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Opinion

Opinion Page Policies

By Howard B. Owens

Summary:

  • Readers may submit either Letters to the Editor or Op-Eds;
  • Submission to the Opinion Page is open primarily to Genesee County residents;
  • All opinions are welcome but any statement of fact must be backed by evidence;
  • No personal insults, no name-calling, keep it civil;
  • Only digital submissions are accepted.
  • Submissions are not edited.

Letter to the Editor: Questioning $1 million on replacing silos

By Staff Writer

Letter to the Editor from Donald Weyer:

Honorable Erik Fix, Batavia assistant city manager, states $1 million was allocated to fix (not Erik) the silos at the Genesee Country Mall. Seriously, sir?

You blithely fling, float, flare-up, and otherwise fire these money sums about -- $1 million here, $110,000 there, $2.5 million in the pipeline, $7 million in the works. All those commas and zeroes alone make me cross-eyed. How about you? Where exactly, Erik, do you think all this largesse is coming from? From the pockets of you and me, my brother, whether indirectly or just a simple pick from our pockets when we're not looking. (Refer to Dickens's character, the Artful Dodger). Growing on trees, falling from heaven, a windfall from a benefactor? Nah, straight from what you have, to those that don't, to those in need to fund their projects.

Treat these sums, my good man, growing more astronomical for public "improvements," day by day, with a little more seriousness. With more care and concern and circumspection, less free flightiness and light-heartedness.

Last I looked, Mr. Fix, for American publicly-funded budgets, since the government doesn't generate a profit, we're dependent upon the productivity of the American working person. You and me, Erik. Now sir, make a decision: would you rather have the fruits of your productivity in your bank account or pay for a fix of the silos? Yeah, I thought so, me too, we think alike!

Did you bother to count the people who use those silo entrances? Did you bother to ask the people who used the silo entrances whether they cared about the condition of the silos? Do you even have a master plan for that mall? Did you ever wonder what the walkers who principally and overwhelmingly use that mall for exercise and physical conditioning, good things, will do when the UMMC community health center and YMCA, a hop, skip, and a jump down Main Street, is completed? Yeah, I didn't think so! But I did: they will wholeheartedly lickety-split, road-runner-like, flock to the new improved facilities. And who will then be left to use that mall? Only to slam the doors for the last time on the fixed $1 million silos. Five simple questions, Erik, and if you answer "No" to three or more, why are we sinking your and my hard-earned money into the silos?

I know, my man, that you're not responsible for the past and present of that mall, but now you're in the driver's seat for the future of it. I hope that you can steer that "white elephant" to a safe, sane, and secure demise. Just throwing money at it will certainly not accomplish that.

Letter to Editor: Increase percentage of vets exemption on property taxes

By Staff Writer

Letter to the Editor from Donald Weyer:

Me too! "What about me? It isn't fair; I've had enough, now I want my share," according to the Moving Pictures song. Or if you're communally oriented, Pink's "What About Us!"

Genesee County Legislature is considering raising the income limits for senior citizens to receive a fifty percent exemption on county taxes. I learned this from Joanne Beck's report in The Batavian on Feb. 9.

But wait a minute. I'm a veteran, a senior citizen, and a Genesee County taxpayer. As such, I receive a fifteen percent reduction as a veteran in the assessed value of my property, on which the county tax rate is figured. (Income limits not a consideration).

That fifteen percent reduction has not been refigured in light of inflation and prices and significant increases in the assessed value of real estate (assessed value goes up, tax goes up; assessed value goes up, but percentage reduction in assessed value goes up, tax may stay the same; simple arithmetic, no?), similar to the reasons given for recalculating the seniors' fifty percent exemption.

I have no opposition to the current proposal to raise the income limits for the seniors' tax exemption. However, "I hope you know what I mean when I say, me too" (credit to Toby Keith); or, at a minimum, Genesee County should study increasing the veterans' tax exemption on real property assessed value, from fifteen percent to twenty percent, to thirty to fifty percent, etc., to be determined.

Letter to the Editor: Issues with the City Council

By Staff Writer

Letter to the Editor by Donald Weyer:

Cue Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers: "Don't do me like that, don't do me like that, what if I love you baby!"

I refer to Joanne Beck's report in The Batavian on Feb. 13 detailing Batavia City Council deliberations of Feb 12. 

I forward my opinion on one of the topics, a different aspect of the safety of Batavia city streets, which I originally submitted to the Batavia Daily News on Feb. 6. I am offering it for the readers of The Batavian today. Also, it might help the Council in their deliberations. I have addressed the issue of the city's proposed 2 percent property tax-rate increase in numerous, and previous, submissions posted by The Batavian. Again, as assists to the Council in its budget hearings.

Anticipatory of how these affairs proceed along their timelines? Maybe. Clairvoyant? Nah, leave it at a simple one-word "anticipation." (Unfortunately, I'm not nearly as atmospherically and searchingly prescient as Carly Simon was on her "Anticipation." I can't even promise to makin' no one late. But maybe I will be able to say something about "these were the good old days, these were the good old days")!

And now I have a new foreseeable future in my head, related to the street safety feature that will hopefully be studied by the Batavia City Council and/or the Batavia Police Department, both august and respected in their respective vision.

Man oh man, do you feel safe on the clearly urban streets of Batavia? I don't today, but I did once, maybe as recently as 10 years ago. I spend as much time on the streets, and I don't mean in a vehicle, but walking, and riding a bike, today, as I did then, mainly in the daytime. (Unlike city resident, Mr. Houseknecht, speaking to the Council on this same topic on Feb. 12, but concerning the nighttime streets). Now I find that I'm constantly looking ahead, looking behind, looking side to side, unlike I did in the past. And I marvel; there are so many new, unfamiliar faces on the streets of Batavia, just within the past 5 years And in the daylight hours, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., I wonder do any or all these new faces work, as they are mostly of working age, 20-50 years old, unlike my retired self? What was said, idle hands and brains are the devil's workshop. And, on foot. Can't afford, or are banned from driving? So maybe that is a reason for not working, no transportation. Or maybe there is something else going on here on the sidewalks of Batavia? Only saying! 

These were the good old days: a policeman, or two, walking a beat. 

These were the good old days: a policeman riding a bike patrol, and not so very long ago. 

To emphasize, I am fully welcoming and supportive of new residents of Batavia, as long as they, their relatives, their friends, and their acquaintances, are somehow contributing to a positive, safe, environment in Batavia. Not contributing to unsafe streets, for whatever reason, physical or property crime, drugs, or threats to adults or children, in the city. 

The city managed these visible tendencies in the good old days. I'm not asking the Batavia City Council or Police Department to provide work and jobs, for our new city residents. I am asking to see some evidence that the city is doing some "managing" the streets in the present day!

Closing, 3 comments/takes on the City Council meeting on Feb 12:

  1. Councilman Viele - leave off your harping on, and comparisons to, school taxes. Those will be addressed or not addressed at the appropriate time and place, certainly not at City Council and certainly not now. I see what you're trying to do. I suggest sir that you examine or research scapegoat, or scapegoating. It has an interesting history, kings, success or failure of agricultural harvests, fertility rituals, etc. Nothing is in the purview of City Council budget deliberations, especially as Batavia is not part of a monarchy, its agriculture is far in the "rearview mirror" in 2024, and we don't dance around worshipping the sun, the rain, the soil!
  2. Fellow-resident Roach - surprisingly, your input at City Council was pertinent on budget cuts. Unfortunately, I addressed the issue of Council cutting/voting on the Bureau of Maintenance parking lot resurfacing in my prior "Opinion" submission to The Batavian on Feb. 9. I even provided a solution. Please read that writing if and when "The Batavian" chooses to publish it.
  3. Again, "Don't do me like that, don't do me like that, what if I love you baby". Substitutions for baby: The Batavian; Joanne Beck; new city residents; Messeurs Housenecht, Viele, and Roach; City Council; Police Dept.

Letter to the Editor: City Budget raises questions

By Staff Writer

Letter to the Editor from Donald Weyer:

Batavia City budget talks, as reported by Joanne Beck in The Batavian on Feb. 8:

1. Okay, City Manager Rachael Tabelski, since you did most of the talking on this issue, I'll address you first. Leave the $110,000 to pave the Bureau of Maintenance parking lot in the Bureau of Maintenance reserve fund or the city reserve fund, I'm not sure which, as we never know when we might need it in these times of crumbling infrastructure. Propose to put the $110,000 into the new 2024 city budget, just so the City Council can vote it up or down, and we citizens can see who "is fer us" (city property owners) and who "is agin us" (property-tax payers, again). Forgive the frontier colloquialisms. If the $110,000 isn't in the budget because the Council voted it down, then the property-tax increase to exactly pay for the now-defeated $110,000 to pave the parking lot ISN'T NEEDED. How simple is that? The only loser in all this is the Bureau of Maintenance parking lot. But that's solved as I segue into my next point, #2 coming up.

