‘Draft Day’ becomes another bust for Buffalo

March 5, 2013, 10:02 pm

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A furious fourth-quarter rally mounted by New York State officials – including a top aide to Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo – has fallen short in keeping the film “Draft Day” in Buffalo.

The movie, which was to depict Kevin Costner as a fictitious Buffalo Bills general manager trying to restore his team to past glory, will instead be shot in Cleveland, with the actor portraying the Cleveland Browns GM.

The big reason, said Tim Clark, who heads the Buffalo Niagara Film Commission, was economics.

“At the end of the day, it was a money thing. I think Mr. [Ivan] Reitman really wanted to shoot here, but it just came down to the cost factor. What we were told is that the Cleveland incentives were better,” Clark said.

“I feel the worse for the Buffalo Bills, because they worked real hard to convince the film company that Buffalo was the place to shoot this, and that Buffalo was America’s team.”

Last month, Reitman, the film’s director, and a location scout toured Ralph Wilson Stadium, asb well as other local sites, and seemed excited about filming the movie in Buffalo, Clark said. But Lionsgate, the film’s distributor, thought otherwise despite efforts by state officials to sweeten the pot and keep the movie here.

Howard Glaser, chief of state operations, was enlisted by the governor to talk with Lionsgate officials in an attempt to change the studio’s mind. Howard Zemsky, one of Cuomo’s go-to guys in Western New York, also was brought in to try to find a solution.

“The state responded in short order in a very robust way and was able to narrow the gap considerably. But at the end of the day, the producer selected Cleveland,” Zemsky said.

Despite the added incentives offered by New York State, it was still about $3 million cheaper to film in Cleveland than Buffalo, a source said.

One factor was that there is a 35 percent tax deduction incentive for making the movie in Cleveland for Ohio crew members, 5 percent higher than New York State. A bill sponsored by State Sen. Patrick Gallivan, R-Elma, would increase incentives for upstate and Western New York, allowing up to a 45 percent credit for Buffalo.

Such legislation, sponsors say, would boost the local film industry and create the kind of workforce that would mean it would not be necessary to bring in stagehands and other crew members from New York City, with the added expenses of transportation and per diem payments.

“I wish I could say what happened was a rarity, but it’s becoming a more common occurrence,” Clark said. “I don’t know if the Reitman film would have come here if we had a higher tax incentive upstate and in Western New York, but it wouldn’t have hurt.”

Gallivan also weighed in on the loss of the movie: “The news today that Cleveland was selected over Western New York as the filming location for ‘Draft Day’ is just the latest example of why New York State needs to expand and reform its film production tax credit program,” he said.

“We have desirable locations through the area, and we have near-universal support from within the community, but we are lacking an incentive program that can compete with neighboring states.

“Western New York didn’t lose a movie today, we lost jobs. A failure to act after this latest development would be inexcusable,” Gallivan said.

Principal photography is expected to begin next month at the NFL draft in Radio City Music Hall.

Gallivan’s legislation has received the support of the Buffalo Common Council and the New York Production Alliance, based in New York City and representing 75,000 movie and TV professionals, in a letter to Cuomo.

Downstate theatrical stagehand unions have also expressed support for boosting the tax credits in upstate and Western New York.



email: msommer@buffnews.com

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Sabres' faults look familiar

March 6, 2013, 3:50 am

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RALEIGH, N.C. — The Sabres arrived at the midpoint of their season with a 4-3 loss to Carolina, a setback that encapsulated Buffalo’s biggest blunders of the first half:

• They don’t always play a full game.

• They have too many defensive mistakes.

• They have lapses after goals that allow opponents to regain momentum.

The Sabres had cleaned up most of their problems during a 3-0-1 run, but Carolina ended the streak Tuesday by picking on the visitor’s weaknesses in PNC Arena. The Hurricanes built a 2-0 lead, in part because Buffalo slept through the opening 20 minutes, then repeatedly pulled away during the third whenever the Sabres got close in a frantic attempt to rally.

“It comes back to playing a full 60 minutes,” defenseman Tyler Myers said. “It’s what’s gotten us in trouble the past three years that I can remember. We have to find a way to start a game and to finish it. We can’t start playing when it’s too late.

“Basically, for the whole third period, we were really good. When we were a desperate team, we played exactly the way we need to play on any given night. In a way it was really nice to see the way we can be as a team, the way we can play as a team.

