Categories for News

Jun 12

2024

A mixed bag on IDA reform in Albany

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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 8 months ago

May 30

2024

A different approach to revitalizing Buffalo’s East Side

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What do you like about your neighborhood, the interviewer asked. What are your concerns? How optimistic are you that things will get better? There was no right or wrong answer for the 567 residents who took the survey, but their responses will help determine which neighborhood serves as a pilot to help rebuild Buffalo’s East Side and elevate the city’s Black community. Henry Taylor, director of the University at Buffalo’s Center for Urban Studies, unveiled the framework last November in “How We Change the Black East Side: A Neighborhood Planning and Development Framework.”  The model poses a radical challenge to[...]

Posted 9 months ago

May 29

2024

Jail advisory board makes some progress

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Erie County Holding Center. Photo by Garrett Looker. The Erie County Corrections Specialist Advisory Board made incremental progress Tuesday, mustering a quorum, barely, after failing to draw enough members to conduct business at its three previous monthly meetings. Six members of the 11-seat board were present, exactly the number needed for a quorum. The board took two actions, approving minutes of past meetings that could not previously be voted on due to lack of members and setting a June 11 date for a special meeting to select a chair, a vice chair and a secretary, positions that have been vacant[...]

Posted 9 months ago

May 23

2024

Harris Beach, Hodgson Russ profiting off IDAs

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A meeting of the Erie County IDA board of directors. Photo by Garrett Looker. When New York’s industrial development agencies grant tax breaks, it’s not just local companies that benefit — two upstate law firms walk away with major paydays, too. Hodgson Russ and Harris Beach — based in Buffalo and the Rochester area, respectively — earn millions of dollars in fees each year, according to research from the watchdog groups Reinvent Albany and Good Jobs First. That report comes on the heels of state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli’s annual IDA report, also released Wednesday. The comptroller’s report showed that for[...]

Posted 9 months ago

May 21

2024

Censoring the news in New York prisons

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DOCCS banned entire issues of publications from New York magazine to Prison Legal News. | Maia Hibbett Editor’s note: This story is republished from New York Focus. Subscribe to their newsletter here. IN 2016, D’UONE MORRISON wanted to read about racial bias in New York’s prison system. Former Governor Andrew Cuomo had ordered an investigation into the topic, and Morrison, a Black man incarcerated in New York, asked a friend to mail him a news article about it. But the prison’s media review committee blocked the article, Morrison told New York Focus, citing its potential to disrupt order and threaten security.[...]

Posted 9 months ago

May 17

2024

Continuing need for mental health services

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Two years after the May 14 massacre at Tops Supermarket on Jefferson Avenue, counselors and other community advocates are calling for expanded mental health services on Buffalo’s East Side. What’s needed, they say, are more community centers serving as “safe spaces” where young people can go, as well as more mental health counseling and more funding for mental health services overall. The advocates and counselors are requesting funds be included in the 2024-25 city budget Mayor Byron Brown and the Common Council are currently working on. “Traditionally, there has always been a lack of any kind of service, and I’m[...]

Posted 9 months ago

May 16

2024

A lot of time (422 days) and money ($50,493.50)

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Photo illustration by Garrett Looker. Fifty-thousand, four-hundred ninety-three dollars. And fifty cents.  That’s how much a New York state agency paid an Albany law firm to review and redact records about the Tesla factory in South Buffalo before releasing them to Investigative Post. It took the agency 14 months to fulfill the Freedom of Information Law request. “I think it’s outrageous,” said Paul Wolf, president of the New York Coalition for Open Government. “It’s outrageous to spend $50,000 on an outside attorney to process one FOIL request. And this is for a project that has already received $959 million in[...]

Posted 9 months ago

May 15

2024

Who’s responsible for dysfunctional jail oversight board?

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Erie County Sheriff John Garcia. Photo by Garrett Looker. The Erie County Bar Association, the sheriff and the Legislature haven’t filled vacancies on a jail advisory board that hasn’t been able to conduct business for lack of a quorum. Meanwhile, prisoners are dying, prompting lawsuits and millions of dollars in settlements and verdicts. Tasked with overseeing the jail and recommending improvements, the Corrections Specialist Advisory Board hasn’t been able to review jail deaths, consider plans for a new jail or even approve a 2023 annual report that remains in draft form. The 11-seat board, which has three vacancies, is supposed[...]

Posted 9 months ago
Investigative Post