Categories for Produced for WGRZ

Apr 25

2024

Reading scores lag across WNY

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A  school bus waits outside Waterfront Elementary in Buffalo. Photo by Garrett Looker Editor’s note: This is the first of a two-part series. It’s not just Buffalo where students are struggling to read and write. Only 39 percent of third through fifth graders in Western New York’s 99 school districts scored at grade level on recent English Language Arts tests. What’s more, 31 percent of students lack even basic reading and writing skills. In some districts, including Buffalo and Niagara Falls, that figure approaches or exceeds 50 percent. The problems extend from the city to the countryside, urban neighborhoods to[...]

Posted 6 hours ago

Mar 14

2024

Mortgage lending lags to Black applicants in Buffalo

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This is the first of two stories on the impact of lending practices on homeownership by Black residents in Erie and Niagara counties. The second story, outlining possible solutions, is here. Black applicants are twice as likely to be denied a home mortgage as the overall population in Erie and Niagara counties, an Investigative Post analysis has found. What’s more, the region’s 18 percent rejection rate for Black applicants in 2022 was higher than in all but a handful of other major metro areas nationally.  The gap between the denial rate for Black applicants and the overall mortgage denial rate[...]

Posted 1 month ago

Nov 14

2023

Reading skills of Buffalo pupils rebounding, but still lag

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Reading test scores in Buffalo public schools dropped by nearly a third during the pandemic, with the youngest students being the hardest hit.  Two years later, there’s been significant, but not complete recovery. However, pupils who were in kindergarten and first grade when the district turned to virtual instruction are still struggling to make up for the learning that was lost, according to testing data. “It was catastrophic. It was horrible,” Nicole Herkey, a reading specialist at Southside Elementary, said of the pandemic’s effect on students’ reading ability.  “It was horrible on so many levels that people who were not[...]

Posted 5 months ago

Jul 26

2023

Our library system is hurting

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Nakia Luper, a mother of three, has watched as the Broadway-Fillmore neighborhood deteriorated around her. Stores closings. The Central Terminal crumbling.  And, in 2005, her neighborhood library shutting down.  “The kids used to go and have fun,” Luper said. There were “different activities going on at the library all the time. And then one day it was just gone.” The closest library is now three miles away. Luper said it’s not safe for children to walk that distance through blighted neighborhoods to take out a library book.  Nearly two decades after funding for the Buffalo and Erie County Public Library[...]

Posted 9 months ago

Jan 27

2023

Cops suing department speak out

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In November, two Black Buffalo police officers and a mental health clinician sued the department and their commanding officer for creating a “hostile” and “discriminatory” work environment. Now the police department is insisting the officers return to work, while the captain they accused of unleashing a racist rant in the workplace is being paid to stay at home. The two officers — six-year veteran Katelynn Bolden and 15-year veteran Brandon Hawkins —  told Investigative Post in an exclusive interview that they’re not ready to come back.  They want assurances the department will protect them and create “a safe space” for other[...]

Posted 1 year ago

Jan 11

2023

Tesla’s solar factory in Buffalo fizzles

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When Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced plans in 2013 for what is now Tesla’s factory in South Buffalo, he pitched it as a cornerstone of the “clean energy revolution” and a new high-tech industrial sector for Western New York. The project would create not only more than 1,400 direct jobs, but spin-off development that would provide a supply chain employing thousands of additional workers. Cuomo proclaimed the project a “game-changer.” Fast-forward to today. Less than one-quarter of the workforce at the Tesla factory is engaged in solar-related manufacturing. That work was suspended altogether for at least six months last year.  Podcast:[...]

Posted 1 year ago

Dec 14

2022

City Hall and the House from Hell

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The boarded-up house on Arkansas Street stands as a testament to City Hall’s ineptitude in dealing with urban blight. Not one, but two people — suspected drug users — have died inside the abandoned house since Sept. 26. That followed years of housing code violations and frequent complaints from neighbors about drug use and other quality of life issues. A maintenance man alerted police when the first man overdosed, but officers didn’t go inside to check on him, according to neighbors and police reports. That didn’t happen until eight days later, when neighbors called police again because of the stench[...]

Posted 1 year ago

Jul 14

2021

Tax breaks approved for Falls project

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Economic development officials in Niagara County have approved nearly $500,000 in tax breaks for a Buffalo developer seeking a total of $2.6 million in public subsidies to open a small event center and a brewery and restaurant in a “highly distressed” area of Niagara Falls.  The Niagara County Industrial Development Agency’s board of directors voted Wednesday to authorize $457,000 in property, sales and mortgage tax abatements to support T.M. Montante’s $3.3 million redevelopment plans on Third Street in the Falls. The company has committed to creating 14 full-time jobs, mostly for bartenders, waitresses and cooks. With incentives totaling $2.6 million,[...]

Posted 3 years ago
Investigative Post

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