Articles for Geoff Kelly

Sep 14

2023

City Hall clerk paid not to work

In February 2016, the City of Buffalo accused a clerk in the fire department of tampering with the payroll in order to pad her checks. Since then the former Jill Parisi — now appearing on city payroll records under her maiden name, Jill Repman — has collected well over a half million dollars while on paid administrative leave, awaiting a resolution to the disciplinary charges against her. For six of those seven-and-a-half years, she has held a second job in the private sector, managing payroll for a local healthcare company. According to the city’s law department, there was never any[...]

Posted 2 years ago

Sep 7

2023

What’s news in government and politics

A digest of noteworthy reporting — some local, some state and some national — from the last week in government and politics: Campaign finance shenanigans New York Focus reports on a new dodge for candidates who feel constrained by the state’s limits on campaign donations: Accept services from political consultants as loans, then never pay them back. New York Focus highlights an example from Rochester, but Byron Brown’s 2021 mayoral campaign pulled the same trick. Brown for Buffalo listed more than $38,000 owed to the Atlanta law firm that represented the campaign in court as an “outstanding loan or[...]

Posted 2 years ago

Sep 6

2023

Political domino theories

This past summer, speculation has run amok regarding exit strategies for longtime elected officials: Will SUNY Buffalo State hire Mayor Byron Brown, or perhaps Congressman Brian Higgins, as its next president? How about Erie Community College? That financially beleaguered institution, too, is seeking new leadership, having run through three presidents — one of them carrying the prefix “interim” for two years — since former Congressman Jack Quinn left the post in 2017. Or perhaps Higgins, who began his 10th term in January, will land instead as the head of Shea’s Performing Arts Center, which lost its president last fall, amid[...]

Posted 2 years ago

Sep 4

2023

OTB chief snubs Erie County comptroller

Last week, the president and CEO of Western Regional Off-Track Betting instructed three of his top executives to ignore inquiries from the Erie County comptroller. Erie County is one of the 17 municipalities that own OTB, an agency beset by allegations that it has misused public money. Since last summer, Erie County Comptroller Kevin Hardwick has made numerous inquiries into the agency’s financial practices, including its provision of expensive health-care coverage to board members, its practice of doling out tickets to sporting events and concerts to friends and family, and the particulars of the development of a new hotel at[...]

Posted 2 years ago

Aug 30

2023

Contracts for OTB executives a first

Six days before being ousted this spring by the state legislature, Western Regional Off-Track Betting’s board of directors voted to give multi-year contracts to 18 of the agency’s top executives. News outlets, including Investigative Post, first reported that the contracts for CEO Henry Wojtaszek and his lieutenants were “extensions” of existing agreements. But they were not extensions, according to OTB’s response to a Freedom of Information request filed by Investigative Post in July, seeking copies of the executives’ previous contracts. OTB said it had no previous contracts to provide. And a former OTB chief operating officer — who is suing[...]

Posted 2 years ago

Aug 14

2023

City authority hires Mayor Brown’s son

The Buffalo Sewer Authority hired a new press information officer in April, but neither the agency nor the mayor’s office will talk to reporters about who he is or how much he’s paid. But payroll records and authority meeting minutes tell the story: It’s Mayor Byron Brown’s son. The minutes of the May meeting of authority’s board directors indicate Byron Brown II was hired in April at an annual salary of $62,665. His home address is listed as 14 Blaine, which is the mayor’s house. The authority’s payroll records show Brown II earning $2,161 as his biweekly base pay when[...]

Posted 2 years ago

Aug 8

2023

Transparency, Roswell Park style

Last week, the new chair of Roswell Park Cancer Institute’s board of directors pledged the state-funded center to “an unprecedented … level of transparency and accountability,” after the board voted to make public a critical report it has kept secret for over a year. And yet the board took the vote in executive session — a proceeding closed to the public. When asked why discussion of the matter and the vote were hidden from public view, Leecia Eve, the new board chair, told The Buffalo News, “No particular reason.” That’s what continues to pass for “transparency” at Roswell Park. Even[...]

Posted 2 years ago

Jul 31

2023

City earning millions on unspent federal relief funds

Mayor Byron Brown’s slow rollout of federal Covid relief funds has infuriated social welfare organizations and Common Council members, who have been waiting two years for the money to start flowing into the community. But the delay has a silver lining, if only for the mayor’s bean-counters: millions of dollars in unexpected interest income. For the budget year that ended June 30, the Brown administration had forecast $100,000 in interest income. The city’s actual interest earnings, as of July 1: $13.8 million. Delano Dowell, the city’s finance commissioner, confirmed that the windfall is primarily the result of more than $215[...]

Posted 2 years ago