2. Councilman Geib has promised to "take a hard look into this next year," whatever that means as if this year's budget look was soft or easy. Heaven forgive that! And remember, my good man, Derek, in your freshman year on the council, the words of Benjamin Franklin, "Don't put off until tomorrow what you can do today," or the unknown speaker's spookily sage advice, "Tomorrow may never come." If you insist, though sir, Mr. Geib, take a hard look at the parking lot macadam next year, maybe the worse for wear, but clearly still there, absent the work of an earthquake or some other horrific calamity. (If that occurred, we may not need a BOM parking lot!) A needed "break" here in my long-winded 5 comments today, in addition to the previous ones I've made in "The Batavian" on other days, concerning these same city budget talks. And anyway, can my proposed course of action be any more logical to you?

3. There's just something "off" about the equivalence of the $110,000 for the parking lot and the $110,000 budget increase necessitating the increase in the property tax rate. Hamlet's "Something is rotten in the state of Denmark." Something in the sense of budget legerdemain, hocus-pocus, too much of the magician, David Copperfield and Houdini, and the "whammy" wizardry of Meyer Lansky; not enough of the budget-constructors' rock-solid book-keeping of Certified Public Accountant standards. I would normally want to insert the lyrics of the O'Jays' Back Stabbers here, "They smilin in your face" and more..., etc., but I will adhere to accustomed polite criticism in this opinion piece and refrain from that insertion. Just saying!

4. Councilman Bialkowski, of the entire Batavia City Council, seems the most reliable to approach the precipice of questioning disagreement/challenge to his compatriots' and the city manager's stances on serious city matters, but then Bob hesitatingly steps back, maybe because of what he sees in the abyss below, maybe he looks up skyward at the next election, who knows, and then compromises, makes nice with the other council members and the city manager. (Maybe we need a return to the City Council days of the early-, mid-career oppositional infusions of Rosemary Christian, even the late-career effusions of Florence Gioia, I don't know)!

5. Why isn't the Batavia city budget presented to the voters, similar to the school budgets?

Letter to Editor: City looking to extract more funds from taxpayers

By Howard B. Owens

Letter to the editor from Donald Weyer:

"Oh, no, I've said too much, I haven't said enough." - Credit to R.E.M. I'm back, are you ready for some more? So, here goes.

The City of Batavia government, honorable city manager, and respected City Council are ganging up on us city taxpayers and marching forth, hi ho, with hats in hands, to get us to cough up payment for unfunded city services! Well, I'll be! I never knew I could get so many more city services, for things that I, or you, don't currently fund. Or maybe even need? Anyway, thank you, thank you!

Seems that most of them are in Public Works and the Water Department. Pay for job-related operating licenses and fees for city employees? What's next, pay for their driver's licenses, vehicle registrations, and work clothes? Come on, we already foot the bill for their heavy equipment, their hand tools, their paperwork, and their pens and pencils and erasers to fill out and correct that paperwork! Pay a stormwater fee? Who or what produces that type of water, and puts it in the streets? No problem, I always suspected all of us had a numinous aspect to our beings. Unfilled city job positions? Well, if they're unfilled, they're unfunded, so why worry about funding them? You'll just end up with more employees that you'll have to keep an eye on and pay fringe benefits to and to get yet more funds to do all this. Work with what you've got.

I'm confused! I certainly hope that we're not playing word games here or swimming in semantics. With all this recent language spoken forth from One City Centre, I feel like I'm living in a house (city) of mirrors or being spun around on a whirlygig or riding on a Merry-Go-Round or stumbling about in a Funhouse (city, again) or being conducted on a boat through Laugh-in-the-Dark and moved along by the aforementioned stormwater (of the city, yet again)!

So get this: City Manager Tabelski is proposing that these unearthed newly-discovered fees and unfunded funds be called programs and/or plans and/or programming. Is that like we pay for a program when we attend an event, which guides us through the event (theatrical play, baseball game, etc.)? Or when we buy a medical treatment or financial investment plan to pay for services covered under that plan? 

Finally, I always thought programming is what one did to a computer or a radio or TV station with its music-play or situation-comedies, respectively. Got it, hmmm, I think, highly-regarded Rachael. But wait a minute, those programs and plans and programming are optional. We can take them or leave them. Will Rachael offer the newfound city fees with an optional choice? If so, guess how many of us city taxpayers will decline the optional programs and plans and programming. I'll lay my wager on all of us.

I need now to list two famous quotations for the revered Rachael, Batavia's City Manager:

  1. First, from Gertrude Stein - "A rose is a rose is a rose is a rose."
  2. Second, from William Shakespeare - "What's in a name? That which we call a rose, by any other word, would smell as sweet."

Reader, please feel free to substitute "fee" for each rose in the two quotations!

"Now I've said too much." - "Trying to keep up with you, And I don't know if I can do it" (again, credit R.E.M.), following the City Council and Manager 2024 budget reviews.

"Plain truth is nothing Nothing but the plain truth" (according to Gentle Giant), and I guess it is the best, and only, advice to offer the players/protagonists in the budget reviews!

Get a whiff of some recent worrisome and noisome rumblings and mumblings emanating from the environs of city budget review rooms:

  1. "Unfunded supplies, positions, studies, equipment, and capital projects. My metabolically slow brain finally gets it, I think. These are all items on a Batavia City Hall wish list. As soon as the ruling city fathers and mothers can finagle or finesse these items with harmless, neutral words, such as "program," "plan," and "programming" (the three P's in the quiver of present-day city management theory, so to say), and to forget dangerous or obnoxious words, such as "money," "taxes," and "fees" (don't dare call them that!), then voila, the city can release its arrows to "fund" them, sort of like on a "flow chart," with us, Batavia's citizens, the targets. Fund with what? You guessed it: city taxpayers' bank accounts! Easy, peasy.
  2. That old city bogeyman: Genesee Country Mall! Let me get this right, feel free to correct me if I'm wrong. The city of Batavia has foreclosed.

Letter to the Editor: First Amendment forgotten in eagerness to settle Kate Long case

By Howard B. Owens

Letter to the Editor by Donald Weyer:

I note that Kate Long has had the criminal harassment charge against her, brought by the Batavia Board of Education, put on pause, potentially resulting in wiping the slate clean, in contemplation of dismissal, all via a plea agreement or deal (deal is my characterization), and I emphasize the deal aspect, as if that is necessarily an honorable thing to make or do, as in the devil went down to Georgia, telling Johnny "and he was willin' to make a deal," boy.

I refer to The Batavian report of Jan. 25. Please also refer to my previous comments on this case in The Batavian, Opinion section, posted Dec. 28.

Ms. Long's defense attorney, Tom Trbovich, decided to circle the wagons to get an easier resolution, a good disposition, for his client, and in the process, not antagonize the office (I assume the Genesee County District Attorney Office). This, in Trbovich's thinking, was accomplished by NOT mounting a constitutional, First Amendment challenge to the harassment charge.

Some further comments by me:

  1. What, this attorney is practicing in the Old West, as evidenced by his resurrection of a Gunsmoke/Annie Oakley-like language reference to wagon-circling (I picture Trbovich taking refuge behind 6-8 Conestoga wagons in the American West, while being assailed by arrows shot from the bows of the District Attorney)? Is the defense totally abject at the mercy of the prosecution? That's not what I learned in school civics class!
  2. Alternatively, what's all this about antagonizing? Doesn't a defense attorney have a naturally and necessarily oppositional (antagonistic), call it adversarial, relationship to the prosecuting District Attorney Office (from the dictionary acceptable definition of antagonize)? Wasn't that what we were taught in civics class in school?
  3. I wasn't aware that the purpose of our legal system was to ensure a good disposition and easier resolution for all parties. I thought the aim of the legal system was to ensure justice for all parties. And that good/easier and justice were not equivalent, the same in every case. This is from the civics class, too.

This entire criminal case has so many missteps, mistakes, misassumptions, and mispronouncements in its travels, making its way, wending by turns through our justice system, that I conclude that a mistrial should be declared by its judge, Durin Rogers. And have it start over by focusing on the only and real and important issue of the case: Ms. Long's First Amendment right to petition a government agency, the Batavia Board of Education, for redress of her grievance concerning the education of her child. She had a legitimate purpose, which was to secure a quality education for her child; an annoyance that the education system was not providing her child with that quality education; and finally, it was alarming to her that the system could not find a qualified teacher to instruct her child! Maybe she overdid it, but that may just signal her sincerity, her seriousness, in pursuing that purpose to the extent that she did!