“It’s frustrating knowing we can play like that and we don’t do it for a full 60 and we don’t stay consistent with it.”

The Hurricanes attempted 33 shots in the first period while Buffalo had just 11. The Sabres were fortunate that only Jiri Tlusty’s deflection 1:31 into the game found the net in the opening 20 minutes.

“They completely outworked us,” Myers said. “They were all over us in our D-zone, and we didn’t deserve to win that period.”

They didn’t win the second, either, as Joe Corvo scored on the power play to double Carolina’s lead.

Cody Hodgson scored his first of two goals just 25 seconds into the third to prove that Carolina’s Justin Peters wasn’t invincible. The goaltender, called up Monday to replace injured Cam Ward and starting only because No. 2 netminder Dan Ellis was ill, earned a standing ovation from the crowd of 15,277 after robbing Thomas Vanek of an open-net goal by diving and reaching his stick across the goal line late in the second.

Peters finished with 37 saves in his first NHL start of the year.

“He made some great glove saves,” Hodgson said. “The ones we scored weren’t easy goals, so he played a good game.”

Just 50 seconds after Hodgson made it 2-1, Jussi Jokinen put the Sabres back in a two-goal hole. T.J. Brennan made it 3-2 with 5:27 left on a rare power-play goal, but Alexander Semin scored 1:40 later to again put Buffalo down by two.

“It was obviously disappointing,” Sabres interim coach Ron Rolston said. “We were trying to fight back in it, and they would get one right after that. We’ve got to do a better job of taking care of those next couple shifts after we score.”

Hodgson’s highlight-reel goal with 35 seconds left – he stole the puck from Eric Staal at center ice and went around both Tlusty and Justin Faulk – completed the scoring.

“Offensively, obviously, it was just too little, too late,” said Sabres right wing Brian Flynn.

The line of Staal, Tlusty and Semin combined for two goals and five assists. Most of the points came when they got free in front for tip-ins or point-blank shots on Ryan Miller (24 saves).

“We could have been tighter in some of those instances, without question,” said Rolston, whose team visits New Jersey on Thursday with a 9-13-2 record. “Their top line, they make a lot of skill plays in that area. We probably could have had better defensive sticks, but it’s a work in progress.”



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Students face long ride

March 6, 2013, 3:46 am

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Each morning, dozens of students as young as 5 from subdivisions in the southern and southeastern corners of the Lancaster Central School District pile onto buses for the ride to the John A. Sciole Elementary School in the town’s northwestern corner.

The young pupils spend 45 minutes or more on the bus each morning and again in the afternoon, parents say. But on their trips, the youngsters pass two elementary schools in southern Lancaster to get to Sciole.

The district must bus some children a considerable distance to Sciole and its other three elementary schools because Lancaster faces a fundamental problem: Its two largest schools are in the northern part of the town, but most of the elementary-age students live in newer subdivisions in the south.

Lancaster isn’t the only local district wrestling with school boundaries, declining enrollment or long bus rides for pupils. Any attempt to address these issues stirs up parental emotions.

The Kenmore-Town of Tonawanda School District recently closed Jefferson Elementary School and has hired a consultant to study further consolidation in a district whose student population is shrinking.

And nearly 300 people came out for a discussion of West Seneca’s plan, approved last month, to convert that district’s East Elementary School into a revamped East Middle School.

“Across Western New York, I think all districts are experiencing declining enrollment,” West Seneca Superintendent Mark J. Crawford said. “We need to face it, given the financial challenges such as significant reductions in state aid.”

West Seneca took on the challenge of closing an elementary school in response to budget constraints and a decline in the district’s population, which went from more than 9,000 students in the 1990s to 6,800 today even though the district still has seven elementary schools.

At Northwood Elementary School, where Crawford served as principal in the 1990s, enrollment has declined from around 650 then to a little more than 500 today, he said.

Following a passionate debate, the district closed East Elementary School because it shares a campus with East Middle School, allowing the district to expand the number of grades served by the middle school.

The district’s population is larger in the western part of town, but the district doesn’t have boundary or busing problems because four of its seven – soon to be six – elementary schools are in the west, Crawford said.In the Clarence School District, the students who have the longest bus ride to the district’s four elementary schools live along Tonawanda Creek, the northern border of the district, or in the section of Newstead within the Clarence district.

