Tag: City Hall

Oct 22

2024

City loan has not stabilized Braymiller Market

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Story updated 10:34 a.m. Oct. 24. A year after the City of Buffalo threw Braymiller Market a half-million dollar lifeline, the downtown grocery store continues to struggle financially. For a third year in a row, records show that owner Stuart Green is months behind on his city tax payments.  That failure to pay $8,119 in taxes, half the annual bill, prompted the Erie County Industrial Development Agency to warn him Sept. 10 and again last week that the property tax abatement it granted him in 2019 could be revoked. On Wednesday, IDA leaders said they were prepared to begin the[...]

Posted 5 months ago

Oct 15

2024

Brown resigns: Addition by subtraction

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I wrote a column in December 2022 that posed the question: Is Byron Brown the worst mayor in America? It was prompted by his mishandling of the Christmas blizzard that year. But, as I noted then, it was but the latest example of his ineptitude. Things have only gotten worse since, in particular city finances. Brown, with the cooperation of an ever-compliant Common Council, first burned through $109 million in reserves the mayor inherited from the city’s state-imposed financial control board. Of late, he has used $150 million — and counting — in federal pandemic aid to cover city operating[...]

Posted 5 months ago

Sep 30

2024

Brown announces he’s leaving City Hall

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Mayor Byron Brown at Monday’s press conference. Photo by Garrett Looker. With Byron Brown officially announcing he’s leaving City Hall within the next few weeks, additional information is starting to emerge about his new job. To begin with, a $295,000 salary as president and CEO of the Western Region Off-Track Betting is only part of Brown’s compensation package. He’ll also be getting an $800 monthly car allowance to use as he pleases, according to two sources familiar with Brown’s contract. That’s enough to rent a high-end car. Or, since Brown’s had a driver during his almost 19 years as mayor,[...]

Posted 5 months ago

Sep 23

2024

City must pay $310,000 to former employee

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The City of Buffalo’s law department last week asked the Common Council to approve a $310,000 settlement to a lawsuit filed by James Kaufmann, who worked 23 years for the police department’s information technology unit before the city eliminated his position 14 years ago. The elimination of his job was retaliation, Kaufmann claimed in his lawsuit. And the city violated state civil service law by not hiring him for another, similar post in the years that followed. According to the lawsuit, city officials said they’d “get even” with Kaufmann for testifying in a 2005 arbitration hearing that led to the[...]

Posted 6 months ago

Sep 12

2024

And the next mayor of Buffalo is …

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Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown hasn’t yet accepted his job offer from Western Regional Off-Track Betting Corp.  He hasn’t submitted a letter of resignation from office. I asked the city clerk on Tuesday, just to be sure. But smart money says he’ll have vacated the second floor of City Hall before Halloween, leaving Common Council President Chris Scanlon as acting mayor. As acting mayor, Scanlon will be a quasi-incumbent when voters choose a new mayor next year. That may not be much of an advantage, given the city’s financial issues, and there will be many candidates vying for many different voting[...]

Posted 6 months ago

Sep 9

2024

Buffalo fails to collect $2.3 million in ambulance fees

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The company that provides ambulance service to the City of Buffalo hasn’t paid an annual franchise fee to the city since its contract expired in 2020. That lapse has cost the cash-strapped city nearly $2.3 million in revenue, according to city budget documents and Fillmore District Council Member Mitch Nowakowski, chair of the Common Council’s Finance Committee. Nowakowski blames the company for not paying and Mayor Byron Brown’s administration for failing to collect the money and negotiate a new contract. “They are operating in our city without a contract and for free,” Nowakowski told Investigative Post. “This a failure within[...]

Posted 6 months ago

Sep 5

2024

Byron Brown is leaving City Hall. What happens now?

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Mayor in waiting: Common Council President Chris Scanlon. Photo by Garrett Looker. Byron Brown soon will step down as mayor of Buffalo after 18 years and eight months in the office.  The five-term mayor has been offered the job as president and CEO of Western Regional Off Track Betting Corp., a possibility Investigative Post first reported in February. He is expected to accept the position, pending completion of negotiations for an employment contract and obtaining a license from the state Gaming Commission. The precise date of his exit from City Hall is uncertain; later this month or October is most[...]

Posted 6 months ago

Sep 5

2024

Buffalo City Hall vandal explains himself

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Today, we’re sharing a portion of  political reporter Geoff Kelly’s weekly newsletter, PoliticalPost. To receive his free report in your inbox every Wednesday, sign up in the subscription box at the end of this article. The man arrested Sunday for breaking windows at City Hall and making threats against Mayor Byron Brown is the uncle of a woman who was killed when she fell out of a moving car on the Kensington Expressway in February. On Facebook Antonio Nunes, 40, posted links to stories about his arrest and described his actions as “a warning.” His family, he wrote, was “being disrespected by nobody being[...]

Posted 6 months ago
Investigative Post