Letter to the Editor: The price of a cup of coffee

By Staff Writer

Letter to the Editor from Donald Weyer:

"I read the news today, oh boy; well, I just had to laugh... found my way downstairs and drank a cup (of coffee)! 

Batavia Assistant City Manager Erik Fix, as he sees it, Batavia property owners get all those things (city services) 'for the price of a cup of coffee a day.' This profound insight bruited out by Fix in Joanne Beck's news article (the news I read today), in The Batavian, dated Jan. 23, reporting on Batavia City Council review of the 2024 budget, held at City Hall on Jan. 22.

I'm sorry, Erik, I credited you with a banker's/accountant's eagle eye in money matters (refer to my opinion letter in The Batavian of Jan. 24 concerning plans for Austin Park), but in this latest particular pronouncement, you're proclaiming some fuzzy math or arithmetic. By my own personal calculations:

  1. I get a minimum of 50 cups of coffee and a maximum of 100 cups of coffee from a 30.6-ounce can of ground coffee.
  2. That 30.6-ounce can varies in price from $7.99 to $14.99.
  3. Doing some basic computations, in the worst case for my pocketbook and coffee fix, 50 cups at $14.99, 1 cup per day, and using a 365-day year: 365 days divided by 50 cups = 7.3 cans per year; 7.3 cans × $14.99 per can = $109.427 per year, rounded up to $109.50 per year. Alternatively, $14.99 per can divided by 50 cups per can = $0.2998 per cup, rounded up to $0.30 per cup. $0.30 per cup × 365 days = $109.50 per year. Again, $109.50 is my cost for the price of a cup a day for a year of coffee drinking, Erik.
  4. I showed all my work in two different computations and came up with the same results; I can't do anything more. You can't slice it any other way,  Honorable Erik; please show your work and/or the way you slice it.
  5. My Batavia city tax bill for 2023 was $539.38. That would be the cost of approximately five cups of coffee per day, not a cup of coffee a day. ($539.38 divided by 365 = $1.48 per day; $1.48 divided by $0.30 [my cost per cup] = 4.93333 cups, rounded up to five cups per day to pay the city tax bill per day. (Not the one cup of coffee per day that the honorable Mr. Fix imagines or fantasizes or wishes on a star about. Now, Erik, you may choose to pay a profligate $1.48 per day for your coffee cup, compared to my miserly (financially perspicacious?) $0.30 per cup per day; it's a free country.
  6. Again, I'm showing all my work to avoid any confusion, accusation, even duplicity or financial abracadabra or funny business. Erik, sir, please show your work.
  7. To reiterate, I'm not getting, as a Batavia city property owner, all the Batavia city services for the price of a cup of coffee a day. Will you issue a refund to me for my overpayment ($539.38 - $109.50 = $429.88)? I could use an extra $429.88! Couldn't you?

I trust that I haven't bored you, enraged, or exasperated you, patient reader, with all these numbers; actually, they've made me a little dizzy. But I was taught how to be sensible, logical, responsible, practical, and because I was feeling so logical.

Op-Ed: Governor Hochul failed to address New York State’s open government crisis

By Staff Writer

By Paul Wolf, president, New York Coalition For Open Government

When Governor Hochul first took office in 2021, she promised a new era of government transparency. She committed to restoring New Yorkers' faith in their government by improving transparency and increasing government accountability.

The New York Coalition For Open Government has documented large-scale noncompliance with the Open Meetings Law and the Freedom of Information Law at the local level. For example:

  • 72% of towns not posting meeting documents online
  • 25% of towns not posting meeting minutes or a recording
  • 39% of counties failed to acknowledge a FOIL request within five business days as required by law.
  • 75% of Planning Boards not posting meeting documents online
  • Only 25% of villages posted meeting minutes online
  • 35% of villages did not even post a meeting agenda
  • Out of 158 school district executive session motions reviewed, 61% were not in compliance with the Open Meetings Law

In her 2023, State of the State speech the Governor did not say or propose anything to address the open government crisis that exists in New York State. This lack of attention was disappointingly repeated in the 2024 State of the State last week.

The Governor proposed addressing the backlog of liquor license applications but said nothing about the broken Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) system where members of the public are improperly denied FOIL requests or must wait many months to receive basic information.

Governor Hochul proposed actions to strengthen consumer protections and to enhance the Attorney General’s ability to enforce consumer protections. Meanwhile New York has some of the weakest open government laws in the nation and the Attorney General’s office actually fights against the public on Freedom of Information Law matters. 

The New York Coalition For Open Government has several important bills introduced in Albany, which will improve government transparency and accountability. We encourage Governor Hochul to support these bills.

Constitutional Amendment (Assemblymember Steck A4429) 

Several states have the right to open government stated in their Constitution (California, Florida, Louisiana, and Montana), New York does not. Assemblymember Phil Steck has introduced a bill to establish a right to open government in New York’s Constitution. Governor Hochul supports amending New York's Constitution so that more Judges can be appointed. It will be interesting to see whether Governor Hochul supports a bill to amend the State Constitution to add a right to open government.

Mandatory Attorney Fees (Assemblymember Steck/Senator Liu A5357A/S5801A) 

Unlike other states, New York does not have an independent body with enforcement powers to address violations of the Open Meetings Law and Freedom of Information Law. Other states also impose fines or criminal charges for violations of open government laws, such penalties are not available in New York. 

The only recourse available to the public in NY is retaining an attorney to file an Article 78 proceeding and hope that the court will award attorney fees.

New York's current attorney fee statute is weaker than many other states and it is more difficult to obtain attorney fees when litigation is successful.

Assemblymember Phil Steck and Senator John Liu have introduced a bill, which reforms New York’s attorney fee statute for Freedom of Information Law and Open Meetings Law litigation.

Create A Hearing Officer System To Address Freedom of Information Law Appeals And Open Meetings Law Complaints (Assemblymember Rosenthal A7933)

In the 1980’s homeowners across New York State were angry about increasing property taxes. The only recourse homeowners had to challenge their property assessments was to hire an attorney to file a lawsuit in the Supreme Court, which was not easy or affordable. To assist homeowners, the New York State legislature in 1982 passed legislation creating a hearing officer system to hear property tax assessment cases.

Through this system, homeowners complete a simple application, pay a filing fee and the New York State Office of Court Administration appoints a hearing officer to decide the complaint. Hearing officers are attorneys, realtors, and others with experience in dealing with real property valuations.

In 2020, 102,000 assessment complaints were handled across the state through this hearing officer system. Applicants paid a $30 filing fee and the Court Administration paid hearing officers $75 per case.

The same system can and should be replicated to handle Freedom of Information Law and Open Meetings Law appeals. Assemblymember Linda Rosenthal has introduced a bill to create an independent hearing officer system to address open government law complaints.

Letter to the Editor: $1.4 million on sidewalks that don't get used

By Staff Writer

Letter to the editor from Donald Weyer:

Batavia's city budget of $37 million for 2024 "includes $1.37 million for street and SIDEWALK improvements" (Joanne Beck's article in "The Batavian", Jan. 12; emphasis mine).

Has the city ever studied who or what uses the sidewalks in our safely walkable neighborhoods? I mean, I do ride my bike (mainly to avoid the danger of the street), probably illegally; dog-walkers; some youth and some senior citizens, the former because of lack of access to a car, and the latter for exercise and because of what they were accustomed to in "days gone by"; some adults who are legally precluded from driving, maybe due to an instance of insobriety. I think that's about the prevalent utility of city sidewalks in the 21st century!

And forget about the walks for most of the winter when residents or some other entity refuse to clear the sidewalks of snow, ice, and slush, plus the propensity of city snow-plows to push the precipitation from the streets up on the sidewalks, further plugging up the process of walking or biking (again probably illegally, but what can I say, a question of life versus [possible] injury, even death), of putting foot or bike tire to pavement.

Shoot, I don't even have a sidewalk in front of my private residence, along with others on my city block "in the same boat" (excuse, please, the mixed metaphor here, and coming up), in addition to others within the city, sidewalk-less, like "sitting in a row boat without any oars".

So you see where this short, maybe rudderless, essay is tacking, goodness, even yawing! $1.37 million is 3.7% of $37 million. Granted, the 3.7% is for both street and sidewalk improvements. What I ask you to consider, though, is:

  1. What happens to the benefit of sidewalk "improvements" when the dog walkers are replaced by new-fangled "dog parks"? When the youth grow up, and get a car? When the senior citizens, accustomed to the past, are no longer with us? When the legally precluded drivers get sober? When my bike tire gets a "flat"?
  2. All the cost of sidewalk "improvements" benefits become an empty or moot point when there is no one to use them.
  3. Maybe the entire $1.37 million is better spent on STREET improvements? After all, that is where modern humanity is primarily focused, drawing soulful inspiration/consolation/imagination, you choose, from engine-charged "rubber on the road" and the exhilaration of instantaneous, or close to it, arrival!

