53 Search Results for recycling

Nov 1

2012

Recycling: City Hall’s bin is less than half full

Published by

Editor’s note: This is a three-part series. Today’s story examines the city’s recycling program. Friday’s report, which will also be the subject of coverage on WGRZ, looks at recycling efforts in the city’s public schools.  On Monday, we look at the wildly success recycling program in San Francisco. City Hall’s halfhearted efforts to increase its anemic recycling rate is plagued by a failure to enforce laws, educate the public or act on a host of recommendations, Investigative Post has found. The result: Buffalo’s recycling rate is less than half the national average, costing Buffalo taxpayers more than $1 million in[...]

Posted 12 years ago

Oct 12

2022

NFL stadiums go green. Will Buffalo’s?

Published by

When it rains in Seattle — which it does just about every other day — the water landing on the roof of Climate Pledge Arena is collected and used by Zambonis to make ice for the hockey team. That ice is actually smoother to skate on than municipal water used in most hockey rinks. In Atlanta, when Falcons fans buy beer or pop and recycle the can, Mercedes-Benz Stadium cashes in the aluminum and uses the money to build new houses through Habitat for Humanity. And in Minneapolis, waste generated during Vikings games is reused, recycled or composted — and[...]

Posted 2 years ago

Jun 25

2021

Rallying to save their patronage jobs

Published by

Wondering whether Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown is giving serious consideration to mounting a write-in campaign to keep his job in November? The answer might have been in plain sight Thursday night at Sahlen Field, where Brown threw out the first pitch before the Toronto Blue Jays went on to drop the Baltimore Orioles, 9-0. Outside the park, a crowd of Byron Brown supporters gathered in front of the main entrance to make a pitch of their own. They wore T-shirts bearing Brown’s name and carried signs reading “Keep Byron Brown.” This was no extemporaneous, grassroots expression of support for the[...]

Posted 3 years ago

Jan 17

2021

Niagara County keeps hiring disgraced GOPers

Published by

For the fourth time in 14 months, Niagara County has hired a politically connected Republican who had previously been accused of misconduct. The latest GOP loyalist to be added to the payroll is Robert W. Welch, who resigned last summer as director of constituent relations for Republican state Sen. Rob Ortt after he was accused of using a racial slur during an encounter with a group of teenagers near his home.  Welch, a North Tonawanda resident, has been hired as a contract administrator at an annual salary of $62,991. The job has been vacant for three years and was not[...]

Posted 3 years ago

Apr 21

2015

City Hall still ignoring Scajaquada Creek filth

Published by

Investigative Post reported four weeks ago that the Brown administration had fudged the city’s recycling rate by including, for the first time, clothing donated to outlets like Goodwill and the Salvation Army. Tuesday we reported another attempt by the mayor’s office to mislead the public, this time involving Scajaquada Creek. Environmental reporter Dan Telvock told WGRZ on Monday that the administration had failed to follow through on its pledge of last July to clean sewage and garbage from a badly polluted section of Scajaquada Creek in Delaware Park. Mike DeGeorge, the mayor’s spokesman, responded with a call to WGRZ after[...]

Posted 9 years ago

Jan 3

2015

Taking stock of 2014

Published by

Investigative Post is wrapping up a busy – and productive – year. Dan Telvock, Charlotte Keith and I produced some 90 original pieces of content in 2014, including investigations, follow-up stories, analyzes and blog posts. Many had impact, none more than Dan’s blockbuster story on the shameful condition of Scajaquada Creek and its stomach churning, heart-wrenching follow. We continued to grow our audience during 2014, thanks to our partnerships with WGRZ, Artvoice and City & State. We’re still reviewing our analytics, but it looks like our stories reached a collective audience of 7 million readers and viewers. That’s up from 6[...]

Posted 9 years ago

Aug 7

2014

DEC’s dustup with Battaglia Demolition

Published by

The decade-long conflict between Peabody Street residents and an adjacent construction and demolition recycling facility continues despite recent enforcement actions by state environmental regulators. The Department of Environmental Conservation on May 1 cited Battaglia Demolition, owned by Peter Battaglia, with five notice of violations. Two of the alleged violations deal with failing to control dust that the DEC say drifts off the property from his concrete crusher as well as from the 80 to 200 trucks that rumble down Peabody Street most days of the week to get to and from his facility, located a mile southeast of downtown in[...]

Posted 10 years ago

Jul 24

2014

State complicit in defiling of Scajaquada Creek

Published by

Way back in 1993 the state Department of Environmental Conversation told the City of Buffalo to dredge Scajaquada Creek to remove decaying human excrement and other sludge that was up to five feet deep in some places. The city refused — and the DEC did nothing. In 2008 the DEC used an enforcement order to force the Town of Cheektowaga to submit a plan to reduce sewer overflows into the creek. The DEC rejected that plan in 2010—and has done nothing since then to force the issue. In the interim, Cheektowaga has dumped more than one billion gallons of raw[...]

Posted 10 years ago