Categories for News

May 14

2024

Secretive state board gives Amazon another break

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The 3 million-square-foot Amazon distribution center being built in Niagara County will not have to pay construction workers prevailing wages, a state board has ruled, despite the project receiving $137 million in tax breaks and subsidies.  State law says the developer must pay prevailing wages if a private construction project costs more than $5 million and subsidies account for at least 30 percent of costs. The wage rate is set by the state Department of Labor and influenced by union pay.  But the state Public Subsidy Board decided in March those rules won’t apply to the Amazon facility.  Why not?[...]

Posted 9 months ago

May 9

2024

Tom Bauerle’s family feud

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WBEN talk radio host Tom Bauerle’s siblings claim in a lawsuit that the right-wing pundit cheated them out of their share of their late mother’s nearly $1 million estate. 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 influence, fraud, and exploitation of [her] infirmity” — to make himself her principal beneficiary. They claim that prior to their brother’s “fraudulent and wrongful conduct,” their mother intended the three[...]

Posted 9 months ago

May 8

2024

Dismissed Buffalo cop had history of complaints

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A Buffalo cop fired for dousing a woman with pepper spray and falsifying reports to justify his actions was the subject of nine inquiries into allegations ranging from rudeness to excessive force. Seven investigations came during Kevin Murphy’s last two years of active duty. In addition, a city parking enforcement officer whom Murphy threatened and berated complained in 2022, while Murphy was on paid leave pending termination for pepper spraying Lekisha Neal and falsifying reports. Other complaints included an allegation that Murphy had beaten a teenager while arresting him on suspicion of robbery. The department could not determine the truth[...]

Posted 9 months ago

May 7

2024

Yup, there’s plenty of bed bugs at LBJ Apartments

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Sign in community room of LBJ Apartments warns of infestation. Photo by I’Jaz Ja’ciel. Days after Investigative Post revealed a bed bug infestation in the LBJ senior citizen apartments, the Buffalo Municipal Housing Authority arranged mandatory pest control inspections for each unit.  Twenty-six of the building’s 206 apartments, including some vacant units, were found to have bed bugs, according to BMHA Executive Director Gillian Brown.  He said bed bugs were also found in the community room, where Investigative Post on Monday saw each couch and chair had written signs posted to them advising residents not to sit on them, as[...]

Posted 9 months ago

May 2

2024

West Side property still the ‘House From Hell’

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149 Arkansas Street on Buffalo’s West Side. Photo by Garrett Looker. Almost two years after two dead bodies were found in a boarded-up West Side house, the property remains a nuisance that continues to attract squatters, drug users and prostitutes, neighbors told Investigative Post.  Complaints to the city, including to police, the Common Council and Housing Court seem to be falling on deaf ears, neighbors said this week.  “I’m losing my patience,” said Arkansas Street resident Wilmer Peralta. “It’s been two years. The house is still vacant. What are they doing?” The boarded-up house at 149 Arkansas St., owned by[...]

Posted 10 months ago

Apr 30

2024

IDAs have ‘perverse incentive’ to issue tax breaks

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The Erie County IDA earns a majority of its revenue from fees generated by approving subsidy deals. Photo by Garrett Looker. No wonder industrial development agencies across New York State dole out so many tax breaks, watchdog groups say: The more IDAs issue, the more money they make for themselves. That system creates a “perverse incentive,” the groups claim in a new report. “It just creates this horrible incentive where the IDA isn’t working for the public anymore, it’s working for its own self interest,” said Anya Gizis, a researcher at Good Jobs First and one of the report’s authors.[...]

Posted 10 months ago

Apr 25

2024

Feds revoke major permit for STAMP industrial park

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Three spills of drilling fluid into protected wetlands contributed to revocation of permit. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has dealt a major blow to the developers of a massive industrial park in rural Genesee County, notifying them this week that the agency would revoke a key permit needed to construct the park’s wastewater pipeline. That pipeline in recent months has emerged as one of the most controversial components of the 1,250-acre Science, Technology and Advanced Manufacturing Park — STAMP — one of the largest industrial parks under construction in New York. It’s so far generated two lawsuits and its[...]

Posted 10 months ago

Apr 23

2024

Bed bug infestation in Buffalo public housing

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Bed bugs are out of control at the Buffalo’s Municipal Housing Authority’s Lyndon B. Johnson Apartments, according to tenants who say the infestation is just one of many problems at the 10-story building at Main Street and Humboldt Parkway. “Everyone in this building has bed bugs,” said Erma Ecford, a tenant representative in the 206-unit building who has lived at LBJ the past 10 years.  Many tenants are struggling financially because of the cost of replacing furniture and buying pest control products, she said. The median income of tenants in the LBJ Apartments is $16,531, according to a demographics report[...]

Posted 10 months ago
Investigative Post