Jim Heaney is editor and executive director of Investigative Post. He was an investigative reporter with The Buffalo News from 1986 to 2011 and a reporter and editor with The Orlando Sentinel from 1980-86. His coverage over the years has focused on economic development, local and state government, politics, education, housing and transportation, and he was an early practitioner of computer-assisted reporting. Heaney has won more than 20 journalism awards and was a finalist for the 1993 Pulitzer Prize for investigative reporting.
May 20
2016
Investigative Post Editor Jim Heaney and Susan Arbetter of The Capitol Pressroom discuss the latest developments involving the SolarCity project in Buffalo, including a reduction in planned factory jobs from 1,460 to 500. The interview, taped Thursday, runs from 22:30 to 37:19.
May 16
2016
SolarCity has some ‘splaining’ to do, to quote Ricky Ricardo. For starters, company executives – and state officials, for that matter – can ‘splain’ why the $750 million solar panel manufacturing plant taxpayers are building for them is going to employ only 500, not the 1,460 originally promised. This scaled-back commitment, reported Friday by Investigative Post and WGRZ, came as news to a lot of people. Mayor Byron Brown told Dave McKinley of WGRZ on Friday that the reduced goal was news to him. Assemblyman Sean Ryan went one better, telling the station’s Michael Wooten that SolarCity officials assured him[...]
May 10
2016
I’ll dispense with the MayDay! declarations of past and get to the latest double-barrel dose of bad news regarding SolarCity. The company released its first quarter earnings report Monday afternoon and it was drenched with more red ink than usual. SolarCity lost a record $283.1 million. That was double the $149.9 million it lost for the same period in 2015. The stock market reacted as you’d expect, with the trading price dropping by 21 percent from the close of trading Monday to Tuesday. SolarCity is now going for $17.54 a share, down from $57.26 as recently as mid-December. Yet another crisis in[...]
May 6
2016
There were two noteworthy developments Friday involving the mushrooming Buffalo Billion scandal. Gannett newspapers reported that Alphonso David, Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s legal counsel, has issued an edict that requires the bureaucracy headed by Alain Kaloyeros to run all decisions regarding the Buffalo Billion and nanotechnology projects in Albany past Bart Schwartz, who is heading the governor’s review of numerous state economic development programs. Meanwhile, the New York Daily News reported that longtime Cuomo associate Todd Howe has been fired from the law firm that employed him to, among other things, represent politically connected upstate developers. Howe is a focus of U.S. Attorney[...]
May 6
2016
The Capitol Pressroom broadcast interviews Thursday and Friday with Investigative Post Editor Jim Heaney. Topics of discussion included the Buffalo Billion scandal, the ramifications of this week’s School Board elections, and efforts by City Hall and Erie County officials to deal with Buffalo’s lead poisoning problem. The interview that aired Thursday starts at the top of the program and runs to 13:07. The Friday interview runs from 13:09 to 22:35.
May 2
2016
One Albany insider told The Buffalo News over the weekend that “everyone is literally flabbergasted” at the turn of events in the federal probe of what can safely be termed the “embattled” Buffalo Billion program. I suppose the spectacle of Cuomo insiders turning on each other as the governor scrambles into damage control mode is a bit jarring. But no one who has been paying attention to Cuomo’s governing style in general, and his administration’s management of the Buffalo Billion program in particular, should be the least bit surprised. In short, the Cuomo crowd is obsessed with secrecy and operates[...]
May 2
2016
Jim Heaney of Investigative Post discusses the latest developments in the federal probe into the Buffalo Billion program with Jay Moran of WBFO. Heaney said the expanding investigation is unlikely to derail construction of the SolarCity plant or any other projects. He also said the allegations of misconduct are not surprising, given what he said is the Cuomo administration’s culture of secrecy and ethos that “the rules don’t apply to us.”
Apr 29
2016
U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara’s investigation into the Buffalo Billion, triggered by Investigative Post’s relentless reporting, appears to have targeted members of Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s inner-circle. The feds issued subpoenas to the governor’s office Friday, and, in turn, the Cuomo administration announced its own investigation and issued a press release that appeared to throw one or more close associates under the bus. Folks, this could get real ugly real quick. Those under scrutiny include Joseph Percoco, a top Cuomo aid and political enforcer who recently left the administration; longtime associate and lobbyist Todd Howe; and Alain Kaloyeros, the so-called nanotech guru who the[...]