By Tony Farina “We need to educate voters and help them hold their city leaders accountable,” says Donta Myles who is seeking a second four-year term on the Niagara Falls City Council which in his view has become pretty much a rubber stamp in its current state to Mayor RobertRead More

The following was written by investigative journalist Ken Cosentino. MORE QUESTIONS THAN ANSWERS A new technology firm called “9 Lives Digital Group” appears to be busy at work in the old Globe Metallurgical factory, located at 3807 Highland Avenue. Locals are saying that they’ve seen bitcoin mining containers and heavyRead More

MICHAEL S. GAWEL, CPA, JD NIAGARA BOOKKEEPING & ACCOUNTING FILING STATUS Get ready for Taxes! It is January and Tax time is here. Niagara Bookkeeping & Accounting is open and ready to prepare your 2024 tax returns. New clients can call Michael at (716)-622-0700 for an appointment and existing clientsRead More

By Tony Farina The Niagara Falls City Council continues to squabble with Jim Perry winning a second consecutive term as chairman in a 3 – 2 vote at the annual reorganizational meeting while defeated challenger Donta Myles vowed to continue his fight for a return to “checks and balances” betweenRead More

The following was written by investigative journalist Ken Cosentino. Picking Up Where We Left Off: Another Round of Smokescreens Last Thursday the Niagara Falls City Council voted in approval of Mayor Restaino’s $9 million+ budget items during a special meeting. After city council originally tabled these items several weeks ago dueRead More

The following was written by investigative journalist Ken Cosentino. Last Wednesday’s Council Meeting In a surprising turn of events last Wednesday night, the majority of Niagara Falls City Council voted against several of the mayor’s budget line items. Local activists including City Councilman Donta Myles, Arlene Doss, Tanya Barone andRead More

Open Government Coalition Cites Perry for Bad Behavior By Tony Farina “All too often, government wants to conduct business behind closed doors, which is wrong, and despite New York’s Freedom of Information Law, that’s what happens all too often across the state,” says Paul Wolf, the president and founder ofRead More

The following was written by investigative journalist Ken Cosentino. MAYOR RESTAINO FIDDLES WHILE ROME IS BURNING As 2024 dwindles down we find ourselves staring into the abyss that is Niagara Falls politics. On a grand scale, I have hope that 2025 will rank better than all four years of JoeRead More

By Tony Farina Now that Mayor Robert Restaino has moved to have Niagara Falls go fully into the development of north Main St. and the Rapids Theater with the purchase of 38 Blue Cardinal properties and the theater, what’s next? No one really knows and it is unlikely Restaino knowsRead More

By Frank Parlato I saw Niagara Falls Mayor Robert Restaino in one of his out-of-control states. Restaino appeared at a fundraising event for Glenn Choolokian between when the New York State Commission on Judicial Conduct kicked Restaino off the bench in 2007 and when he was elected mayor in 2019.Read More

The following was written by investigative journalist Ken Cosentino. It’s been two years since the former director of the Niagara University’s Global Tourism Institute, Pat Whalen, warned us about the looming tax burden Mayor Restaino’s Centennial Park and event center will inevitably create for us. Despite these warnings, our mayorRead More

The following was written by investigative journalist Ken Cosentino. Rats! It’s like a scene from a horror movie, except it’s all too real for hundreds of residents living in the LaSalle area where giant hungry rats have invaded homes, cars and trash cans. In September, City of Niagara Falls MayorRead More

By Frank Parlato Escalating Costs of the Bills Stadium On November 15, 2024, the Buffalo Bills management confirmed the new Bills stadium will cost more than $2.1 billion, 50% higher than the original estimates in 2020 of $1.35 billion. The $560 million increase is primarily due to inflation, which hasRead More

By Tony Farina Even if you believe Mayor Robert Restaino’s heart is in the right place when it comes to rebuilding Niagara Falls, his vision on how to get it done is unfortunately an old, worn path that has not delivered in the past and is not likely to proveRead More

By Tony Farina New York State has a structural budget deficit with a three-year budget gap of $13.9 billion projected and it is expected to increase further as stop-gap tax measures phase out and public education and health care costs continue to grow. Many experts see the problem as stateRead More

The following was written by investigative journalist Ken Cosentino. The fight continues between (38 year) US Army veteran/community activist Arlene Doss and cowardly bully Mayor Robert Restaino over the Beech Avenue Project. Despite Arlene’s larger-than-life moral stature, it would be misleading to label this a “Battle of the Titans” dueRead More

By Tony Farina The real measure of the economic benefits that would accrue to the city of Niagara Falls across the board with the development of a nine-building, $1.5 billion South End digital campus as proposed by Niagara Falls Redevelopment is now becoming much clearer and even beyond the wildestRead More

By Jacob Tierney  The developer, which owns more than 140 acres in downtown Niagara Falls, plans to construct nine buildings – totaling 1.2 million square feet – over five phases on 53 acres of undeveloped or underdeveloped land between Falls Street and Rainbow Boulevard. “We’re talking right now about undevelopedRead More

The following was written by investigative journalist Ken Cosentino. The Amtrak Train Station located at 825 Depot Avenue is an early polling location for voters in and around Niagara Falls, NY. Early voting began on Saturday, October 26th and “since then, every single day, at least one, and sometimes severalRead More

This is Part Two of a series on the eminent domain fight between Mayor Restaino and NFR. Read the first article here. Niagara Falls’ mayor Robert Restaino is a lawyer and formerly a city court judge who famously was removed from the bench for an unfortunate episode where he lockedRead More