Letter to the Editor: Is revamp of Austin Park worth the price

By Staff Writer

Letter to the editor from Donald Weyer:

$500,000.00, half a million, for Austin Park in Batavia ("The Batavian" report of Jan. 15)? With the city slipping in, handing off another $225,000.00 of Public Works funds, that would make it nearly three-quarters-of-a-million (actually, 72.5%).

Man, that big wad of cash would look mighty nice spread across a number of other needful parks in the city! Also, some questions for the "city fathers" and mothers too. Like:

  1. MacArthur Park, can we get numerous improvements to the youth baseball fields? Doing something with the unused tennis courts (installing basketball courts, or heh heh, a "pickleball court" moved from the proposed one at Austin), since the city schools overtook the basketball court at the old swimming pool/Youth Center to store its equipment? A permanent fix to the parking lots' surfaces, as they clearly suffer under high usage?
  2. The open, empty field to the immediate east of Dwyer Stadium. The site of the former junkyard, the "Superfund" area, which N.Y. State recently purified, cleansed, and beautified at a "pretty penny" cost to state taxpayers! Good, prime land, just waiting for some recreational infrastructure! Or even an entertainment venue, see #3, below.
  3. An "entertainment hotspot" proposed for Austin Park? I thought we had a thriving one at Jackson Square. And a second one at Batavia Downs Casino. And a proposed third one, see #2 above.
  4. I question what the population density of children is within, say, a 1.5-mile radius (walking distance) of Austin Park compared to that around other city parks. Certainly, you want to put the money where it will serve the greatest number of clients/customers, no?
  5. What's this "master plan" for Austin Park? I assume then that all the other city parks have "master plan(s)," too? And if so, what are they? And if not, why not? I trust that city government officials are all well-intentioned (I do give credit to Assistant City Manager Fix describing these park proposals as "expensive," a word you don't hear often when it comes to the officials addressing spending taxpayers' money, he must have had some experience in the banking industry), but let's get all the "plans" on the tabletop, and the money amounts in clear figures of dollars and cents for each, just to see if we non-government people with "skin in the game" agree with the "plans" and monies!
  6. What is an "all-inclusive playground," and otherwise stated as a "universal inclusive playground"? (What, no more "king of the hill" games, "we got firsts," "we got next," "I got first dibs," "last one in is a ......," etc.)? Are we citizens of Batavia not currently "inclusive" enough? I think we are more "inclusive" than most; and/or are we being too "exclusive"? I think not. (I see quite a lot of new faces around the city in the past few years, "multi" in nearly all categories). If these characterizations are not accurate, which I have stated, is throwing money at them the best way to fix the problem? And if we build the ideal playground, who or what will control or regulate what goes on in that ideal playground?

Letter to the Editor: Fee for stormwater runoff another way to "hook cash" from residents

By Staff Writer

Letter to the editor from Donald Weyer:

Honorable Batavia City Council and respected City Manager Tabelski, you're considering a proposal for us city water-service payers to "assume the position" so that you can seamlessly lubricate and insert a stormwater fee onto our water bills (The Batavian report of 1/9/24).

So now it's all your duties, elected and appointed officials, to go on fishing expeditions and fly-cast about for further ways to hook cash out of our pockets to put in the creel-caches of city coffers? Well, I think with this "stormwater" fee, you just snagged a smelly and ugly stinkfish or the cadaver of a huge and rotting carp!

I understand that stormwater is the runoff from rain and snow storms, both the results of the acts of a higher being (Mother Nature, God, the Universe, call it what you will), not the results of agency by water-service payers. And that the runoff ends up in the city streets and then the city sewers, and then further, I have no idea where—the first two, the clear budgetary responsibility of the city, for which the city has already exacted tribute, and we payers have already paid our pelf, our costly and clean lucre, via property taxes and water bills!

Too much logic and reason for your higher minds, City Council and Rachael? Therefore, you can do one of three things:

  1. Charge the fee to the storms.
  2. Charge the fee off to the city's "cost of doing business."
  3. Charge, do, nothing (and I am not implying that that is your usual modus operandi; I am leaving that up to the judgment of the readers of this petition to our vaunted "city fathers" [and "mothers" too], in lieu of my appearance at an eventual "hearing" on this topic before, again, celebrated and considerate City Council.

Let's not weigh down city taxpayers with further taxes, fees, charges, surcharges, assessments, calls on, or impositions on their financial assets! Batavia is a fairly decent city, our "baby." Let's not "throw the baby out with the bathwater," er, stormwater!

Batavia school officials should find teacher for Spanish class, culture

By Staff Writer

 My, my, my!  Kate Long, a local Batavia parent (charged with harassing the Batavia Board of Education and Batavia schools superintendent with e-mails and correspondence over the lack of a satisfactory, according to her, Spanish language teacher at the Middle School), is resurrecting shades of the "N.Y. Times" newspaper, the legal concept of "prior restraint," Daniel Ellsberg and the "Pentagon Papers," calling up an appearance of the spirits of Mario Savio and Berkeley's "Free Speech Movement." The only thing missing is a rising from the dead of the eminent judge, Learned Hand, to decide the case of Ms. Long vs. the Batavia Board of Education.

A veritable "three-ring circus" right here in Batavia, N.Y. energizing the 2023 holiday season? You decide!  (Nothing like it since the imbroglio over the Christmas manger scene in downtown Batavia at, I think, the old City Hall, what year, I forget!)

I do have to give Ms. Long credit for being someone who actually seems to be an individual who genuinely and sincerely cares about, and is immersed in, the quality of the education her child is receiving in Batavia (this from media reports covering the case); and also credit to the BOE reawakening from its customary preference to just being left alone, or debating politely and with incredible seriousness, the monumental topic of the merits of artificial turf versus natural grass.
 
Ms. Long "annoying?"  Maybe.  The BOE having to deal with "annoyances?"  Heh, really, comes with the turf, er, job, doesn't it? And as for her emails to be construed as "alarming," I doubt very much that they can be interpreted as threats, and anyway, I haven't heard any screaming sirens or bells or warning whistles piercing the peaceful airs of Batavia during the period of the allegedly harassing emails streaking, Valkyrie-like, across the internet to the inboxes of the Board/school's superintedent!  Have you?
 
So, I'll step in here and play the part of Lenny Bruce (another spectre from the past) producing something of a "menage a trois" for this peculiarly Batavia contretemps: I posit that Ms. Long provides a refreshing, even relaxing, respite from the constant and tiring and infantile din of local Buffalo Bills fans rotating daily between heartbroken abject despair and foaming-at-the-mouth unhinged,  exhilarated madness, concerning their beloved, but overplayed (outplayed?), team! 
 
And Batavia Board of Education, also, honorable Batavia school superintendent, I ask you both to stand up in your "landmark case" newfound spotlight, and hire a Chat GPT  "large language" AI deeply learned (not the same as Learned Hand), to impart instruction of the Spanish language to our eager and ready-to-learn Batavia students as well as provide an imaginative and respectful introduction to Spanish culture, for the youth that of Cervantes, Picasso, and the dances: tangos and flamencos and sambas and rumbas.  Three aspects of that culture which are serious, yet lots of fun, too!  (Incidentally, qualities that seem to be missing from present-day American culture)!
 
Donald Weyer, Batavia

Letter to the Editor: Move food distribution to Dwyer Stadium

By Staff Writer

Letter to the Editor from Donald Weyer:

Essentially, the city of Batavia has ordered Batavia's City Church to cease its distribution of food to needy citizens from the church's property on Liberty Street, the former facilities of St. Anthony's Church. The reasons for the stoppage order included the safety of nearby schoolchildren, congestion of street traffic, complaints from nearby residents involving the above two reasons and including blockage of their access to and egress from their private properties. All reasonable issues, I'm sure you will agree. (I gleaned this information from an article posted on "The Batavian" website on 12/6/23.)

In reference to this City Church/former St. Anthony's Church/Liberty Street/City of Batavia food distribution clash of titans, or "tempest in a teapot": why not use Dwyer Stadium to give/share the comestibles? It has free and easy street access; a large parking lot; refrigeration facilities; seats and restrooms for waiting recipients and volunteer food distributors and supervisors; a PA system for communication between all-involved; a nearby neighborhood used to and tolerant of disruption, crowds, and noise during the collegiate league baseball season, as well as excessive street traffic to and fro the high school during the school year (we in the neighborhood are tough and resilient, shoot, we can take a mere bi-monthly food distribution, compared to the year-round inconveniences and interruptions of the combined baseball and school seasons); and heck, you could probably even get Robbie Nichols of Muckdogs fame to emcee the food handouts; he seems to be good at managing and organizing big stadium events! Plus, it would be "a feather in the cap" for the city of Batavia and its manager, Rachel Tabelski, (she did promise to assist City Church locate an alternative site, which I am doing with this writing), since Dwyer is the city's stadium, and we Batavia residents would thus "give credit where credit is due"!

