Looks like Mayor Byron Brown and Steve Pigeon are together again, again. Their on again, off again political relationship appeared to be down for the count just two months prior to the September 15 Democratic primary, in the fallout of the NYS Senate coup that stalled Albany this summer. At the time, the Buffalo News described Pigeon as “radioactive,” explaining why Brown’s campaign declined a June 25 fundraiser Pigeon was to host. The event might have raised $100,000 for the mayor’s campaign.

Now, Pigeon is on the State payroll for $150,000 as counsel to Pedro Espada (the off again, on again Democratic senator who left and rejoined the party along with Hiram Monserrate this summer), and he is also serving as Mayor Brown’s lawyer, according to this petition filed last Friday. Four people signed the affidavits reporting lines at polling places: Cindy Cooper, Omar Price, Mary Scarpine, and Cavette Chambers. Scarpine notarized Chambers’s affidavit, Chambers notarized Scarpine’s, Cooper’s, and Price’s. They all work for corporation counsel in city hall.

The petition is a follow-up to this order issued by judge John M. Curran late Tuesday night which sought to keep voters at certain polling places from being disenfranchised.

A new telephone poll commissioned by WGRZ TV has already been posted with a story in the online version of Buffalo Business First. This, the “final poll” commissioned by the TV station from Survey USA, puts Mayor Byron Brown ahead of challenger Mickey Kearns.

Survey USA also conducted a poll for WTVD-TV in Raleigh-Durham, NC last fall, for the Presidential election. There, three previous Survey USA polls had put McCain up by eight, five, and four points, while the fourth one put him up 20. Said McCain would get 58% of the vote, Obama 38%.

On election day, Obama won North Carolina and picked up 15 electoral votes.

So remember, polls are good space fillers for media outlets, but they aren’t always accurate, and they don’t even have to be, no offense to Survey USA.

People seem to love ‘em, though, so I figured I’d get a little mileage off this one, seeing as somebody else paid for it.

Here is mayor Byron Brown cutting a ribbon with Brian Davis on June 4, as covered by BuffaloRising.com.

But now with the election fast-approaching, he brought out the big scissors on Sunday for the opening of two-way traffic on the 700 block of Main Street, according to the Buffalo News.

Then, just this morning, he was at MLK park for another ribbon-cutting with Assemblywoman Crystal Peoples and Common Council member Demone Smith, according to this press release from the Buffalo Olmsted Parks Conservancy.

This makes two ribbons cut in 48 hours for Brown.

Can he keep up this break-neck pace until the Democratic primary on September 15? Everyone knows how dangerous it is to run with scissors.

Four items of interest:

—Byron Brown wins the endorsement of Goin’ South, the South Buffalo political organization stacked with city employees. No surprise there; there was no chance that Ray McGurn and Goin’ South would buck the mayor and his allies Brian Higgins, Mark Schroeder, and Tim Kennedy. Still, it’s a show of force for Brown.

—Mickey Kearns wins the endorsement of the Police Benevolent Association. No surprise there, either: What was Bob Meegan to do, spin around and embrace a mayor who keeps dragging the PBA to court and losing? (It’d be informative to get a breakdown of the City of Buffalo’s legal expenses fighting the PBA over the past three years, including time spent by the Corporation Counsel.) The PBA is Kearns’s first union endorsement, but how much good will it do him? There are 700-odd cops in the BPD, plus support staff, but lot of cops live and vote in the suburbs. Nonetheless, Kearns needed an endoresement like this and now he has it.

—Jim Heaney reported in Sunday’s Buffalo News that the FBI, US Attorney, Erie County DA, and New York State Police are all in some manner or another investigating Buffalo’s City Hall. Some are looking at Brian Davis’s finances, some at BERC and One Sunset, some at the city’s use of HUD money. Heaney did well to confirm these investigations are occurring; it’s hard to get beyond a no comment on these matters. His article also offers a review of the cavalcade of scandals rolling out of City Hall over the past few months.

