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Jan 13

2025

What is The Buffalo News thinking?

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The vacant Buffalo News building, sold to developer Douglas Jemal. Lee Enterprises bought The Buffalo News nearly five years ago and has vandalized it since. That was never more evident than last week. Let’s start with the extensive use of New York Times obituaries. It’s a pet peeve of mine.  A week ago Sunday, the paper’s local section included no fewer than five such obits, totaling some two pages, almost as much space as as what was devoted to local news in the section.  As is usually the case, the deceased had no connection to Buffalo. In fact, most were[...]

Posted 1 week ago

Jan 8

2025

Investigator should have never gotten the job

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Buffalo City Court building. Photo by Garrett Looker. A man who two years ago admitted to tampering with evidence and lying about it in court was, until last week, employed as a state human rights investigator in Buffalo. As of Friday morning, he was no longer employed by the Division of Human Rights, Investigative Post has learned. The individual, Eliezer Rosario II, was hired last July to investigate claims of discrimination in the agency’s local office. But, when Investigative Post inquired about his employment last week, a spokesperson for the agency said Rosario was “no longer an employee of the[...]

Posted 2 weeks ago

Jan 7

2025

Geoff Kelly named associate editor

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Geoff Kelly is the new associate editor at Investigative Post. Photo by I’Jaz Ja’ciel Geoff Kelly has been promoted to associate editor of Investigative Post. Kelly has covered government and politics since joining Investigative Post in April 2019.  “Geoff has an encyclopedic knowledge of government and the community at large,” said Jim Heaney, Investigative Post’s editor and executive director. “He’s also got a wealth of editing experience, which will suit him well as he steps into our No. 2 position.” He succeeds Susan Schulman, who shared management of the newsroom until her retirement last month. Heaney and Kelly will share[...]

Posted 2 weeks ago

Jan 6

2025

Awaiting an avalanche of activity

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The ICE detention center in Batavia could become a very busy place when Donald Trump acts on his campaign pledge to begin mass deportation of undocumented immigrants.  Dan Herbeck of The Buffalo News recently spent time at the facility and produced an inside look at life inside for its 530 detainees and what the future holds. The story notes that there are serious logistical and procedural issues that will likely preclude Trump from deporting immigrants en masse as quickly as he wants. Herbeck’s account includes statements from ICE officials about how well detainees are treated, a claim that’s been disputed[...]

Posted 2 weeks ago

Jan 3

2025

Bauerle story voted tops in 2024

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Readers have voted Geoff Kelly’s story on the legal battle involving the family of talk radio host Tom Bauerle as Investigative Post’s top story of 2014. The story, published on May 9, detailed claims by the siblings of the WBEN talk show host that he schemed to defraud them of their share of their late mother’s estate. Kelly wrote: The lawsuit, filed May 3, alleges that Bauerle moved in with his mother, Dorothy, during the last two months of her life. Dorothy Bauerle died March 6.  During that period, his siblings claim, Bauerle convinced their mother — “through duress, undue[...]

Posted 3 weeks ago

Jan 2

2025

Building off a strong year in 2024

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Investigative Post heads into the new year with a head of steam. Traffic to many news websites has flatlined or even dropped the past several years. That’s not the case with Investigative Post. Our pageviews in 2024 jumped by 62 percent and our traffic is more than double what it was in 2021. There’s a variety of reasons for our growth. We produced more content last year than ever, some 250 pieces for our website and another 50 we co-produced with our television partners. We also worked with AlignSimple and the Google News Initiative to develop and implement strategies to[...]

Posted 3 weeks ago

Jan 1

2025

Staying with the story

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When last we spoke in December 2023, I touted my reporting on Black homeownership rates as some of my best work of the year and promised some follow-ups to dive deeper into the issue. I’d like to think I delivered on that promise this year through some in-depth pieces I wrote on the region’s mortgage lenders. In March, I produced a two-part package exploring how banks and non-bank lenders in both Erie County and the City of Buffalo were approving mortgage loans. I scoured tens of thousands of records from Census and Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data to determine where[...]

Posted 3 weeks ago

Dec 31

2024

Dabney appointed to Buffalo Housing Court

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Buffalo Housing Court, Part 17 of Buffalo City Court. Photo by I’Jaz Ja’ciel After months of speculation, Buffalo City Court Judge Phillip Dabney Jr. has been named the city’s new Housing Court judge. Dabney, 55, was a fill-in judge for Housing Court several times this year and that experience  prepared him for being appointed to the position for the coming year, said Eighth Judicial Administrative Judge Kevin Carter. “I’ve heard that he’s been doing a really nice job. He seems to be serious about it. He also wants to do it, so that’s an important factor,” Carter told Investigative Post.[...]

Posted 3 weeks ago
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