Tag: City Hall

Nov 5

2025

Ryan wins, Democrats sweep Cheektowaga

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Erie County Democrats had plenty to celebrate Tuesday night. It was no surprise that the party’s nominee for Buffalo mayor, Sean Ryan prevailed, beating two opponents with more than 70 percent of the vote. Nor was it a surprise that incumbent Erie County Comptroller Kevin Hardwick won reelection, beating Republican and Conservative nominee Christine Czarnik by nearly 18 percentage points. The real wins for Democrats were outside the city. Tonight: Our event on ICE and immigration in WNY In Cheektowaga, the party’s candidates swept every race, winning back the majority on the town council by unseating two Republican and Conservative[...]

Posted 3 weeks ago

Nov 4

2025

The intersection of neglect and indifference

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The intersection of Niagara and Jersey streets on Buffalo’s Lower West Side is riddled with trash, vacant lots, abandoned buildings and menacing squatters. It’s been going downhill for a decade or more. The only consistency has been the indifference of property owners and the inaction of city officials. Jersey Street resident David Eisenbart used to tend a community garden on a corner of the intersection, but he said that squatters in an abandoned cottage next door made the environment too dangerous. “Every once in a while I would go and mow, just because it got very bad, but the squatters were[...]

Posted 3 weeks ago

Oct 30

2025

Buffalo to raid “Rainy Day” fund

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The bad news keeps coming for the City of Buffalo’s finances. Comptroller Barbara Miller-Williams informed the Common Council this week that the city would need to dip into its Emergency Stabilization Fund — a.k.a. the Rainy Day Fund — in order to balance the books for the fiscal year that ended June 30.  According to the city’s finance commissioner, the shortfall is due to costly settlements to police misconduct lawsuits that hit the city in May.  Lawmakers were told the city will need to use at least $2 million from the fund and perhaps as much as $10 million, according[...]

Posted 4 weeks ago

Oct 14

2025

Michael Gainer: A political profile

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Michael Gainer moved to Buffalo 20 years ago, just as Byron Brown was campaigning for his first term as mayor — the office Gainer is seeking as an independent candidate in next month’s election.  An educator with construction experience, Gainer had picked up a job doing renovations on a house on Chapin Parkway. One day as he was working, listening to public radio, he heard Brown describe his plan to demolish 10,000 derelict houses over the next decade.  Gainer quickly did some math on a napkin. “It was like half a billion dollars,” he said. “We were going to spend[...]

Posted 1 month ago

Oct 7

2025

Pushing again for lead inspections in Buffalo

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From left: Matthew Parham, Daniel Corbitt, Sarah Wooton, Dawn Wells-Clyburn and Alex Fehrman Updated Monday at 4:49 p.m.  A group of tenants and community organizations on Tuesday appealed the dismissal of a lawsuit that sought more vigorous enforcement of a City of Buffalo program aimed at lead hazards in rental housing. The Partnership for the Public Good along with three other organizations and four tenants filed a lawsuit last July  in State Supreme Court against the city. The lawsuit alleged that the Department of Permits and Inspections was failing to provide a clean and healthful environment for its residents by[...]

Posted 2 months ago

Sep 30

2025

Buffalo’s Housing Court: Fewer fines, lax collections

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The City of Buffalo over the past six years has failed to collect $6.5 million in Housing Court fines that could help to address the city’s budget deficits.  Since January 2020, Housing Court judges have issued $7,024,200 in fines, according to data Investigative Post obtained from the New York State Office of Court Administration. The city has collected $481,500, or 8.5 percent of the fines issued. And between 2017 and 2019, the city failed to collect another $6.8 million in Housing Court fines, according to city records. That’s more than $13 million the city has left on the table over[...]

Posted 2 months ago

Sep 25

2025

Overtime straining Buffalo’s budget

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Two-and-a-half months into the city’s current fiscal year, overtime for Buffalo’s police and fire departments is on track to run $10 million over budget, threatening once again to push the city into deficit. That’s a smaller cost overrun than the city has seen in previous years, but nonetheless a problem for a city whose growing costs, stagnant revenues, and lack of reserve funds leave officials no room for error as they implement this year’s $622 million spending plan. Police and fire headquarters in downtown Buffalo. Photo by I’Jaz Ja’ciel. Fillmore District Council Member Mitch Nowakowski, who chairs the Council’s Finance[...]

Posted 2 months ago

Sep 16

2025

Shaky math involving Buffalo’s budget balancer

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The 52-year-old Charles R. Turner Ramp across from Buffalo City Hall. Photo by I’Jaz Ja’ciel. The City of Buffalo’s current budget and its four-year financial plan rely on $42 million from the anticipated sale of four downtown parking ramps to a newly formed public authority.  But how Acting Mayor Chris Scanlon’s administration came up with that number, and whether it accurately reflects the price the ramps will fetch, is a mystery. City officials have refused to share documents showing how they determined what the ramps are worth. The board treasurer of the organization that manages the ramps now — and[...]

Posted 2 months ago
Investigative Post