Seems to me that Dwyer Stadium is a "win-win" all-around!

On a minor negative note, what does Brett Frank (one of the starring actors, along with [sort of a Fab Five] Ryan Macdonald of City Church and Chief Heubusch of the Police Dept. and of course, Rachel, and Todd Crossett, a City Church parishioner [also a former assistant Police Chief?]) and the director of the city of Batavia Public Works department have to do with the current food distribution issue on Liberty Street? Shouldn't he be out worrying about, and hastening to, street potholes; and snow plowing; and the excessive grass cutting of city-owned grasses; and the watering of overhead flower pots along Main Street; and primary and urgent snow plowing of the Mall parking lots and subsequent hauling away of all that snow (double duty or "double the work," and thus double debits from the city budget)? And leave the food distribution to City Church and the Police Department? (Oh goodness, Mr. Frank, my good man, "stay in your lane"). He's not being used as the "point-man" or the scapegoat, the "fall-guy," for what's going on over there on Liberty St., is he? Hope not! Just wondering!

Letter to the Editor: No changes to Regents

By Staff Writer

Letter to the Editor from Donald Weyer:

I achieved a "Regents diploma" in the mid-1960s upon graduating high school (additionally, I won/was awarded a Regents college scholarship at the same time, and later, in the early 1970s, a Regents war-service scholarship, so I'm not exactly a neutral observer). The "Regents," a council of educators sitting in Albany, N.Y., standardizes and regulates what is taught in N.Y. public schools, and what specific academic coursework leads to, in this case, high school graduation and a diploma. The Regents are still very much in existence today!

My high school, Bennett, in Buffalo, N.Y., had coursework that led to either a "Regents diploma" or a general "local" diploma. The courses required for the Regents diploma were more complex, difficult, advanced, and demanding—whatever those adjectives may connote—than those required for the general diploma. The Regents diploma was not easily earned or lightly given. Additionally, at that time in the 1960s, colleges and universities seemingly preferred applicants and thus entrants with Regents diplomas.

Anyway, the result of this diploma differentiation, now going on 50-70 years to the present day, has been, at best, positive; and at worst, neutral. American society has flourished economically, politically, culturally, and intellectually. At worst, it has not gone backward, maybe only "marched in place." It has maintained its international primary position, with the factors listed above, beginning post-World War II. I'm still here, and my peers from the 1960s with general diplomas are mostly still here! I've had a pretty good life, and all indications are that the general diploma recipients have fared likewise. Everything, with a few glaring exceptions, is good. So, what's the problem here?

Does all this prelude recall something to you? Like the cliché, "Don't fix it if it isn't broken"? Yeah, I thought so!

First, in present-day, the 2020s, expert state education policymakers and administrators propose to eliminate the Regents diploma but keep the Regents coursework, as I understand this issue (based on widespread newspaper reports of the past 30 days). And second, to introduce and institutionalize and fix in stone "broader assessable inputs" to achieve a high-school diploma—whatever that phrase, "broader assessable inputs," means or signifies. Well, I'll be! Replace the Regents diploma and establish for all time one all-encompassing, read "all students," high-school diploma, and add to it a "stamp" (a smiley-face?) or "seal" (waxed?), or some kind of annotation highlighting and recognizing Regents coursework. (Puts me in the mind of the gold or blue stars affixed to a good piece of grammar-school reading or writing or arithmetic)! Has it truly come to this? A "fix" for a "broken" system? In my estimation, these various add-ons are simply "asterisks," and what asterisks may mean: a possible exception, a qualifier, a not-necessarily outstanding achievement, something accomplished under special or extenuating conditions (quite similar to Major League Baseball individual records "under the influence of steroids"). And maybe not even evident or noticeable on the face of the diploma. At best, a superficial change! At worst, a "dumbing-down" of our educational system, a leveling-out of our meritocratic economic, political, and social systems; "everyone gets a trophy"; mediocrity, the new wave of the future, incipient in this proposal; etc.! What do you think?

N.Y. State Regents, instead of making changes based on which way you think the current wind is blowing, maintain long-established standards. You state that requirements for a high-school diploma are "inflexible" for "modern education standards." Aren't requirements and standards, by definition, a bit "inflexible"? In my world, they are. And I suspect, in my readers' worlds, they are too! Even better yet, Regents, strengthen those standards. "Inflexible" as they may be, they have just enough flex, "give," but in a positive or "good" direction! Further, best better yet, strengthen education instruction so that all high-school students can achieve a Regents-level school diploma. Aim high, not low or middle, respected Regents, with your window-dressing on diplomas, and do what you were entrusted to do: make every citizen an intelligent decision-maker in our great State of New York, starting with the teaching you initiate in kindergarten, and continuing through all levels of instruction!

Regents, stop your tweaking and tinkering and twiddling with the controls and standards of state education. Previously, I had railed against the demise of the "top 10" ranking of students in a high school graduation class. And against ditching the positions of "valedictorian" and "salutatorian" of the senior graduating class. I warned that those were the "first shoe to drop" in reference to a high-quality high-school education. I now see these current 2023 Regents' proposals as possibly being the "second shoe to drop." Particularly, if the new "broader assessable inputs" for credits to attain a high-school diploma in N.Y. include not only the much-ballyhooed "basket-weaving" of the past but the new and improved "basketball-playing" or "guitar-strumming-member" of a garage band, and even maybe "just showing up" (reserve that top-notch ability for jobs, post-graduation), as acceptable credit-bearing inputs of the present and the future! If those requirements scenarios come to fruition, we'll all be walking around shoeless!

Letter to the Editor: Covering true crime

By Staff Writer

Letter to the Editor by Donald Weyer, of Batavia:

Who said Truman Capote's "In Cold Blood" was the pinnacle of true-crime reporting? They hadn't read Howard Owens's factual article about his protagonist, his character, Abrams; his setting, the Tonawanda Indian Reservation; his action: the comings, goings, and doings or lack of doings, of the crime of said Abrams; and his dialogue of Abrams, and of the judge, the prosecuting attorney, and the defense attorney, in Abrams's criminal sentencing hearing (on 12/7/23?)! 

(The only thing missing from the literary account was the probable incredible amount of cash money floating around the reservation from its sales of cigarettes, gasoline, etc., and the reservation's exemption from certain laws, regulations, taxation, etc., applied to the majority of U.S. citizens. But then, maybe those are topics for future "The Batavian" examination).

Letter to the Editor: Two sides should come together on food distribution solution

By Staff Writer

Letter to the Editor by Donald Weyer of Batavia:

Instead of City Church and Batavia City government squabbling over the church's food distribution at the former St. Anthony's Catholic facility at Liberty and Ellicott Streets on Batavia's south side, why don't the two adversaries meet, and in partnership, get down to the root causes for the necessity of food distribution in this city in the first place: unemployment, inflation, inequality and the 1 percent, racism, sexism, ageism, education shortcomings, capitalism, conservatism, etc.? You know, all the "usual suspects"!

Since that prospect is probably neither feasible nor productive, here are some questions, thoughts, and musings, from my pen:

  1. Remember when there was an issue, interestingly also taking place on the south side of Batavia, within the past 2-4 years, concerning street parties, private-yard get-togethers, whatever you want to call them? Isn't this current issue quite similar to that former one? Is this all about NIMBY ("Not In My Backyard")? Just saying.
  2. Speaking of NIMBY, come on, Rachael Tabelski, Batavia city manager, you suggest that the food distribution be moved "outside the city"? Wouldn't that be the supreme NIMBY, not even suggesting an alternative site WITHIN the city? What do they say? Even an animal doesn't soil its own nest or stall. So, we send the soiling elsewhere? Hmmmm. Just saying!
  3. Referring back to #1 above, wasn't there a "racial" undertone involved with that? Just saying!
  4. Referring to the current imbroglio, is there a "religious" undertone to it? City Church, at best, is non-denominational; at worst, it leans Protestant. Wasn't south side Batavia historically Catholic; In fact, the site of the distribution, St. Anthony's, is a former Catholic Church. And you know the traditional relationship between Protestantism and Catholicism? Again, just saying!
  5. Referring back to both #1 and #4 above, what is it with the "south side" here in Batavia? I suspect there is a long-entrenched populace who are "insiders" in the "south side". But now, there has been a significant influx of a new populace into the "south side", "outsiders". Inevitable conflict between "insiders" and "outsiders"? Probably! Isn't it the responsibility of Batavia city leaders to defuse the conflict and not inflame it? Ditto, just saying!
  6. Is there a social/economic/political/religious "class" aspect to this latest iteration of a donnybrook within the confines of the city of Batavia? Maybe, and finally, just saying!

