Categories for DailyPost

Dec 30

2025

Geoff Kelly’s year in review

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This year my plate was full with Buffalo politics, as city voters were asked to elect the city’s first new mayor in 20 years. I kicked off the year, fittingly, with a three-part profile of Acting Mayor Chris Scanlon, who was at the time competing for the Democratic Party endorsement in June’s primary election.  This month, to ring out the year, Jim Heaney and I interviewed the guy who won the endorsement, the primary and November’s general election — incoming Mayor Sean Ryan. We did the interview in front of an audience at the Burchfield Penney Art Center. I also[...]

Posted 2 months ago

Dec 29

2025

A revolution and civil war, all in one

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The Ken Burns documentary series on the American Revolution that recently aired on PBS is an unsanitized version that they didn’t teach us in school. The fight for independence was one part revolution, one part civil war, with brutalities on both sides. That was one takeaway. Others include: George Washington was not all that hot of a military strategist, but he was a great leader of men. He was the towering figure of the revolution after the  Declaration of Independence. Patriot soldiers won the war in part due to their sheer fortitude. The militias and Continental army were not to[...]

Posted 2 months ago

Dec 24

2025

Tenants again sue judge-turned-landlord

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  APL Property’s apartment building on Elmwood Avenue. Photo by I’Jaz Ja’ciel. A Buffalo couple is suing former county judge-turned-developer Anthony LoRusso for alleged rental fraud — the third lawsuit LoRusso and his real estate companies have faced this year. Two of those court actions originated with renters, the other with a contractor. All told, courts this year have levied more than $300,000 in judgments against LoRusso’s companies. The first suit was filed by LaBella Associates D.P.C., an environmental consulting firm, in March, followed by the attorney general’s in May.  In September, Sabrina and Antonéo Page filed a lawsuit against[...]

Posted 2 months ago

Dec 23

2025

Subsidies, nonprofits reduce Buffalo taxes by $20M

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The Delaware North building, recipient of major tax breaks. Photo by J. Dale Shoemaker. The City of Buffalo last fiscal year missed out on $20 million in revenue due to a variety of property tax exemptions and abatements, according to a recently released audit. That’s the biggest loss the city has recorded since it began tabulating the figure in 2017, city financial audits show. For a city facing a current-year deficit that could be as high as $54 million, the uncollected property tax is “obviously a concern,” said Benjamin Swanekamp, who will be Ryan’s deputy mayor overseeing tax and finance[...]

Posted 3 months ago

Dec 22

2025

The many costs of proposed data center

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There’s a lot to not like about data centers. They consume a lot of energy, and oftentimes water, and usually demand a lot of public subsidies. All to fuel the operations — and profits — of the likes of Amazon, Google, Apple and Meta. J. Dale Shoemaker reported last week about a new proposal to build a massive data center at the STAMP industrial park in Genesee County, located midway between Buffalo and Rochester. How massive?  There’s its physical size: 38 football fields. And its energy consumption: 500 megawatts. That’s enough electricity to power practically every residence in Erie County.[...]

Posted 3 months ago

Dec 19

2025

The case for public financing of nonprofit news media

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This story originally published Dec. 19. It has since been updated and now includes an interview conducted by BronxNet, a public access channel based in New York City, with Investigative Post Editor Jim Heaney. Last June, CNN broadcast a live performance of Good Night and Good Luck, the Broadway play about legendary journalist Edward R. Murrow, who called out and stared down the red-baiting Senator Joseph McCarthy. Following the broadcast, Anderson Cooper interviewed Scott Pelley, correspondent for 60 Minutes, who at one point declared: “You cannot have democracy without journalism.” There’s a lot less journalism being practiced these days and[...]

Posted 3 months ago

Dec 17

2025

STAMP data center could jack up power bills

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A national builder is once again proposing to construct a massive data center at Genesee County’s STAMP industrial park, one that would use so much electricity that it could drive up costs for residential and commercial consumers.  The data center’s power demands could also hamstring efforts to recruit other businesses to the industrial park, which has struggled to attract tenants despite a state investment of $100 million. A proposal filed with Genesee County officials on Friday from Stream Data Centers for a 2.2-million-square-foot facility states it would require some 500 megawatts of electricity — 83 percent of all power that[...]

Posted 3 months ago

Dec 16

2025

Transcript: Buffalo Mayor-elect Sean Ryan interview

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  Buffalo Mayor-elect Sean Ryan sat for an interview on Dec. 12 with Investigative Post’s Jim Heaney and Geoff Kelly before a live audience at the Burchfield Penney Art Center. In the course of the 85-minute interview, Ryan responded to questions about a host of issues:  Balancing the city’s finances in the short and long term. Shaking up the culture of the city’s police department. Investing in quality, affordable housing, especially in East Side neighborhoods. Revitalizing downtown through event programming and infrastructure improvements. Improving educational outcomes by lifting kids out of poverty. Taking a lead role in the Kensington and[...]

Posted 3 months ago
Investigative Post