The district prefers that students not ride longer than 45 minutes on a bus, but some may ride a little longer, said Rick Mancuso, the district’s business administrator.

If he could magically move an elementary school, Mancuso said, he would shift Sheridan Hill, on Boncrest Drive East, a mile or so to the north.

“Other than that, everything’s working well,” he said.

And the Orchard Park School District in 2007 redrew the boundaries for its four elementary schools because three of the schools were at, or over, preferred capacity; only Windom was under.

“The structure of the population got to the point where we needed to balance our schools to maintain class sizes,” said Al McClymonds, president of the Orchard Park School Board, recalling an inclusive decision-making process and packed board meetings.

The Lancaster district has faced this situation before, when it closed Central Avenue Elementary School in 2010. That school was centrally located in the district, but was the smallest of the five elementary schools, officials said.

After that closing, the district tweaked elementary school boundaries that had been in effect since 2002.

The district was left with two elementary schools a mile apart from each other in the north – Sciole, on Alys Drive East in Depew, and Hillview, on Pleasant View Drive in Lancaster – and two located 2½ miles apart in the south – Court Street and Como Park, on the streets of the same names.Sciole and Hillview each can accommodate 75 to 90 more students than the smaller schools in the south. The elementary schools serve kindergarten through third grade, while William Street School serves fourth, fifth and sixth grades.

The four elementary schools were built between 1947 and 1964, when the Village of Lancaster was the densely populated part of town, said Superintendent Edward J. Myszka, who graduated from Lancaster schools.

The growth in the district in the last 20 years came in the new subdivisions in the south and southeast sections of the town, off Aurora Street, Lake Avenue and Bowen Road.

“The south, prior to that, was predominantly vacant land,” Myszka said.

The district a decade ago worked out a map that has Hillview covering the largest geographic area, mainly the northeastern part of the town. Como Park draws from a barbell-shaped district in the southwestern part of the district, and Court Street draws from a largely contiguous district located east of the Como Park district.

Sciole’s 379 students, however, come from three areas: 213 from the northwest corner of the district, 54 from a small pocket in the southern part of town and 112 from the larger piece in the far southeastern corner.

“The big problem, the reason this all came about, was the development in Lancaster. We were building, building, building, and nobody took into consideration where the building was happening,” School Board Vice President Marie MacKay said.

Parents say the odd configuration of the district can mean long bus rides for their children.Lynn Zamrok, co-president of the Sciole Parent-Teacher Organization, has a son in third grade at Sciole and a daughter in fifth grade at William Street who spent four years at Sciole. Her son can spend 45 minutes on the bus, each way. Next year he will join his sister in the much shorter ride to William Street School.

“I count the days now,” said Zamrok, whose family lives on Fox Trace. She said she recently joked with the Sciole principal, “I bet you, once I’m gone, they’re going to redistrict.”

Nicole Spaulding and her family live in the Country Club Estates development, leaving her son, a first-grader, with an “absolutely crazy” bus ride of 55 to 70 minutes to Hillview.

Both Zamrok and Spaulding say they love the Lancaster schools and recognize the complexity of the problem. As a short-term fix, they suggested not waiting until the buses are full and instead sending the buses on to their schools once they are half-full.

District officials, however, say this isn’t realistic because of the extra cost involved in using more buses and hiring more drivers.

School administrators say the general movement of students from south to north is the only way to make the numbers work.

At last week’s School Board meeting, Michael J. Vallely, the assistant superintendent for curriculum, instruction and pupil services, showed a map of the current district boundaries with colored dots representing students.

“Those particular boundaries are not perfect, not exactly commonsensical, but when we closed Central Avenue, it all works, and all the little dots there fit into the buildings in the appropriate ways,” he said.The district reviews its boundaries each year, and as part of the review, presented two redistricting options to take the temperature of the School Board.

Based on the lukewarm reaction from the board, district officials say they won’t change elementary-school boundaries this year.

But they will watch the population trends in the district, where the classes entering elementary school now are smaller than the classes in the high school. In response, the district laid off three elementary-school teachers last year and is proposing to lay off two more this year.

“I think to address the inconvenience issues with some people, the options we see would create a bigger problem,” board President Kenneth Graber said. “We’d like to resolve it, but there doesn’t seem to be a better way.”



email: swatson@buffnews.com

A river rescue by Officer Daryl Truty

March 9, 2013, 7:08 pm

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NORTH TONAWANDA – When Daryl Truty thinks back on it now, just three or four minutes went by between the calls for help and his rescue of the drowning man he has never seen or heard from again.

