Tag: Mayor Byron Brown

Feb 8

2016

Mayor backtracks on lead pledge

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You don’t have to go as far as Flint, Michigan, to find a serious lead poisoning problem. There’s one right here in Buffalo, one that City Hall continues to downplay. New data obtained by Investigative Post shows there’s an increase, for the first time in four years, in the number of children in Erie County who tested positive for lead in their blood. In 2015, Erie County reported 295 children who tested positive for lead in their blood. That’s a 14 percent increase from the prior year. The real problem is in Buffalo, however, where 273 children – 93 percent[...]

Posted 9 years ago

Nov 12

2015

Greenleaf garners support despite complaints

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Greenleaf & Company has a history that includes numerous tenant complaints, prosecutions in Housing Court and unpaid bills and taxes. Yet officials have lined up in support of the firm’s proposal to build off-campus student housing adjacent to Buffalo State College. College officials acknowledge they did not perform a background check on the company before they started collaborating on the project. Mayor Byron Brown said Greenleaf’s difficulties should not disqualify the company from the project. Meanwhile, community members said Housing Court Judge Patrick Carney voiced support for the project at a community meeting this summer even though Greenleaf had pending cases[...]

Posted 9 years ago

Oct 5

2015

State says lower Riverbend goal being met

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The state released figures Monday related to the employment of minority construction workers at the SolarCity plant that they had previously refused to disclose. The release follows a report last week by Investigative Post that showed it was unclear whether the project’s diversity hiring goals were being met. Those figures show that minorities have done 16.2 percent of work on the site from the start of construction in May 2014 through July this year, based on the number of hours worked. Investigative Post had earlier reported that minorities made up 6 percent of the workforce from the start of construction through[...]

Posted 9 years ago

Jun 25

2015

Recycling coming to Buffalo’s waterfront

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In San Francisco, residents can recycle food waste. In fact, it’s mandated. In Seattle, residents can recycle cigarette butts. But in Buffalo, we can’t even get recycling bins downtown. Despite this, there is something good to report. Baby steps, folks. Canalside visitors will soon notice bins for recycling cans and bottles at the popular waterfront destination. Wednesday morning, the Coca-Cola Bottling Co. in the Town of Tonawanda provided the city with 50 recycling containers. This is a step in the right direction in the city’s effort to boost its dismal recycling rate, which is less than half the national average. But what[...]

Posted 10 years ago

Jun 24

2015

Demone Smith promoted despite violations

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Demone Smith’s long history of violating the state elections law hasn’t stopped Mayor Byron Brown from appointing him to a key position in his cabinet. Smith, majority leader of the Common Council and a political ally of the mayor, starts next week as executive director of the Buffalo Employment and Training Center. The center matches employers with city and county residents seeking jobs. Over the past decade, Smith has failed to file campaign disclosure reports on time 28 times. That’s prompted the state Board of Elections to impose seven penalties, five of which remain unpaid. Smith owes $3,382 in penalties.[...]

Posted 10 years ago

Apr 21

2015

City Hall still ignoring Scajaquada Creek filth

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Investigative Post reported four weeks ago that the Brown administration had fudged the city’s recycling rate by including, for the first time, clothing donated to outlets like Goodwill and the Salvation Army. Tuesday we reported another attempt by the mayor’s office to mislead the public, this time involving Scajaquada Creek. Environmental reporter Dan Telvock told WGRZ on Monday that the administration had failed to follow through on its pledge of last July to clean sewage and garbage from a badly polluted section of Scajaquada Creek in Delaware Park. Mike DeGeorge, the mayor’s spokesman, responded with a call to WGRZ after[...]

Posted 10 years ago

Mar 23

2015

City Hall inflating Buffalo’s recycling rate

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Mayor Byron Brown’s administration has found a new way to inflate the city’s recycling rate by counting clothing donations given to nonprofits such as Goodwill and the Salvation Army. By taking credit for clothing donations – some 4,800 tons last year – the Brown administration is expanding on a practice started in 2013 of counting materials the city does not collect and which state and federal authorities discourage localities from including when calculating recycling rates. Brown, by including these materials, has claimed an ever increasing recycling rate. But data obtained by Investigative Post shows the city’s curbside recycling rate has[...]

Posted 10 years ago

Mar 13

2015

Thwarting the public’s right to know

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Government reluctance to release public records is at an all-time high – particularly in New York State and the City of Buffalo – a panel of experts said Wednesday at a luncheon sponsored by Investigative Post. “It’s increasingly difficult to acquire records in a timely way,” said Robert Freeman, executive director of the New York State Committee on Open Government. Freeman said that while the Cuomo administration has made progress on open data and providing online access to some records, the length of time it takes state agencies to fulfill Freedom of Information requests “warrants criticism.” “Across all levels of[...]

Posted 10 years ago
Investigative Post