Categories for DailyPost

Jun 12

2024

A mixed bag on IDA reform in Albany

New York State Sen. Sean Ryan. The push to reform New York’s industrial development agencies gained significant momentum this year, but not enough to net a serious win for the coalition of labor unions, teachers and good government groups backing the effort. Smaller measures, however, did make it over the finish line, including one expanding representation on IDA boards and another increasing transparency over agency projects. “The momentum is building and we’re going to continue to build that momentum,” said state Sen. Sean Ryan of Buffalo. “But the community itself is building it.” IDAs, of which there are 107 across[...]

Posted 5 months ago

Jun 11

2024

Buffalo lawmakers’ side gigs

Published by Geoff Kelly

Buffalo Common Council Majority Leader Leah Halton-Pope, President Pro Tempore Bryan Bollman, and University District Council Member Rasheed Wyatt. Photo by Garrett Looker. The Buffalo Common Council’s majority leader, Leah Halton-Pope, was sworn into office — and onto the city’s payroll — on Jan. 1. But she was collecting more than a city paycheck during her first four months in office. Halton-Pope continued to work as a part-time policy consultant for Assembly Majority Leader Crystal Peoples-Stokes — the woman she has called her “forever boss” — until the end of April, making about $3,000 a month. And she continues to[...]

Posted 5 months ago

Jun 10

2024

Price gouging that makes Terry Pegula look good

Published by Jim Heaney

If you’re a regular reader of this column, you know I’m not a fan of the way Terry Pegula operates his sports teams. (Personal seat licenses, for staters.) But there is something to be said about how he prices Sabres tickets, although the size of our market probably has a lot more to do with it than his benevolence. The Arizona Coyotes of the National Hockey League are relocating to Salt Lake City for the coming season and the team last week announced its ticket prices. Let’s compare with Buffalo. Season tickets in the lower seating bowl for the Sabres [...]

Posted 5 months ago

Jun 7

2024

Buffalo-areas schools spending about $28,000 per student

Published by Investigative Post staff

Thirty-nine school budgets totaling $4 billion were recently approved in Erie and Niagara counties for the upcoming school year. The money will educate some 138,000 public school students in kindergarten through 12th grade. The individual budgets range from a low of $17.7 million in North Collins, the smallest school district, with just 564 students, to a high of almost $1 billion in the largest district, Buffalo public schools, with some 30,000 students. (Charter schools in the Buffalo area, with some 12,000 students, are not included in this analysis.) We looked at per pupil spending - total budget divided by enrollment.[...]

Posted 5 months ago

Jun 6

2024

Charters outperform urban public schools in reading

Published by Garrett Looker

The reading skills of young students who attend charter schools in and around Buffalo are slightly better than those attending urban public schools, an Investigative Post analysis has found. The results of 2023’s testing showed 30 percent of third through fifth grade students at the 19 charter schools tested in Erie and Niagara counties could read and write at or above grade level, according to the New York State Education Department. That compares with 25 percent of students in the same grades in Buffalo public schools. “There’s more we want to achieve for our kids, clearly,” said Fatimah Barker, executive[...]

Posted 5 months ago

Jun 5

2024

Erie County making headway on foster care

Published by Garrett Looker

Illustration by Christine Ongjoco. This story is being co-published with The Imprint, a national nonprofit news outlet covering child welfare and youth justice. Where Kin Come First: The Imprint’s first-ever analysis of how often New York counties place foster children with relatives found huge gaps across county lines. This story reveals how counties that prioritize kin are keeping children within family networks. Part two of a two-part series. Read part one here. In 2018, when her young nephew was found wandering outside alone, Krystal Henderson got a call from the Chemung County social services agency. Would she and her husband[...]

Posted 5 months ago

Jun 4

2024

Falling short on foster care

Published by Garrett Looker

Illustration by Christine Ongjoco. This story is being co-published with The Imprint, a national nonprofit news outlet covering child welfare and youth justice. Where Kin Come First: The Imprint’s analysis of New York child welfare agencies’ reliance on family and friends reveals where children end up depends a lot on geography. Part one of a two-part series. Six years ago, the federal government made a dramatic shift in the way it funds foster care. Instead of only paying states after they removed children from parents accused of abuse or neglect, local authorities could be reimbursed to avoid family separation through[...]

Posted 5 months ago

Jun 3

2024

Numbers dispute the claims of a WNY renaissance

Published by Jim Heaney

Some numbers caught my eye in the new edition of the WNY Economic News produced by economic professors at Canisius University. And I quote: National payroll employment has surpassed its pre-COVID peak by more than 7 million jobs while WNY employment is more than 12,000 below its pre-COVID peak. As they have been since the late 1980s, wages for workers in the Buffalo MSA [metropolitan statistical area] are lower than wages for workers in most industries in the United States. Thus, it should not be a surprise that the most recent data for the Buffalo MSA shows that the average wage[...]

Posted 5 months ago