As he told the story of jumping into the swift current of the Little River branch of the Niagara River, it seemed like it all lasted a slow 15 minutes.

“He was struggling to stay up. He was going under for a second at a time,” Truty said, relating what he remembers of that afternoon last July.

“He would go down and pop back up briefly. He wasn’t able to stay above water.”

Truty had been on vacation, taking his boat out to fix the propeller, when he heard the cries and jumped in the water to make the rescue along with two other men who were nearby.

In the months that have gone by since, news of what happened percolated through local civic clubs. This year, his daring led them to surprise him with commendations, which included a city proclamation “for the dedication and zeal he has demonstrated for his lifesaving ‘Selfless act of Heroism.’ ”

He started to help when a friend of the drowning man called out from a cement bridge piling he managed to climb up on.

Soon Truty and his friend were in life jackets holding onto the man and the edge of an inflatable dingy that Tim Trimper, who also heard the cries, had motored over in from Smith Boys Marina.

“That was that guy’s lucky day, because there was nobody else around except for us,” said Jim Maloney, Truty’s friend and manager of the River Oaks Marina on Grand Island. “If he lives to 80 years, he’s there because three people he didn’t know decided they were going to do something.”

So you threw a first, then a second, “rescue” pillow into the water before you jumped?

I almost hit him with it. I believe he was semiconscious because he didn’t know what was going on. He made no attempt to grab it.

Jim put the life jacket on. He jumped in off the bat. The wind was blowing ... He was getting too far away for us to catch up to him.

The guy in the dingy managed to grab onto the drowning man?

They were basically free-floating on the channel.

You swam to the raft as the boater was saying he didn’t have the strength to keep holding the man?

We met up kind of at the same time ...

So then I was holding on to the kid in the water. Jim Maloney finally caught up to us at that point, swimming. I was holding onto one of the ropes as I was holding onto him. Once Jim Maloney came, we decided that we would push him onto the boat. Somehow we communicated to each other that we needed to get him into the boat. We grabbed onto him and pushed him into the boat ...

The boat couldn’t have been more than eight feet long. It’s just a small inflatable with a motor on it.

Were you afraid?

What was going on in my head was what I had to do. That was probably more job-related. I don’t think I thought about the dangers of what we were doing until it was all over.

Everything seemed to work out in his favor at that time. I can’t say it wasn’t that dangerous. Any series of events could have happened with the boat propellers. With one of us getting too tired and drowning. Even to this day, I don’t see how much I put myself at risk because I don’t see it as that. When it was all over, to me, it felt like the everyday thing that we do every time I come to work.

Have you done other rescues?

Most of the time we’re not able to be in the position to have made a difference. Because that kid would not have been here today if anything was off by 10 seconds. He had a very little window of time where he probably wouldn’t be here. There was probably less than a minute of time whether or not he was dead or alive.

What do you know about him?

I think he was around 20. I think they were just swimming. I think he tried to swim upstream to get back to where he was, and he got tired.

I thought I heard he was from Rochester. One of the firemen seemed to think he was here with Canal Fest. I believe they transported him to DeGraff.

Was it strange not to hear from him?

I thought somebody would have maybe said something. I guess it is a little surprising never to have heard.

I wouldn’t describe it as disappointing because I wasn’t looking for anything. I’ve obviously received awards for what happened. I wasn’t looking for any awards. They’re very much appreciated.

What did your family think?

My wife ended up seeing all the fire engines. She was there when I got back. It didn’t surprise her that I was in the middle of it. It isn’t out of the ordinary. I seem to end up in the middle of things.

What do you mean?

Probably six years ago, I went in water after somebody else before that was trying to avoid the police. He was trying to avoid arrest, and he jumped in the water. Almost the same exact spot. That’s why it didn’t surprise her.

We always had a pool. We’ve always had a boat. I grew up around the water. I’m not afraid to go in the water.

Everybody’s been pretty good about it. I’d prefer to not be in the center of attention.

Hopefully this summer I’ll only have to swim for my personal pleasure.



