News

The new giant train station will likely cost more than $500,000 per year to operate. Amtrak will not pay for most of the cost - city taxpayers will. As the picture shows- the new station will be huge, but ridership will not necessarily increase since people do not choose to ride trains simply because you increase the size of your train station.

Looming Train Station Disaster Has Dyster Looking For Cover

Featured, News April 28, 2016 at 4:59 pm

Although the Dyster administration has had more than five years to come to an agreement with Amtrak and the Underground Railroad Interpretive Center for use of the new, $44 million train station on Whirlpool Street, market the facility to other prospective tenants and come up with a budget to run the place, it has done none of those things.

The present train station is small, but large enough to accommodate the average of 30 passengers who leave the falls every day. The good  news is that it costs taxpayers nothing to operate. The cost of running it is borne by Amtrak. That will soon change.

Dyster’s Train Station Ten Times Larger Than Needed, According To Amtrak

Featured, News April 28, 2016 at 4:58 pm

Niagara Falls Mayor Paul Dyster hasn’t said a word about the $44 million train station he built on Whirlpool Street in weeks, leaving public pronouncements about the project to his associate, City Planner Thomas DeSantis.

Kristen Grandinetti tried to pass a law that would put women like this one in jail for the crime she is committing: feeding stray cats. After an expose in the Reporter the proposed law unraveled as thousands of cat lovers complained.

Grandinetti Targeted By Cat Lovers Online For Proposed Anti-Cat Legislation

Featured, News April 28, 2016 at 4:55 pm

When the Niagara Falls Reporter broke the story of city Councilwoman Kristen Grandinetti’s draconian anti-cat legislation here a couple of weeks ago, we had no idea that she would become the target of harassment and threats from cat lovers across the country.

Reclaim Niagara Aims To Get Albany Out Of Our Pockets

Reclaim Niagara Aims To Get Albany Out Of Our Pockets

Featured, News April 28, 2016 at 4:54 pm

The ways in which the Niagara Frontier, and the city of Niagara Falls in particular, has been ripped off for decades by Albany has been a recurring theme for the Niagara Falls Reporter since the paper was founded 16 years ago.

Gov. Cuomo loves the little children. He wants them to have a bright future, which is why he’s spending $70 million on the state-owned waterfront while reneging on tens of millions in aid promised for downtown Niagara Falls.

Cuomo Lavishes $70 Million On Parkway, State Park  Little Benefit Seen For Local Economy, Quality Of Life

Featured, News April 28, 2016 at 4:53 pm

By the time the Niagara Falls State Park Landscape Improvements plan and south Robert Moses Parkway upgrade are finished sometime next year, Gov. Andrew Cuomo will have spent $70 million derived from Niagara Greenway, “Buffalo Billion” and “NY Works” economic development programs. That’s more than $140 for every man, woman and child living in the city of Niagara Falls.

DEC Launches Investigation Into  Illegal Dumping In Niagara Falls

DEC Launches Investigation Into Illegal Dumping In Niagara Falls

Featured, News April 28, 2016 at 4:52 pm

Since The Reporter broke a story about illegal dumping at a city-operated composting facility last week, the State’s Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) has launched an investigation into the illegal dumping. On the same day, last Thursday, Department of Public Works supervisors instructed employees to put sweeper dirt in dumpsters rather than atop mounds already at the composting site.

Officer Michael Stover (l) and Lt. Toby Trowbridge
...Lockport officers honored

Niagara County Judges and Police Conference Honors Law Enforcement Officers of the Year

Featured, News April 28, 2016 at 4:50 pm

The Judges and Police Executive Conference of Niagara County honored the group’s law enforcement officers of the year last Saturday night at Antonio’s Banquet and Conference Center in Niagara Falls.

Trane Seeks Lewiston Highway Superintendent Appointment, Will Run For Post

Featured, News April 28, 2016 at 4:49 pm

Dave Trane has announced he is seeking both the Lewiston Town Board’s appointment as town Highway Superintendent and will be running for the office in the November elections.   The position has been vacant since February with the death of Douglas Janese who was re-elected last November in a narrowRead More

Rotella Offers Experience and Balanced View on School Board

Rotella Offers Experience and Balanced View on School Board

News April 28, 2016 at 4:47 pm

As each academic year nears its end, the Board of Education and District staff celebrate the more than 100 business and not-for-profit partners, as well as parents, grandparents, and other volunteers, who take an active role in students’ education year after year.

Destino is a 2014 Leadership Niagara graduate and a recipient of the NYS School Board Association’s Life-time Achievement Award in recognition of the extensive time and effort he has spent as a school board member striving to expand his knowledge and skills for better board governance.