I'm sorry, I have no hard and fast answers or solutions to the questions I pose. But I believe that the questions should be posed! All I can suggest is that we all try to get along together! As E.M. Forster wrote in "Howards End," "Only Connect"!

Letter to the Editor: GLOW Region students aim high at career exploration event

By Staff Writer

Op-Ed submitted by Karyn Winters and Angela Grouse

We just keep GLOWing! Vendors and volunteers from across Genesee, Livingston, Orleans, and Wyoming Counties recently conducted another successful hands-on career exploration program for local students. This workforce development program is designed to educate the next generation of employees in the skilled trades, advanced manufacturing, agriculture, and food production workforce.

Now in its fifth year, the September 26th GLOW With Your Hands event welcomed 1,100 students and chaperones from 30 school districts across the GLOW region who connected with 200 representatives from more than 60 agencies and employers sharing engaging activities that provide exploration of careers and pathways into these industries.

The retirement of baby boomers, attrition, relocation, and a reduced number of job seekers in general have created tremendous pressure points in these industries in our region and across the country. “It is critical that we continue to engage students and employers to share the message that financially rewarding careers exist in our region, the pathways into those jobs are cost-effective, and employers in these arenas offer long-term opportunities with upward mobility. 

With support from vendors and school districts, students were able to engage in hands-on activities and informative conversations throughout the day-long event. GLOW With Your Hands provided students the opportunity to operate an excavator, run a CNC machining simulation, try their hand at welding and so much more. Students explored the careers they were interested in and learned about others they did not know existed. Our vendors are subject matter experts with on-the-job experience, and they were well-equipped and excited to answer students’ questions.

The increased enrollment in BOCES programming and now the employment with participating vendors of students who have participated in prior GLOW With Your Hands programs is a testament to the success of this career exploration event. Employers know that by engaging and guiding students at an early age, they can recruit from a well-educated and prepared pool of potential workers seeking career opportunities right in their own backyard.

An event of this scale – the largest ever in our region – would not have been possible without the support of so many public and private sector entities. A big thank you to our platinum sponsors, National Grid and LandPro Equipment, and the dozens of other companies, unions, and agencies whose significant investment generated a successful event.

In addition to the support of vendors, 100 people from across the community volunteered their time to assist with the event, serving as part of the set-up team, parking attendants, tour guides, lunch servers, event clean up, and more. This program would not have been possible without the support of these valued sponsors and volunteers.

It is also vital to share our thanks with the students who once again expressed tremendous enthusiasm for exploring career opportunities at a successful GLOW With Your Hands event! The second annual GLOW With Your Hands: Healthcare is just 5 months away, providing yet another venue through which to engage the emerging workforce and local employers! 

Karyn Winters is Director of the Genesee County Business Education Alliance, and Angela Grouse is Director of Education to Employment with the Livingston County Area Chamber of Commerce. Both served as co-chairs of this year’s event.

Letter to the Editor: Looking at The Batavian and the Investigative Post

By Staff Writer

Letter to the Editor from Donald Weyer, of Batavia:

Investigative Post, a not-for-profit online media outlet, agrees that "advertising is evil." Well, I do too, and I suspect that Howard Owens, editor and publisher of The Batavian, a for-profit online media outlet, would concur! But it's advertising, a necessary evil, part of the cost of doing business. And I think that all would agree that the result of that evil, money or revenue, whether it gets into the hands of a non-profit or a for-profit, or my own greedy ones, is a good thing, an exceptionally good thing, as long as we're playing the game of capitalism! Don't you all agree too? (I suspect that the Post doesn't necessarily think that they're playing that game, although they really are, they just don't honestly admit it, but The Batavian and I are clearly playing it, and we freely admit it).

As far as I'm concerned, there's room for both media outlets in Western New York, and heck, even for a third good source of news and opinion,the Batavia Daily News! And why not let the consumers, the readers, of these three sources decide for themselves whether there is bias, slant, or fakery in the way that the news is presented? 

Come on, providers, treat us like adults, and don't tell us, like children, how to think about or interpret what you provide! After all, isn't that what you all promote and encourage: independent, intelligent, and informed readers of your news output? Leave it to us and our capabilities of cognition, reason, and what have you, and you, respected news outlets, worried about your advertising revenue sources, advertising bottom lines, and the directions you aim that advertising money at! Admit that "evil advertising" is here to stay, yes, it's a bogeyman, and get on with the news, so I can consume it; forget about your internecine arguments and accusations. We, the readers, aren't really interested, and to the extent that we are, allow us, sovereign and autonomous individuals, to weigh the importance of what you say or write about each other. I'm tired of hearing about the decline of conventional news reporting and publishing, you know, about how we all are getting our news from social media today, but your attempts to cannibalize each other are only quickening and facilitating that trend. So, stop it!

Yeah, I notice and also think about The Batavian's recent increase in reports by Mr. Bojarski and Ms. Richenberg of Batavia Downs racing results (a subsidiary of WROTB, the bogeyman here). Don't know what to make of it other than that there is a much bigger audience for harness racing here in Batavia than I thought there was. Alternatively, the seemingly progressive stance of Investigative Post's questioning and then demonizing aspects of business, read advertising, and, yes, capitalism makes me note and think about that source and its news reliability.

Gambling, what they do over there on Park Road in Batavia, superintended by WROTB, and the home of Batavia Downs, is a nasty and dirty business! The only difference is that it's legal now. (Remember when people went to prison and were murdered or killed because of gambling? No more prison, at least!) Anyway, what do you expect to avoid stepping in and recoiling from today when you attempt to report on it to look into the business of legal gambling? You're bound to absorb some of its taint, its slime, its smell, merely reporting on it, just accepting advertising from it, merely thinking about or critiquing it, just by your proximity to it! The secret is to keep the "guilt by association" with gambling to a minimum.

All right then, sisters and brothers of the news media, you see what I mean. It's really hard to scrape it off the sole of your shoes or expunge the scent of it from your pant cuffs or skirt hems! But keep on keeping on! We readers want and need you.

What I've learned from this "tete-a-tete," this tiff, this baring of teeth and fists, this throwing of stones at glass houses, between The Batavian and Investigative Post:

  1. The Post exists.
  2. The Batavian has a business relationship with WROTB.
  3. As a consumer of news media and its outlets, I'm better informed and more learned.

So, who's the winner here?

Opinion: Addressing Investigative Post's glass house

By Howard B. Owens
Batavia Downs 2022
File Photo by Howard Owens

This is from a recent edition of an email newsletter published by Investigative Post.

The Batavian has drawn a fair amount of attention over the years for being a successful online, for-profit news organization. What’s been left unsaid is its practice of writing favorable stories about its sponsors and advertisers, in particular, the Western Regional Off-Track Betting Corp. Owner Howard Owens was at it again the week before last, penning another story that echoed the OTB party line (sic on the link)

The Post is a Buffalo-based startup news not-for-profit that doesn't attempt to offer its community complete and comprehensive coverage but rather to cherry-pick the stories it chooses to write.

The publication has been on my radar for a while for its sensationalistic, often incomplete reporting.

Now it is attacking me and my publication, and I think that deserves a public response.

Yes, we're for-profit (though, honestly, it's not that much profit, just enough to keep us in business). And I've known plenty in the nonprofit news sector who consider advertising-supported news to be unethical. Throughout my career, going back to 1986, I've come across no shortage of reporters and editors who thought news should be a charity case.

In 2010, I was in Chicago at the first gathering of small, independent online news publishers. Several of the publishers represented start-up nonprofits. At one session, somebody in the middle of the room stood up and said, "Can we all agree right now that advertising is evil."

I responded by saying essentially that advertising support is far superior to the nonprofit model because you have a greater diversity of revenue.  If you're doing it right, no one advertiser is going to be able to hold you hostage.  If the need arises to report something negative about a business, you can do so without fear or favor because if that advertiser cancels its promotions, it's not going to put you out of business.  It likely won't even mean significant cuts in expenditures.  No layoffs. No furloughs. Nobody is hurt.

That diversity of revenue gives us a lot of freedom to report what is factual and honest without succumbing to threats. 

I don't give in to blackmail.

For example, by a hard-and-fast policy, we run all arrest reports without favoritism.  I've written up arrests of good friends, people I know well and respect. I've had volunteer firefighters, who I have a soft spot for, call me and ask me not to run their arrests. There's no shortage of people calling and asking that we just make this one exception this one time.

