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Making Water Affordable and Accountable | Buffalo in Transition
Anna Blatto — Jun 6, 2025
Buffalo sits on one of the world’s largest freshwater sources, but many residents still struggle to afford water. Rates have increased five times since 2006, and in a single year, over 2,500 occupied homes were shut off, many for owing less than $1,000. The system lacks transparency and is managed by a private company under a quietly renewed $7.8 million annual contract. This brief outlines how Buffalo can restore public control, prevent shutoffs, create income-based rates, and …
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Restoring Trust in City Hall | Buffalo in Transition
Caitlin Love Crowell — Jun 6, 2025
Buffalo’s city government must cultivate transparency, accountability, and good faith - qualities that are essential to public trust and effective democracy. But Buffalo falls short of ethical standards in several key areas, from nepotism and closed-door decision-making to inactive oversight bodies and political influence in public spending. This brief outlines practical, common-sense steps to rebuild trust: enforcing transparency laws, preventing conflicts of interest, strengthening …
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Ranked Choice Voting in Western New York? Successes & Lessons from New York City
Jay Wendland, Erin Carman — May 8, 2023
Western New York (WNY) should consider joining the ranks of the sixty-two jurisdictions nation-wide that have chosen Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) over the more commonly used plurality voting system. In weighing the importance of such a change, voters and leaders may consider lessons and successes learned from New York City (NYC) in its adoption and implementation of RCV.
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A Planning Board for Erie County
Anthony Hilbert Apr 13, 2016
The Partnership for the Public Good (PPG) unites 212organizations working to build a better western New York. Each year, the partners vote on their top policy priorities for the coming year; these priorities become the PPG Community Agenda. The very first Community Agenda, formed in 2008, included a provision calling for a planning board in Erie County. Since that time, the reasons for a planning board have only become more compelling. There is a reason that every other …
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City of Buffalo Living Wage Ordinance
City of Buffalo — Dec 31, 2007
The city awards many contracts to private firms to provide services to the public and to city government. Experience indicates that procurement by contract of services has all too often resulted in the payment by service contractors to their employees of wages at or slightly above the minimum required by federal and state minimum wage laws. Such minimal compensation tends to inhibit the quantity and quality of services rendered by such employees to the city and to the public. …