Know a Niagara County resident who would make an interesting column? Write to Q&A, The Buffalo News, P.O. Box 100, Buffalo, NY 14240, or email niagaranews@buffnews.com. email: mkearns@buffnews.com

Church left out with Chestnut Ridge rule changes

March 9, 2013, 7:08 pm

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Congregants of Armor Bible Church in Orchard Park for decades have gathered for a sunrise Easter service inside the stone-and-timber casino building at Chestnut Ridge Park.

The tradition will come to an end this year.

The popular park building is no longer available to rent for private events and weddings.

It is a policy change for Erie County that came as welcome news to parkgoers who found themselves locked out of the building and its restrooms during private functions.

But it also means groups like Armor Bible Church have been displaced.

“Is this the park service serving the public?” asked the Rev. Douglas Sukhia, pastor of Armor Bible. His church only used the building for a few hours once a year on a typically quiet Easter morning and always kept the service open to anyone who wanted to attend, he said.

“It’s sort of like, for the sake of one or two people, 200 have to change,” he said.

The rental policy for the building was actually changed last year, after County Executive Mark C. Poloncarz took office, but the Parks Department allowed groups and bridal parties that already had secured reservations to continue with their events through 2012. No new reservations have been taken.

The goal, said Parks Commissioner Troy Schinzel, is to keep one of the county’s “crown jewels” open to the public whenever the park is open. Rental fees, he said, didn’t make up for the loss of public access to the building during weddings and private parties.

Easter Sunday might be a slow morning at Chestnut Ridge, but some Saturdays during wedding season can bring hundreds of people to the park who couldn’t use the casino building if it was rented.

“It’s a policy decision, which to me has nothing to do with the financial gains but what you lose by renting it out and making it a private, not-open-to-the-public area,” Schinzel said.

Rental revenue for the Chestnut Ridge casino remained just a tiny portion of the county’s parks revenue. The building, according to county records, was rented 15 times in 2011 for a total of $5,400. The county that year brought in $2 million in revenue through its parks, golf courses and concessions.

That’s a contrast to Marcy Casino in Buffalo’s Delaware Park, where the non-profit Olmsted Parks Conservancy relies heavily on income derived from the building’s rental to support maintenance and care of the Olmsted parks. The organization uses a professional manager and caterer to help facilitate weddings and events.

“It’s a long tradition in Delaware Park to use the Marcy Casino for private functions,” said Thomas Herrera-Mishler, president of the conservancy. “It’s also part of our strategy to raise earned income for the support of the parks.”

At Chestnut Ridge, park users like Julie Francisco of Springville found the previous rental policy for the county-owned stone casino unfair, especially during the busy fall and summer wedding season when the building would sometimes be closed to the public on back-to-back Saturdays. Even after the county said it would keep bathrooms open to the public during private functions, she said, park users often found “closed” signs on the door when wedding preparations were under way.

“I totally understand that the county wanted to raise some revenue from this beautiful place,” said Francisco, who runs with a group in the park every Saturday. “Our problem was that it locked out the public. It’s a public place with public access, and our tax dollars went to renovate it.”

The decision to take the building off the county’s rental list will likely disappoint some brides-to-be.

“It’s a beautiful location,” said Katie Ingraham, who specializes in wedding and equestrian photography through her company, Il Cavallo Photography.

Ingraham has used Chestnut Ridge as a backdrop for wedding portraits. On one wintery day, she had taken a couple to the park for portraits expecting to photograph them outdoors. A private group was using the casino for a race, but she said organizers graciously allowed the wedding party inside.

Sukhia, the pastor at Armor Bible Church, said the church has never had to rent the casino, but instead got special permission to use it Easter morning for free when the building was typically empty.

This year, Armor Bible will move its Easter sunrise service – which Sukhia says has drawn between 150 and 300 people in previous years – to 8 a.m. at its church on Powers Road in Orchard Park.

“We’ll make do,” Sukhia said. “It’s just that, boy, it was a beautiful place to have a service. It was open to everyone.”



email: djgee@buffnews.com

Mist-ified by lawsuit? Pay attention as state, Falls boat tour operator defend themselves in court

March 9, 2013, 7:08 pm

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NIAGARA FALLS – No one seems to know exactly what the new lawsuit challenging the Maid of the Mist will mean for Niagara Falls.

It could spell the end for an iconic local company that has taken people to the base of the falls for centuries.

It also could disrupt the popular boat tours at the height of the tourist season.

Or Hornblower could simply end up losing its case.

