Categories for News

May 13

2025

Assessing the New York state budget

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Gov. Kathy Hochul. Three prominent think tanks of varying political stripes agree that the state budget just adopted by Gov. Kathy Hochul and the Legislature leaves a lot to be desired. The Citizen Budget Commission labeled the spending plan “a short sighted budget.” “The extremely late $254 billion State budget virtually ignores the double-whammy threat posed by looming massive federal budget cuts and a possible recession. Instead of holding funds aside, lawmakers skyrocketed spending, slashed recession reserves, and sabotaged the State’s fiscal foundation. The budget simply is unaffordable.” The Empire Center concluded the $146 billion spending plan calls for “an[...]

Posted 2 months ago

May 9

2025

Local landlords, brokers accused of rejecting Section 8 tenants

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A text message between a tester and a real estate agent used as evidence in a housing discrimination complaint. Screenshot provided by Housing Rights Initiative. A non-profit watchdog group Wednesday filed complaints accusing 103 real estate agents, brokerage firms and property owners across the state of discriminating against Section 8 voucher holders. Thirteen of the defendants named in the 52 complaints filed with the New York State Division of Human Rights are located in Buffalo.  Some of the Buffalo defendants, contacted by Investigative Post for comment, are calling foul on the accusations. Housing Rights Initiative — an organization that aims[...]

Posted 2 months ago

May 8

2025

City Hall discusses ‘public-private partnership’ for culturals

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Kleinhans Music Hall. Photo by J. Dale Shoemaker. Acting Mayor Chris Scanlon’s administration wants to set the record straight: Under no circumstances will the City of Buffalo sell the buildings used by its cultural institutions. “There was never the word ‘sale’ mentioned out of the mayor’s mouth, or anyone in this building’s mouth,” Deputy Mayor Brian Gould said in a recent interview with Investigative Post. “We’ve never said the word ‘privatization.’ We’ve never said the word ‘sale.’” Indeed, it wouldn’t even be possible for the city to sell Kleinhans Music Hall, for example — the deed forbids it. But questions[...]

Posted 2 months ago

May 7

2025

Buffalo’s streetlight maintenance “haphazard”

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The streets of Buffalo are illuminated by more than 30,000 streetlights, the majority of them installed decades ago, according to the engineer who once oversaw the entire system.  And every year the city’s 311 citizen complaint line receives hundreds of reports of damaged or missing streetlights, according to city data.  And yet the city’s Department of Public Works can produce no records of the city inspecting, maintaining or replacing any streetlights in the past seven-and-a-half years. That’s according to DPW Commissioner Nate Marton, to whom  Investigative Post in February directed a Freedom of Information request, seeking all documents tracking the[...]

Posted 2 months ago

May 6

2025

ICE detainee in legal limbo

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Saul Valverde-Venegas and his wife, Paula Diaz, on the Maid of the Mist tour in Niagara Falls. Photo provided. Saul Valverde-Venegas, the Buffalo man arrested two weeks ago by federal immigration officers, is stuck — legally and literally. “I’m trying to have a strong mindset,” he told Investigative Post in a phone interview from the Buffalo Federal Detention Center in Batavia, where he’s been held since his April 23 arrest on the city’s West Side. He said the arrest caught him by surprise. “We went out to go to work and they just caught us,” he said. “Of course I[...]

Posted 2 months ago

May 3

2025

Scanlon considers “privatization” of Kleinhans

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The Scanlon administration has been talking about unloading city-owned cultural institutions as part of its efforts to shore up Buffalo’s short- and long-term finances. Since taking office, Acting Mayor Christopher Scanlon and his aides have discussed selling Kleinhans Music Hall, perhaps to the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, which is the venue’s principal user. They also have discussed shifting the maintenance costs of city-owned cultural venues — including Kleinhans, Shea’s Buffalo Theater, Sahlen Field, the Buffalo History Museum, the Buffalo Museum of Science and the Buffalo Zoo — to Erie County.  Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz threw cold water on that idea,[...]

Posted 2 months ago

Apr 30

2025

ICE seeks to deport Buffalo man over traffic tickets

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Immigration and Customs Enforcement is seeking to deport a Buffalo man whose only offense appears to be traffic citations. And in a second case, ICE appears to be attempting to deport someone arrested for a crime they committed prior to entering the United States. ICE officers last week arrested West Side resident Saul Valverde-Venegas, a roofing contractor, while he was loading a work truck. For days, ICE refused to explain why. In a statement Monday evening, an ICE spokesperson described him as “unlawfully” entering the United States more than a decade ago and said he had “since acquired several vehicle[...]

Posted 2 months ago

Apr 29

2025

Neighbors say site of Allentown murders was ‘unsafe’

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Neighbors of Mickey Harmon and Jordan Celotto — the Allentown couple murdered in their home on March 4 — say the tragedy might have been averted if the building they lived in had been better maintained and secured. The couple’s landlord disputes that notion. Harmon and Celotto moved into the lower apartment at 5 St. Louis Place last September. Their upstairs neighbor, Jordan Bidwell, who lived in the property since 2021, was not was not home during the break-in, but she claimed the basement window that accused murderer Bryan Chiclana used to access the house was boarded up with a[...]

Posted 2 months ago
Investigative Post