robert Gioia is one of Western New York’s consummate insiders. At present, he holds two key positions, president of the John R. Oishei Foundation, Western New York’s largest philanthropic organization, and chairman of the Erie Harbor Canal Development Corp., responsible for developing Canalside and the Outer Harbor. Gioia’s career has straddled the public and private sector. His family operated the Gioia Macaroni Co. and he was a principal with the Food Group of Strategic Investments and Holdings Inc. from 1992 to 2007. On the government side, he chaired the Niagara Frontier Transportation Authority during its construction of the new airport terminal in Cheektowaga[...]
Apr 1
2013
Investigative Post editor discusses the state of subsidy deals granted to developers, including Yahoo and the Buffalo Sabres, on his monthly installment of Press Pass.
Mar 28
2013
In only the second prosecution of its type in the nation, Tonawanda Coke and one of its managers is found guilty on most charges involving the release of toxic pollutants into a neighborhood that is suffering from high cancer rates. A report from WGRZ, including Dan Telvock of Investigative Post.