But one thing’s for certain: The suit, to be played out in State Supreme Court starting next month, already includes many intriguing angles for local residents.

The heart of the argument by Hornblower Cruises & Events of California lies in the contract that the Maid has with the state Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation.

That agreement allows the Maid to lease valuable public land at the base of Niagara Falls for the purpose of operating its popular boat tours.

The Maid keeps most of the profits from the service but pays New York State a share of each boat ride.

For years, the state has said little about how this agreement came to be. Hornblower’s suit sheds a bit more light on the state’s contention that the current 40-year contract with the Maid of the Mist – as well as previous contracts that dated from more than a century ago – did not need to be put out to bid.

The contract to lease the prime land at the base of the Niagara Gorge was never opened to public bidding, state officials have said, because the Maid was considered the “sole-source provider” of the tours.

In other words, no company other than the Maid could conceivably provide the American tours because they depended on the storage facilities controlled by the Maid on the Canadian side.

Those facilities – which protect the boats from the icy winter waters – have been used to store the Maid’s American and Canadian fleet for decades. No storage or fueling facilities have ever existed on the American side.

In justifying the lack of public bidding for the 2002 lease, state parks officials say that “it would be impossible for [the Maid] to use the American side for anything akin to their operation across the river,” other than to “pick up and discharge passengers,” according to the suit.

That statement was given in 1996 in response to concerns from the State Comptroller’s Office about why the new lease was not being put out to public bid.

And what would happen to the American contract if the Canadian operations, for some reason, were no longer controlled by the Maid?

State parks officials, according to a letter obtained in the suit, said they “could negotiate with” or “assign the balance of the [New York license] to,” whichever “new vendor” was awarded the license in Canada.

Hornblower says that it wanted a chance to do just that, but was never afforded the opportunity by state officials.

And company officials now say – given the previous reasoning – that they don’t understand the state’s recent agreement to let the Maid build a new storage facility on the site of the former Schoellkopf Power Plant.

That’s not the only instance where Hornblower is trying to use New York State’s words against it.

It also cites official state parks policy that calls for the state to “encourage competition for private sector investment and operation of public service facilities at State Parks and Historic Sites.”

State officials have said they do not need to put the lease out to public bid because the $30 million in storage construction at the Schoellkopf site is covered under an amendment to the original 2002 contract.

But Hornblower says in the suit that the state would essentially need to “move heaven and earth [and, according to recent regulatory filings, solid waste and storm water runoff]” for the company.

The crux of the lawsuit may lie in the state’s ability to prove that the Schoellkopf modifications are not significant enough to warrant a new deal and, therefore, public bidding.

Just as intriguing is the choice of legal representation by Hornblower.

In addition to its New York City legal team, the San Francisco company has chosen John P. Bartolomei to represent it in the proceedings.

Bartolomei is a longtime Niagara Falls attorney who seems to regularly find himself at the center of high-profile cases.

Only recently, he has served as legal representative for Niagara Falls Redevelopment, the controversial downtown landowner.

Last year, he also represented Nik Wallenda, the “King of the High Wire” who fought the city over unpaid expenses after his history-making wire-walk.

The Maid of the Mist case may not be as closely watched as Wallenda’s breathtaking event that drew worldwide attentionlast summer. But it could prove to be just as important to Niagara Falls.

“I have never seen something so blatantly against the law as this,” Bartolomei said last week. “To me, it’s as clear as day. I think we will prevail.”

Maid officials have said they “are confident that the courts will determine that this lawsuit is without merit.”

The next phase of the suit begins April 11.



email: cspecht@buffnews.com

Four community leaders to be honored for contributions

March 9, 2013, 7:09 pm

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Four community leaders will be honored as the National Federation for Just Communities of Western New York holds its 2013 Citation Banquet at 6 p.m. March 20 in Hyatt Regency Buffalo.

The honorees include Sister Margaret Carney, president of St. Bonaventure University; attorney Kenneth P. Friedman, a partner in Hodgson Russ LLP; certified public accountant Gerard T. Mazurkiewicz, a partner in Dopkins & Co. LLP; and Surjit Singh, a retired SUNY Buffalo State chemistry professor and an interfaith community leader.

Carney, the 20th president of St. Bonaventure, was appointed to the post in 2004 and helped restore integrity to the university following the basketball recruiting scandal that forced her predecessor to resign.

