Tag: City Hall

Aug 2

2012

City’s audit chief abruptly fired

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By Jim Heaney / Investigative Post Comptroller Mark Schroeder fired the city’s chief auditor this afternoon for undisclosed reasons and ordered him to leave City Hall immediately. Schroeder said he fired Darryl McPherson over an incident, rather than his work performance, but declined to go into details. McPherson, who served as chief auditor since 2007, has a history of drunk driving arrests, but Schroeder said the incident was not alcohol related. “This is a work-related issue,” Schroeder told Investigative Post, which broke the story along with WGRZ, 2 On Your Side. “There was an incident that took place. It wasn’t[...]

Posted 13 years ago

Jul 20

2012

DataBank: Housing Court fines by the numbers

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A look at the numbers behind Investigative Post’s explosive expose this week on the unwillingness of delinquent property owners to pay $22 million in Housing Court fines since 2006 and the failure of City Hall to collect those debts.            

Posted 14 years ago

Jul 19

2012

Who is stiffing Housing Court?

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Investigative Post identifies the biggest scofflaws who have failed to pay fines and why the court came down so heavy in the first place. Featured Thursday on WGRZ.

Posted 14 years ago

Jul 18

2012

City Hall forgoes millions in housing fines

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You can’t get away without paying your property taxes or garbage fee or even a parking ticket without City Hall coming after you. Letting your property go to seed is another matter. Judges in City Housing Court have imposed more than $22 million in fines since 2006 against some 1,470 property owners who ignored orders to repair building and health code violations. A vast majority have ignored the fines and gotten away with it, an Investigative Post inquiry has found. Less than $800,000 in fines have been paid during that period – less than a nickel on the dollar. It’s[...]

Posted 14 years ago

Jul 4

2012

Feds find aiding city is risky business

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Federal housing officials are tightening the screws on City Hall over its chronic mismanagement of anti-poverty funds. A series of critical reports and audits have documented problems dating back to the Griffin-era, but meaningful sanctions to this point have been few and far between. But the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development is now moving on three fronts to force compliance from City Hall in how it spends about $18 million a year – three-quarters of it block grant aid that is the primary pool of money used to combat poverty in one of the nation’s poorest cities. HUD,[...]

Posted 14 years ago

Jun 12

2012

Only in Buffalo

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A proposed bill by Common Council Majority Leader Demone Smith would prohibit employers from requiring job seekers to disclose any criminal convictions on their application. Buffalo would stand alone among cities, towns or villages statewide in limiting the ability of private employers to make the inquiry. Employers would, however, be able to obtain the information as the application process moves forward.

Posted 14 years ago

May 31

2012

The rap (sheet) on the Common Council

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Brian Davis’s plea to federal corruption charges Tuesday comes as no surprise. Neither does the Common Council’s appointment of a bartender to fill Mickey Kearn’s vacant seat. Such is the state of the Common Council. Jimmy Griffin used to call them the “Comical Council” back in the day and yes, they used to bicker a lot. But once upon a time, the Common Council had a core of stellar lawmakers—think Gene Fahey, Jim Pitts, and Dave Rutecki, among others, followed in later years by the likes of Brian Higgins and Kevin Helfer—who attempted to deal with serious issues and function[...]

Posted 14 years ago
Investigative Post