But it would be unfair to all the people I don't know, the people who have no connections or advantages or even think to call, to play favorites.  We run all arrests we receive from local law enforcement. Period. No exceptions. That has cost us money and hard feelings, no doubt.

Over the past 15 years, three business owners have been arrested (that I know of).  In the first case, the advertiser had -- the week before he was arrested -- said he wanted to double his spending with us.  The day after we ran news of his arrest, he canceled his ad.  He's never advertised with us again.  In the second case, the business owner called a staff member and rudely and profanely canceled her ad.  In the third case, a friend of the advertiser called me and warned me about running his arrest report. This business owner was a top-tier advertiser.  We ran his arrest report the following week when we received it, and he canceled his ad and hasn't run with us since, nor will he again as long as I own The Batavian.

In another case, we ran a story about a local organization that mentioned a newsworthy faux pas by the director.  The next time we called for an ad, she said no, citing our previous story.  

Look, if an ad buyer has some business reason for not advertising with us and we can't convince that person about why they're wrong, it's the ad buyer's right not to buy an ad from us. But when a buyer tries to blackmail our coverage, that's a line ad buyers are not allowed to cross, as I made clear to this particular ad buyer. We don't change the course of an article to please an advertiser; that's what journalistic integrity is all about.

Batavia Downs
Yes, there's no hiding the fact that Batavia Downs is a major advertiser.  And yes, we put effort into covering most of the Downs' good news stories (Wiener Dog races, donations, concerts, etc.). Some of this stuff is just fun to cover.  And being a comprehensive local news publication, or at least trying, we cover positive events as well as news that is less than favorable to people and places.  A news outlet that isn't covering what is good in a community is not serving the community. It's a drain on the community if all the news is negative and sensational, something the folks at Investigative Post clearly don't understand.

I don't think positive stories about local businesses are a bad thing. They are not unethical. Investigative Post seems to disagree, based on the statement above.  We cover a lot of business openings.  We celebrate significant business anniversaries and expansions.  We make it to as many ribbon cuttings as we can.  I think successful small businesses are critical to a healthy local community (one of my major complaints about not-for-profit news outlets is they often ignore their locally owned shops, which ill-serves their communities). You will never see positive coverage of locally owned businesses in the Post because, you know, "advertising is evil," which means small business owners don't matter to the "serious journalist."

As for Batavia Downs and what it means to The Batavian: If Western OTB canceled all spending with us, yes, it would hurt. It would hurt a lot. I'd probably cry. But it wouldn't put us out of business, not with our diversified revenue streams (something Early Access Pass is slowly helping with, as well, so please join). If that happened, we would cut back on some spending but nothing that would hurt our employees.

Our main reporter for Western OTB is Mike Pettinella.  He's a freelancer, which is ideal in this circumstance because, in accordance with state employment law, I have limited ability to direct his work.  He chooses his own stories for the most part (I can suggest stories), and he chooses how to cover them. Investigative Post is making it sound like I cover Western OTB, but I've only ever been to two meetings of the board, and I've done only one significant story about the organization's legal issues. This is by design. I recognize that Batavia Downs is a major advertiser.  When Mike is available to cover OTB, his coverage provides a degree of separation between me and that business interest.

Mike is an experienced and professional reporter.  He does something that the folks at Investigative Post often fail to do -- he makes sure all sides are represented.  He doesn't cherry-pick. He doesn't sensationalize.  He just reports the story straight.

It seems the folks at IP think we toe the "OTB party line" (itself a loaded phrase that betrays the Post's bias).  No, we just ask Henry Wojtaszek questions and are careful not to misquote him or misrepresent him. Apparently, the folks at IP equate telling a balanced story, letting both sides have their say, with biased coverage. That tells us something about their mindset. Being fair is biased when your view is already made up about a person or entity. 

It's almost like they want to try and cower another publication from calling into question their shoddy reporting.

Take, for example, their latest report on Western OTB's legal fees.

OTB shells out millions for lawyers and lobbyists

The basic presumption of the article is biased, that Western OTB isn't entitled to respond to legal challenges.

Legal challenges that were largely created by the past sensationalistic reporting by IP on Batavia Downs, a fact IP pretty much admits to:

Investigative Post used 2018 as a benchmark for spending on lawyers and lobbyists because OTB operated in relative obscurity until Investigative Post began reporting on its problems that December.

Investigative Post considers mistakes and oversights to be "problems," implying misdeeds in the context of the story.  More bias.

An old journalist's trick to justify reporting on something you think should be scandalous is to find somebody to criticize it without full transparency about the source's agenda or finding a way to balance his or her opinion.  IP has those sources, an Erie County elected official with a political agenda and a former disgruntled OTB executive.  Not that there is anything wrong with giving those people a platform to speak their minds, but knowing up front that they are biased against the target of a story, a fair so-called investigative reporter would seek out sources who might have a different point of view, particularly the chief spokesperson for the agency in question, in this case, Henry Wojtaszek.  Of course, Wojtaszek refused to comment on this particular story, but who can blame him, given the IP's history of sensationalizing its coverage of OTB?  But surely, the reporter, J. Dale Shoemaker, could have found another legal expert to address the issue that would balance the story, perhaps noting that these expenses are not out of line given what OTB has had to deal with since December 2018.

We now know that Shoemaker could have called City of Rochester OTB representative Dennis Basset for a less sensationalistic take on the legal expenditures, though one suspects that Shoemaker didn't much like Bassett's response to his questions following Thursday's OTB meeting. There are surely other board members who support Wojtaszek who would have shared their views on the matter.

Then there is this quote from Mike Nolan, the former OTB employee, that is presented naked of any meaningful context. 

“As a former chief operating officer, the costs that you’re speaking to seem to be extraordinarily high from what they were in years past,” he said.

Well, of course, costs have gone up since Nolan left.  He's one of the reasons for higher legal costs since he filed a lawsuit against Western OTB alleging wrongful termination.  And since he's left, there have been other questionable attacks on Western OTB that officials there feel the need to defend.  Why is it surprising that the agency's legal costs have gone up? And isn't it the right of OTB leadership to defend themselves against what they see as unfair and legally misguided attacks?

Here's their most significant 2018 story reported by IP:

OTB’s part-time board enjoys gold-plated perks

This started the ball rolling on the accusation that the OTB board has illegally or improperly provided itself health care insurance.  In the one story I've written on this topic because Mike Pettinella wasn't available, Wojtaszek explained how this issue has been misrepresented. The interview was in response to a now-dismissed lawsuit by George Maziarz (who was represented by another Erie County Democratic politician, Nate McMurray). (It's worth mentioning that this story gave Maziarz his say and allowed Wojtaszek space to respond -- fair and balanced reporting, as it should be done).

As for health insurance for board members, Western OTB has attorneys working on the issue.  The agency does not agree that board members can't receive health insurance coverage.  

While Maziarz says that the Comptroller's Office and a legal firm hired by Western OTB say the practice is illegal, the issue doesn't appear to be that cut and dry. There is an older Comptroller's opinion that says the practice is permissible.  The memo on the topic, prepared by attorneys Gabriel M. Nugent and Robert J. Thorpe for the board, cites the 1978 opinion as well as the later opinion and suggests board members no longer accept health insurance.  It doesn't, as Maziarz claims, call the practice illegal.  

Health insurance, Wojtaszek said, is justified because pretty much every other public benefit corporation in the state offers it, and Batavia Downs operates in a very competitive environment and needs to attract and retain the most qualified board members. 

The other issue addressed by Wojtaszek is the allegations first raised by IP and echoed in the Maziarz suit is the use of free tickets to sporting events.

Batavia Downs acquires tickets as perks for high rollers and special guests, Wojtaszek said.  A host from Batavia Downs typically accompanies these guests to the events. The role of the host is to ensure things go smoothly that people get their tickets, get into the venue, receive the service expected for the event, and that the host takes care of any issues that arise.

"Previously, if you were host, we provided a ticket to the host and then the host was allowed to bring a guest with them," Wojtaszek said. "At that point, they may have brought somebody from a wife, a husband, a son, or a daughter with them. We have since corrected that. Subsequent to the recommendation from the compliance company, it's just a host who takes care of whatever event, hockey game, football game, concert, and I think we're doing it properly now."

He said that the accusation that board members could just casually ask for tickets to Bills or Sabres games at board meetings and receive them misrepresents what actually took place. He said anybody, including board members, could ask for tickets on behalf of patrons of Batavia Downs.  They were not, he said, asking for themselves and friends and family.  However, to help improve the procedure, all requests must now be in writing and clearly state who is receiving the tickets. 

There were about 100 tickets unaccounted for, not the thousands previously alleged.

