Jul 19
2012
Who is stiffing Housing Court?
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 13 years ago
Jul 19
2012
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.
Jul 18
2012
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[...]
Jul 4
2012
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,[...]
Jun 24
2012
Erie County Democratic Party chairman discusses his plans, upcoming elections and how long it’s been since he and Gov. Andrew Cuomo have spoken.
Jun 13
2012
Investigative Post Editor Jim Heaney is interviewing Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz Wednesday for a segment that will air Sunday on WGRZ’s Daybreak. If you have a question you’d like Heaney to consider posing, e-mail him or post a comment below by 1:30 p.m. today.
May 17
2012
The New York Board of Elections has slapped a campaign committee controlled by Common Council Majority Leader Demone Smith with another fine for failing to file financial disclosure reports. The most recent fine of $1,121 is at least the seventh assessed against Smith campaign committees. The fines total $4,084 and the committees have yet to pay any of them, including one that dates to March 2008. Smith, in an interview Tuesday, said he is working with the Board of Elections in an effort to reduce the fines. “We’re trying to get them lowered,” he said. However, John Conklin, a spokesman[...]
Apr 11
2012
Common Council Majority Leader Demone A. Smith, whose wife pleaded guilty to fraud charges last week, has legal problems of his own. Smith’s campaign committee has not paid $1,842 in judgments filed by the state Board of Elections for its failure to file disclosure reports in a timely fashion. In addition, another campaign committee that lists Smith as its treasurer hasn’t paid $1,121 in judgments involving late and missing disclosure reports. Smith’s campaign committee has had problems meeting disclosure requirements since he first ran for public office in 2005. Investigative Post has determined that while the Committee to Elect Demone[...]
Mar 21
2012
By Luke Hammill The UB Foundation and other foundations and non-profits associated with SUNY schools operate in some ways similar to authorities in state government. In UB’s case, its foundation manages university real estate, grants scholarships and supplements the pay of hundreds of employees. But unlike state authorities, SUNY-related foundations operate behind closed doors. Their meetings are not open to the public and their records are not subject to disclosure under the state Freedom of Information Law. The opaqueness has come under criticism in the face of press reports that raised possible conflicts of interest by UB Foundation board members[...]