—Most interesting to me, however, is this story by Susan Schulman, about a Cleveland developer whose East Side housing project was nixed after the Jeremiah Project, a group run by the influential Reverend Richard Stenhouse, failed to win a contract to oversee minority hiring on the project. (For the sake of argument, I’m leaving alone the merits of NRP’s project. In any case, Stenhouse’s objections seem thin, since the Jeremiah Project has been lead agency in similar low/mod rental housing development themselves.) Schulman is admirably careful about what she implies in her story, but it reads to me like a classic Buffalo shakedown: Stenhouse, in a position to stall a project, seeks a part of it. When he doesn’t get the contract, he helps to kill the project.

Why is this much more to me interesting than Heaney’s article? Because, whereas a local developer might take this setback stoically in hopes of working another day, a developer from Cleveland may not fear the consequences of speaking out. This is the sort of thing that raises eyebrows at the FBI.

What’s the message Buffalo Students First is sending to voters this weekend promoting the incumbent candidates, three days before the school board election? That depends on where you live in the city of Buffalo.

First, here’s a mailer sent by Buffalo Students First to voters in the 144th Assembly District, represented by Sam Hoyt. The message on the back begins: “The politicians and special interest groups want to take over control of our schools. We can’t allow that to happen…”

If that’s the case, what does one make of  this mailer sent by Buffalo Students First to city voters in the 141st Assembly District, represented by Crystal Peoples? Voters there, primarily African-American, received an open letter from Mayor Byron Brown, Assemblywoman Crystal Peoples, and State Senator Antoine Thompson, endorsing the incumbent slate of Florence Johnson, Catherine Collins, and Chris Jacobs.

Are Brown, Peoples, and Thompson not politicians? And is Buffalo Students First and/or the Buffalo Niagara Partnership  not a special interest group? News Flash: THE POLITICIANS AND SPECIAL INTERESTS CURRENTLY HAVE CONTROL OF OUR SCHOOLS. And it’s clear they will spend a great deal of money in the hope of keeping it that way.

The blatant hypocrisy displayed by Buffalo Students First in sponsoring these two divergent messages should be offensive to every voter in the city. But there’s plenty of shame to go around here. Why would Brown, Peoples, and Thompson lend their support to a slate of candidates in an election that is held in May for the express reason that it should not  be political?

And why would the Buffalo Niagara Partnership hide behind a phony name like Buffalo Students First, when it is clear that they are directly involved in the funding of this campaign that preaches two different messages to urban voters based largely on the color of their skin? The evidence of their involvement is here in this one-page financial disclosure form, signed by Glenn Aronow, Director of Government Relations for the Buffalo Niagara Partnership.

Then there’s Saturday’s Buffalo News, which contains this editorial endorsing the incumbents.

(While writing this blog, I have received a report from a resident of University Heights that all the cars in the neighborhood had anonymous flyers on the windshield this morning, referencing this Buffalo News endorsement of the status quo.)

“Ideally, a School Board member encompasses a strong work ethic, willingness to do the necessary homework and the ability to ask the right questions and to come to a fair decision without undue political influence. Florence Johnson, Christopher Jacobs and Catherine Collins have done so, and deserve to continue in their current roles,” the News editorial staff opines, apparently with a straight face.

Is it not interesting that their very own columnists have offered contrary opinions? Consider Rod Watson’s May 29, 2008 article that begins, “Despite the many things the Buffalo Board of Education is probing in the McKinley High School fiasco, one critical issue has yet to surface: What to do about board members who appear to lie to the public?”

Or Donn Esmonde, who wrote on April 16, 2008: “Put the pieces together, and you get a picture of what happens when a school system is run by the integrity-lite and the ethically challenged. They all will tell you that nothing matters more than the kids. Amazingly, their noses do not grow an inch when they say it.”

Watson summed it up also on July 3, 2008 in an article entitled: School Board lacks guts to do right thing. He begins: “Of all the reforms possible in the wake of the McKinley High School fiasco, the most obvious has yet to be mentioned: Students need a union. And lobbyists. And bigger allowances, so they can make campaign contributions to buy off legislators who write the laws that Buffalo school officials are hiding behind to avoid holding anyone accountable.”