Better Cooperation Between City and School District Long Overdue

News April 28, 2016 at 4:46 pm

The most recent project I’ve been involved with was helping select a new operator for Sal Maglie Stadium. Needless to say, I think the City of Niagara Falls has hit a home run with the new group currently making major aesthetic improvements to the ball park – including plans to erect a new scoreboard and playing host to major youth baseball tournaments.

Herbert Spencer (1820-1903) said, “”Each has freedom to do all that he wills provided that he infringes not the equal freedom of any other.” Was he a liberal?

A Libertarian View: War of the Words

Featured, News April 28, 2016 at 4:41 pm

by Jim Ostrowski The older I get, the more I think that politics is a battle of the dictionaries.  Whoever has the best words, wins. The political movement I have been active in for 35 years is the contemporary revival of the movement that is responsible for most of whatRead More

Grandinetti’s Cat Plan Could Apply to Her

Grandinetti’s Cat Plan Could Apply to Her

Featured, News April 21, 2016 at 1:00 pm

In reading about Council member Kristen Grandinetti’s boneheaded idea about fining or jailing people who are taking humane steps to manage the area’s feral cat population, I couldn’t help but think that it’s too bad we can’t trap, spay and release Grandinetti somewhere other than Niagara Falls.

On Kristen’s airbnb listing she posts nine pictures of the room she rents in her house on Orchard Parkway. The reviews have been favorable. There about 300 other property owners in Niagara Falls who also list rooms or apartments for rent by the night to tourists. If Kristen rents her room out for 60 nights per year she earns about $3,000 which will make a small dent in the super high property taxes she [and everyone in Niagara Falls] has to pay.  In a free society, we are trying to find anything wrong with this free enterprise.

Crackdown on Renting Rooms Makes Little Sense in City where Money is Tight

Featured, News April 21, 2016 at 12:56 pm

Airbnb is a website for people to list, find, and rent lodging. Founded in August 2008 and headquartered in San Francisco, California, the company is privately owned, and in the business of matching vacationers and business travelers with locals who want to rent out a room, apartment or house.

Dynamic Dicienzo Sharp Contrast To Dull, Plodding Hamister Here. Choice Seems Obvious

Dynamic Dicienzo Sharp Contrast To Dull, Plodding Hamister Here. Choice Seems Obvious

Featured, News April 21, 2016 at 11:48 am

Last fall, the Niagara Falls City Council agreed to sell a landlocked half-acre city owned parcel to Sheraton at the Falls owner NFNY Hotel Management for $190,000. DiCienzo confirmed that the intentions are to add a water park to the hotel that has in recent years developed a T.G.I. Fridays, Rainforest Cafe, a candy store, and a Starbucks Cafe.

The valuable downtown parcel which was given to Hamister for $100,000 remains vacant. In recent years it was used as a parking lot.

Hamister Hotel Still Dormant if Not Dead

Featured, News April 21, 2016 at 11:40 am

Buffalo developer Mark Hamister was given “preferred developer” status on a valuable piece of property on Rainbow Boulevard just a few hundred yards from the state park entrance for two reasons.

The speed limit on Hyde Park Blvd has been reduced in front of Gaskill Prep (above) from 35 to 25 mph. Meantime the speed limit in front of nearby Hyde Park Elementary is still 35 mph.

DOT, City At Odds Over Speed Limit Schoolkids Remain At Risk

Featured, News April 21, 2016 at 11:30 am

While the Hyde Park Boulevard speed limit was lowered recently in front of Gaskill Prep, a middle school, from 35 mph to 25 mph, the speed limit past Hyde Park School, serving children Pre-K through 5th grade, remains at 35 mph.

Print Edition 4.21.16

Print Edition 4.21.16

News April 21, 2016 at 11:15 am
Print Edition – 4.14.16

Print Edition – 4.14.16

News April 14, 2016 at 9:51 pm
Caroline Wojtaszek has announced she will run for Niagara County DA.

Complaints against violent no surprise to lawyer representing Donatello

News March 24, 2016 at 12:47 am

It was in the Sept. 3, 2013 editions of the Niagara Falls Reporter that I broke the story that one of the top prosecutors in the Niagara County District Attorney’s Office was threatening to bring legal action against the county on her claims that she had been discriminated against inRead More

Dyster’s follies cost taxpayers, lead to absolutely nothing constructive

News, Niagara Falls March 9, 2016 at 11:14 pm

    For Niagara Falls Mayor Paul Dyster, it’s not about the destination but the journey. Which is why, since taking office in January 2008, the city has been subjected to numerous and lengthy forays into the unknowable unknown, for the most part without any measurable result aside from moneyRead More

.wpzoom (color:black;}