Categories for News

Mar 15

2023

Commitment to diversity on stadium project

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State and local officials on Wednesday pledged that construction of the new Buffalo Bills stadium will include opportunities for local businesses owned by women and people of color — and that they’re working with local unions to diversify their ranks ahead of the groundbreaking. Officials also said the new stadium in Orchard Park will include additional bus service for Bills fans who can’t or don’t want to drive to games. Those commitments came as the Erie County Stadium Corp. — a subsidiary of the state Empire State Development Corp. — met to approve a framework for the $1.4 billion stadium[...]

Posted 2 years ago

Mar 13

2023

Get a load of @ChrissyCaBoom’s tweets

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As a first-time candidate for elected office, one of Chrissy Casilio-Bluhm’s biggest challenges is introducing herself to voters. But it appears the Republican challenger to incumbent Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz doesn’t want voters to know her too well. In the days prior to and since winning the GOP endorsement on Feb. 25, Casilio-Bluhm scrubbed her Twitter account of posts and retweets that amplified conspiracy theories, including the belief that COVID was the creation of “ONE Globalist Party,” which “rigged an election” and “destroyed Trump” for “exposing the Swamp.” She also promulgated the conspiracy that the Buffalo Bills covered up[...]

Posted 2 years ago

Mar 6

2023

Bonuses for executives at embattled OTB

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Western Regional Off-Track Betting Corp. awarded $40,000 in bonuses to its top executives in January, even as federal and state investigators continued a probe into allegations of malfeasance at the public benefit corporation. At OTB’s January 19 board meeting, the 13 directors present voted unanimously to award a bonus of $12,000 to Henry Wojtaszek, president and chief executive officer. Including the bonus awarded by the board, Wojtaszek is making more than $200,000 in salary, plus benefits. The board also awarded bonuses of $6,000 each to Scott Kiedrowski and William White, both vice presidents, and $6,000 to Jacquelyne Leach, chief financial[...]

Posted 2 years ago

Mar 2

2023

No permits for work that might have sparked deadly fire

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The fire that killed a Buffalo firefighter Wednesday might have been sparked by crews working on the Main Street building without permits. A review of city records by Investigative Post found no active permits for work at 743 Main St., which was recently purchased by a company owned by former Congressman Chris Jacobs. Michael DeGeorge, spokesman for Mayor Byron Brown, confirmed that the city’s Department of Permits and Inspection Services had “no active or valid permits” on file. The most recent work permit the city issued for 743 Main Street was last April, for emergency repairs to the three-storey building’s[...]

Posted 2 years ago

Feb 27

2023

Yet another Roswell lawsuit alleging bias

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A former Roswell Park physician claims she was fired by the cancer treatment center for calling attention to practices that “put numerous patients in serious danger,” according to a lawsuit filed in federal court. Dr. Anne Grand’Maison’s federal whistleblower lawsuit alleges her warnings were dismissed and her work at Roswell undermined due to “a work environment which was hostile to female physicians in innumerable ways.”  Hers is one of more than a dozen lawsuits filed in the last eight years by Roswell doctors and other employees alleging workplace discrimination based on gender, race or disability. Grand’Maison’s lawsuit alleges: Pathology reports[...]

Posted 2 years ago

Feb 22

2023

Ryan wants Tesla firings investigated

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State Senator Sean Ryan has called on New York’s economic development agency to investigate Tesla’s firing of more than 40 employees last week in the wake of a union organizing drive at its South Buffalo plant. In a related development, attorneys for Tesla Workers United amended one of its  complaint against the company with the National Labor Relations Board. The union charges that at least 25 of those fired last week were in retaliation for the organizing effort. Ryan, in a letter to Empire State Development President and CEO Hope Knight and Fort Schuyler Management Corp. Vice Chair Kristin Pound,[...]

Posted 2 years ago

Feb 17

2023

Workers dispute Tesla’s version of firings

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Tesla has denied it fired dozens of workers in retaliation for joining a union organizing effort at its plant in South Buffalo. Rather, the dismissals were based on poor job performance reviews, and the timing of the firings was coincidental, the company said in a statement Thursday. But several employees and a former manager challenged Tesla’s representation of the dismissals in interviews with Investigative Post. They noted that the number of employees fired for poor performance — more than 40 — is an unusually large number. They also noted that most of the firings were in Tesla’s Autopilot portion of[...]

Posted 2 years ago

Feb 14

2023

IDA subsidizing more market-rate housing

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Under normal circumstances, market-rate housing is supposed to conform to the forces of the free market: A developer buys a piece of land, builds housing, and sells or rents it for a price that recoups their costs and turns a profit. But in Niagara County, the Industrial Development Agency is poised to subsidize two market-rate apartment complexes — a total of 90 units — to the tune of $3.9 million. In one project, the proposed IDA subsidy would cover 22 percent of the building costs. That project would create zero jobs. In the other, the subsidies would cover 44 percent[...]

Posted 2 years ago
Investigative Post