“You can thank the unions and their grip on Albany’s legislative machine, as well as their intimidating ability to affect a School Board candidacy in elections with miniscule turnouts,” he continues.

Shall we also thank the editorial staff of his paper for their ability to try to do the very same thing?

Tuesday’s school board election will be decided by city voters. It should be decided by the parents of children who attend classes every day in the city of Buffalo, and by every city resident who recognizes the critical importance of improving the quality of education for the children of our impoverished city—where only 46% of students graduate from high school in four years—a number that has worsened over the past five years under the the questionable guidance of the incumbent at-large school board members, who now seek an additional five years to finish the job.

Their biggest success, they claim, is a $1 billion “state of the art” school renovation project that is so hopelessly out of touch with progressive green-building standards that the electrical bills to run the buildings will be an albatross around taxpayers’ necks long into the future.

The title of the Buffalo News editorial nails it on the head: Tuesday’s Buffalo school board vote will determine future of district.

Wouldn’t it be a surprising miracle if, when voters step into the booth this Tuesday, May 5, they remember the little voices of the children who deserve so much better, and forget the propaganda dumped upon them by business people from Niagara Falls and the suburbs, who would have us believe that things are just fine in the Buffalo Schools?

Vote!

According to City Finance Commissioner Janet Penksa, quoted in yesterday’s Buffalo News, the city’s proposed traffic light cameras will generate $2.75 million annually based on $50 fines. Mayor Byron Brown has been pushing the plan.

That would equal 55,000 tickets yearly. Or, 150 tickets per day, 365 days a year. This “pilot project” will involve 50 surveillance cameras at traffic lights around the city for the next five years.

The home-rule message was approved by the Common Council in a 5-3 vote on Tuesday. Mickey Kearns, David Rivera, and Richard Fontana voted against it.

According to a press release from Assemblymember Sam Hoyt’s office, issued yesterday, the bill will be approved in Albany next week. Antoine Thompson is the sponsor of the measure in the NYS Senate.

The News reports that Common Council members “would have one last chance to approve or reject the initiative,” after it is passed in Albany next week.

Proponents say it is not a “money grab.”

Put another way, the plan will mean an average of a little more than one $50 red light ticket issued every ten minutes, every hour, seven days a week, for the next 1,825 days in the city of Buffalo—totaling $13.75 million dollars in five years.

Penksa said the fines might increase to $75 if they’re paid late.

All around Hoyt Lake in Delaware Park, one can see signs that the seasons are changing. Shakespeare Hill offers the following warning. (click on any image to enlarge)

Another sign cautions against a different winter pastime, no matter how tempting the big open lake may appear.

Here’s a recent sign reminding you who to thank for the Delaware Park Pathways: David Paterson, Governor; Carol Ash, Commissioner of New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation and State Historic Preservation Officer; Byron W. Brown, Mayor. All part of a 1986 Environmental Quality Bond Act Project. In the background, it looks like the lake is ready for a cleanup. The sign, however, appears to be in excellent shape.

And last but not least, my favorite. The most beautiful, colorful, and positive among the bunch. Also possibly unauthorized and illegal, so get out and enjoy these tell-tale signs of spring before they’re gone.

Because I’m in a critical mood:

About that new voice over internet protocol phone system being installed in stages in City Hall: Seems like a good idea, notwithstanding the screwup that left several departments without any phone service yesterday—progressive, modernizing, money-saving over the long haul.

But in his December report on the new system to the CitiStat panel, the city’s IT chief, Raj Mehta, explained that one of the benefits of the system is that the mayor’s office will be able to order and review reports of all phone activity in City Hall. That makes a certain amount of sense, in terms of efficiency; it’s nice to know which employees are wasting time on Dial-a-Joke. (I acknowledge the anachronism.)

But government is not any an ordinary business. City Hall is political. Should Byron Brown and his chief political officer, Steve Casey, be allowed to monitor calls made and received from the offices of those they consider political opponents? If that’s okay, will they make their phone records publicly available, without requiring a lengthy Freedom of Information request process?

