Categories for News

Dec 10

2014

Termini questions Outer Harbor housing

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Rocco Termini, one of the city’s preeminent residential developers, doubts there’s a significant market for housing at the Outer Harbor. “Everyone is talking about it but no one has produced a market study or any numbers,” Termini said Wednesday at a luncheon sponsored by Investigative Post on urban development. The Erie Canal Harbor Development Corp. has proposed building some 2,100 housing units, as well as retail, restaurants and some parkland, on a portion of the Outer Harbor’s northern 171 acres. That plan has proved controversial, with Rep. Brian Higgins and Assembly Member Sean Ryan, among others, contending it lacks public support.[...]

Posted 11 years ago

Nov 26

2014

Troubled families, troubled services?

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Seven social workers on the front lines of dealing with troubled families have taken the unusual step of accusing their employer of cheating both taxpayers and the families they are tasked with helping. The social workers – who are employed by the Buffalo Urban League – sent a letter to the Erie County Comptroller’s office Nov. 14 expressing “extreme concern” that their organization was failing to live up to the standards agreed upon in its county contract. Their letter outlines a number of problems, including short staffing, inflated billing and a failure to store client information securely or train staff[...]

Posted 11 years ago

Oct 15

2014

Ogilvie: School reform will take 10 years

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It will take up to 10 years to turn around Buffalo’s public schools, School Superintendent Donald Ogilvie told an audience of around 70 at a luncheon Wednesday hosted by Investigative Post. And that turnaround will only happen if best teaching practices, currently stymied by outdated union work rules, are put in place, two other speakers added. Ogilvie detailed the problems he’s encountered in Buffalo schools since starting as interim superintendent in July and told the sold-out luncheon at Osteria 166 that they will take seven to 10 years to resolve. It’s essential, he said, that the Board of Education avoid[...]

Posted 11 years ago

Jul 28

2014

City Hall ignoring Scajaquada Creek eyesore

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    Despite two weeks of reporting on the badly polluted Scajaquada Creek, the administration of Mayor Byron Brown has yet to clean up the mess near Hoyt Lake, the spot where  five ducks died this past Monday. Reporter Dan Telvock took this photo Saturday. David Comerford, general manager of the Buffalo Sewer Authority,  told Investigative Post last week that it is the responsibility of the Public Works Department to clean up this section of the creek, a hot spot for avian botulism. Apparently Public Works Commissioner Steve Stepniak didn’t get the memo.

Posted 11 years ago

Jul 28

2014

Cheektowaga pols won’t discuss Scajaquada

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Cheektowaga is responsible for dumping more than 300 million gallons of untreated sewage and stormwater runoff in the Scajaquada Creek every year. The state Department of Environmental Conservation ordered town officials to develop a plan to address the problem six years ago, but Cheektowaga has yet to devise an acceptable plan. Against that backdrop, Dan Telvock went to Town Supervisor Mary Holtz seeking an explanation. She has failed to respond to a dozen phone calls and emails and town Council members are no more eager to talk. Here is his complete report, which aired Friday on WGRZ.  

Posted 11 years ago

Jul 10

2014

Pulitzer Prize winner elected iPost president

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David Cay Johnston, a Pulitzer Prize winner and best-selling author, has been elected president of Investigative Post’s board of directors. Johnston was one of three new members appointed to the board of the investigative reporting center that serves Buffalo and Western New York. Also appointed were Eric Walker, co-founder of PUSH Buffalo, and Whitney Crispell, manager of an AmeriCorps VISTA program at The Service Collaborative of Western New York. Johnston succeeds board president Lee Coppola, a former investigative reporter and retired dean of the School of Journalism at St. Bonaventure University. Coppola has accepted an appointment as a hearing officer with[...]

Posted 11 years ago

Jun 25

2014

Western Lake Erie’s algae blooms not going away

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The harmful algae blooms in western Lake Erie may be a problem over the next century. In fact, some parts of the western basin could see huge increases of blooms. A story from the Columbus Dispatch in Ohio.

Posted 11 years ago
Investigative Post