Balanced Coverage
These are just two examples where the Investigative Post has sensationalized stories and misrepresented the truth. If you search the Post's website for "Batavia Downs," you will find four pages of sensationalized headlines and stories, a regular drum beat of negative story angles. What you won't find are stories about record revenue, about Democratic board members backing Wojtaszek's leadership, record distributions to counties, in-depth interviews with Wojtaszek addressing the allegations against him and the board, the Downs' support of area charities, any of its concerts, or its successful Night of Champions.  It seems that anything positive about Batavia Downs would disrupt the flow of IP's "corruption" narrative.

Shoemaker was so eager to push the corruption narrative that he used that loaded word with Bassett in an interview after the board meeting on Thursday.

Clearly, Shoemaker didn't like Bassett's full response to his question because he truncated the key portion of Bassett's quote in his report on the meeting

"I think corruption is a very strong term," he said. "I've been on this board, as I said, 14 years, and I don't see corruption."

The denial of corruption by a Democrat completely upsets the narrative being pushed by the Post, so of course, Shoemaker didn't include it.  Shoemaker's article on the whole overlays and misrepresents Bassett's discussion of "reform."  Overall, Bassett concentrated on how well Western OTB is doing and that it is important to stay focused on the business of the operation and its success and not be distracted by politics.

Shoemaker also left out Bassett's statements about changes and reforms already undertaken, instead focusing on potential further "reforms."  Again, it would disturb the narrative to report that Wojtaszek and the board have actively responded to criticism and made changes.

If your news business model is to always attack and criticize without ever recognizing the good in people or institutions, then that's a flawed business model. As long as Investigative Post maintains that business model, all it will do is hurt its credibility with fair-minded people while partisans cheer them on, giving them the illusion that they're doing everything right.

It's worth noting that nobody yet, not even the Post, has turned up any evidence of corruption.  Mistakes, yes, as Wojtaszek has owned up to, which IP hasn't reported. Throughout five years of constant badgering by IP and others, no illegal activity has been identified.  Yes, there is an FBI investigation (which is helping drive up OTB's legal costs), but that has been ongoing for years -- apparently, but the FBI never confirms anything -- and an investigation is not proof of illegal activity. Yet IP throws around the word "corruption" often enough to convince me that the folks there clearly believe OTB is corrupt.  In old-school journalism, we call that kind of belief "bias." 

GCEDC
Based on a prior email conversation with Shoemaker, the folks at Investigative Post also seem to think we pander to GCEDC because GCEDC bought some ads from us.  Yes, GCEDC this year -- for the first time -- placed some ads with The Batavian.  The entire expenditure is less than one percent of this year's revenue. Yet Shoemaker called into question my ethics. He was ticked that I wouldn't grant him an interview about the ad buy.  Why? Because I don't trust the Investigative Post, which I made clear to him.

We've had no issue in the past reporting stories that are unfavorable to GCEDC's agenda. Most notably, we brought attention to GCEDC's plans to use tax incentives for remodeling at Batavia Towne Center. Those design changes would eventually, as expected, lure Dick's Sporting Goods to Batavia. Tax incentives to support retail businesses are a questionable use of an IDA's power since locally owned businesses can be damaged.  In fact, both businesses mentioned in the story above are now out of business.  I know for a fact that our stories did not please, to put it mildly, the folks over at GCEDC.

Tainted Money
So let's return to the for-profit vs. not-for-profit debate.  

I've encountered the arrogance of nonprofit publishers many times over the past 15 years. They think that because they are not driven by profit in capitalist terms, their motivations are pristine.  And that is their blind spot.  All news organizations need to bring in more revenue than they spend and set some aside for inevitable revenue shortfalls when business cycles take a dive, as financial disclosures show Investigative Post does.

Here's the thing though: All money is tainted in some way. The need to raise money to fund journalism doesn't isolate the publication's leaders from pressure to shade coverage. It doesn't matter if you operate with a profit motive or without.  As Bob Dylan sang, "You've got to serve somebody."  

If you rely on advertising, you might be tempted to bend to an advertiser's will (though, as I explain above, this is less likely, but I have seen it happen).  If all of your revenue comes from readers, either through subscriptions or memberships, then you will be more likely to cater to the will of the readers, who don't always see the full picture or have a balanced view of the world. For example, if you're a publisher in a largely progressive Democratic community, you're going to be hard-pressed to publish stories that run against that orthodoxy.  If nothing else, you'll be less welcome at swank cocktail parties. And, finally, if all your revenue comes from donors, you're going to be beholden to your largest donors.  

If most of your donors are institutional -- meaning big annual grants -- you're only going to get grants if your operations conform to the foundation's political ideology if they have one, and in my experience, many do, either left or right, because that's why they get into the business of handing out money -- to push agendas.

Investigative Post reported $434,875 in donations in 2022. Jim Heaney, the founder, editor and executive director, was paid more than $70,000. That isn't exorbitant for his leadership position, but clearly, he needs the Investigative Post to be successful if he wants to continue earning that salary in an era when good-paying journalism jobs are hard to come by.

The Post lists among its major donors some fairly progressive, left-leaning funders, such as the Wallace Global Fund, the Rowboat Family Foundation, and the Knight Foundation (this might surprise some, but I have personal experience dealing with that foundation's agenda-driven contributions in another organization where I served on the board).

These potential ties to Democratic donors, and the need to pander to mostly Democratic Erie County, are important to think about because the reporting of the Post has helped lead the the disenfranchisement of the rural counties that are members of the OTB board of directors.  Earlier this year, Democratic State Sen. Tim Kennedy of Buffalo pushed through legislation that weighted the OTB board voting in favor of the Democratic-dominated counties of Monroe, Niagara and Erie. 

For the Investigative Post, mission accomplished, perhaps. The problem is the current board seems to favor Monroe County's Bassett, who seems to support Wojtaszek, as its new chair, with one notable exception. Erie County's board member Jennifer Hibit blocked Bassett's appointment to chair. 

Isn't it interesting that an Erie County Democrat, Sen. Kennedy, wrote legislation to put enough power in the hands of Erie County's Democrats that one OTB member can thwart the will of the rest of the board, including non-Erie County Democrats? A more cynical and conspiracy-minded person (and I hate conspiracy theories) would suspect that Erie County Democrats, aided and abetted by the Investigative Post, are trying to angle to gobble up more of the revenue generated by Batavia Downs.  Legally that might be difficult, but way less difficult for Erie County Democrats to pull off is selling Batavia Downs to the Seneca Nation or the politically connected Delaware North (where Gov. Kathy Hochul's husband works UPDATE: A couple of days after publication I was informed Bill Hochul recently left Delaware North). Don't be surprised if there is pressure from the governor's office on Monroe County to remove Bassett from the OTB board. Would Heany and Shoemaker call that corruption? 

And don't expect the Investigative Post to question the motives of the Democratic Party when it comes to Western OTB.

Savarino and Elliott Station
If the Post isn't just about pushing a political agenda and really, truly, about investigating questionable conduct, why hasn't it written anything about Sam Savarino and Savarino Companies? 

Savarino is one of Buffalo's most prominent developers and has been involved in multiple projects supported by taxpayer dollars, which is normally just the kind of target the Post likes.

As The Batavian has pretty much exclusively reported -- Ellicott Station was sold to the community first as market-rate housing, then as workforce housing, only to find out it was really intended to be very low-income housing with subsidized rents. The Investigative Post has called into question our relationship with GCEDC, but that reporting by Joanne Beck led to a less-than-pleasant phone call from a GCEDC official.  Of course, we knew our reporting would upset some people locally, but we did it anyway because it was the right thing to do.

Since then, Savarino Companies has gone out of business. The result, apparently, of questionable dealings with Alfred State and New York State, leaving, we're told, multiple projects incomplete, including Ellicott Station.

This is surely a situation that begs for more investigative reporting. We're doing our best to push hard on the Ellicott Station issue, the only news organization to do so, even though we must rock some boats in the process, but we don't have the resources to commit to a major investigative project. A developer of Savarino's history certainly has a deep and long paper trail an investigative reporter could explore. I would love to do it, but I wouldn't be able to cover soccer and basketball games, school board meetings, planning board meetings, town board meetings, community events, and other such news that I'm sure Heany finds beneath his dignity.  All my time would be taken up by digging through Savarino documents and ferreting out sources.

Meanwhile, the Investigative Post is generating substantially more revenue than we are, has a much larger staff with only one charge -- digging up dirt -- and they're letting Sam Savarino off the hook.  Why?

My only guess is it has something to do with Savarino being a major contributor to Investigative Post and sitting on the board of directors.

Talk about a conflict of interest for Heaney. He's living in quite the glass house, but he wants to throw stones at me.

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