Some items, possibly true and possibly not, to consider:

—Is North District Councilmember Joe Golombek considering a run for City Comptroller? If so, how does Andy SanFilippo feel about that? Both enjoy cozy relations with Mayor Byron Brown. Who would win the mayor’s support?

—I called to ask Joe, but turns out the phones in City Hall are down today. Raj Mehta, the city’s IT chief, has been overseeing the installation of a new digital VOIP phone system in City Hall. (You can learn more about it by watching Mehta’s last round with the CitiStat panel.) He says that Verizon switched off the Common Council’s old lines on Friday at 4pm instead of today at 4pm. (I emailed Joe, as well, and will relay his answer when it comes.)

—I’ve been told that the continuing battle between the mayor and the Common Council over the 2009 capital budget originated with a $200,000 streets project for the intersection of Linwood and North—a project in the Niagara District, represented by David Rivera, who beat out mayoral advisor Peter Savage for that seat. The mayor left that project out of his original capital budget; the Common Council added the project in its version, which divided infrastructure improvement funds equally among councilmanic districts instead of leaving all the spending at the mayor’s discretion. (The five-member majority coalition argued that the mayor has used the capital funds to reward and punish councilmembers over the past three years.) When the mayor vetoed the Council’s revisions, he retained funding for the Linwood-North project, admitting it was necessary, while stripping infrastructure improvement funds from the districts represented by the councilmembers who voted to revise his original budget.

—Finally, I’ve heard that a member of the Buffalo Police Department’s Mobile Response Unit has been detailed to perform a bomb search at HSBC Arena before each home Sabres game. Problem is, there’s no such duty. The BPD doesn’t do bomb searches at HSBC Arena before each home Sabres game. So what is that officer being paid to do?

UPDATE: Joe Golombek says he, too, has heard the tumor that he’s running for comptroller, but at this point he’s happy to be North Dostrict Councilmember. He says, “There are several issues that I would like to work on, including:  new and improved special police, crime stats on the internet, artist studios at the BRAC (Buffalo Religious Arts Center) which is the former St. Francis Xavier, a Main Street Project for Tonawanda Street, City Manager form of government and non-partisan elections for the City of Buffalo among others.”

It’s been two weeks since I first wrote about Syaed Ali and a week since I followed up. (Last November Ali detained and interrogated while Buffalo police searched his home and confiscated his possessions—all because he was suspected of harassing Mayor Byron Brown.) The story has since been picked up by other news outlets, but the mayor’s office remains mum: Brown won’t even admit that Ali is accused of harassing him, though Ali insists that’s what his interrogators told him. Buffalo Police won’t say whether or not they’re investigating Ali.

City Court Judge Craig Hannah—an old friend of Byron Brown whom the mayor appointed to the bench just 11 days after taking office in 2006—won’t admit he signed the search warrant that Buffalo Police presented when they ransacked Ali’s house on November 7. But here is a copy of that warrant, and that appears to be Hannah’s signature at the bottom.

On the last page of that document is a makeshift receipt given to Ali’s family by Buffalo Police Detective Anna Mydlarz, who led the raid on Ali’s house and is supposedly in charge of the investigation that Buffalo Police won’t acknowledge. After the jump is a much longer list of items that Ali says Buffalo Police actually took from his home on November 7. It’s coming up on three months, and none of the items have been returned. Nor has Ali been charged with a crime.

Because no one will comment on this case, I have yet to receive answers to these questions:

1. Why bother with a search warrant for a misdemeanor harassment charge? What were police looking for?

2. On what basis was Ali suspected of harassing the mayor? Where is the evidence on which Hannah agreed to sign the search warrant?

3. Even if Ali had done what he is accused of doing—spreading prurient rumors about the mayor’s personal life—does that constitute harassment? Does that justify sending Buffalo Police into his family’s home with what is apparently a flimsy warrant to seize his propoerty and his person?

More on this soon.

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