She served for eight years as general superior for her community, the Sisters of St. Francis of the Providence of God, before joining the St. Bonaventure staff in 1997 and, as president, has worked to reinforce the school’s role as a leading international resource for the Franciscan order.

Friedman, who is listed among the Best Lawyers in America, specializes in corporate law and leads his firm’s Business Practice Area and its Corporate & Securities Practice Group. He and his wife, Amy, a founder of Tapestry Charter School, are recipients of the NCCJ Sisterhood/Brotherhood Award for their dedication to the community.

A former board chairman of the NFJC and Leadership Buffalo, he supports numerous charitable and cultural agencies. He is secretary of the Shaw Festival, vice chairman of the Buffalo History Museum and a member of the boards of trustees for Temple Beth Zion and the Jewish Community Center for Greater Buffalo.

Mazurkiewicz, a former partner in the Buffalo office of KPMG, joined Dopkins in 2004 and specializes in income tax, estate tax and succession planning.

He serves on the boards of Women & Children’s Hospital, Kaleida Foundation, Community Foundation for Greater Buffalo, Hilbert College and University at Buffalo Foundation. Last year, he and his wife, Barbara, received the Bishop’s Medal from the Foundation of the Catholic Diocese of Buffalo.

Singh, who was born in India, has fostered a spirit of peace, diversity and interfaith dialogue since his arrival here in 1967. He was on the welcoming committee for the Dalai Lama’s visit to Western New York and after the 9/11 attacks helped lead the prayer service for healing and unity.

He has been a leader in the annual Interfaith Thanksgiving Service sponsored by the NFJC and the Network of Religious Communities and speaks frequently on interfaith issues. Former president of the Amherst Diversity Commission, he was instrumental in construction of the new Sikh Temple in Niagara Falls.

Co-chairmen of this year’s banquet are NFJC board members Laura A. Zaepfel, vice president for corporate affairs for Uniland Development Co.; and Peter A. Vukelic, vice president of government affairs for Try-It Distributing Co.

The NFJC has worked to combat racism and other discrimination in the area since it was founded as a branch of the National Conference of Christians and Jews in 1951. For information and tickets to the dinner, call 853-9596 or visit www.nfjcwny.org.



email: citydesk@buffnews.com

Dollar General prepared to build in Wilson

March 9, 2013, 7:09 pm

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WILSON – A Buffalo firm has been contracted to build a Dollar General store at 684 Lake St. and submitted a site concept plan to the Village of Wilson Planning Board.

Plans call for a 9,100-square-foot building on 1.1 acres of land, according to David Pawlik, of Creative Structures Services of Buffalo.

The property is directly across the street from the former Pfeiffer Foods plant, which closed in 2009.

“This was farmland, and we will need to grant a variance to make it commercial," Wilson Deputy Mayor Bernard “Bernie” Leiker said.

“They brought in their plans, and we said we’d need landscaping and a sidewalk put in across the front of the property. We want something in the façade to give it more character. They want to work with us on this to make it unique to Dollar General and unique to the village. ”

Pawlik said he hopes construction could be under way by May.

“This store will provide a service,” Leiker said. “A lot of people here like Dollar General, and they’ve been traveling to Newfane or other places to visit the store.

“ Now they’ll be able to walk to it. We also think this will draw people in from outside of the village, and this will increase our tax base.”

Dollar General is a Goodlettsville, Tenn.-based corporation with 10,000 stores in 40 states, posting $14.8 billion in sales last year, according to its Website.

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Niagara Wheatfield board votes to keep tax hike under limits

March 9, 2013, 7:10 pm

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SANBORN – Niagara Wheatfield Central School District voters won’t be asked to break the state tax cap this year.

The School Board has voted to keep any tax hike in 2013-14 within the maximum property tax hike limits. State law permits taxing entities such as school districts to raise taxes no more than 2 percent each year, with a number of exceptions. A district can override the taxing limit if the budget is passed by a “super majority” of voters, or 60 percent.

In 2012, Niagara Wheatfield voters were asked to approve a $61.7 million budget that carried a tax hike of slightly less than 10 percent. Several factions of the district had been lobbying at meetings to convince the board that a large tax bill was preferable to devastating cuts in programs and personnel.

Voters rejected that budget proposal and later supported a second proposal that kept the tax hike at less than 5 percent.

Board president Steve Sabo said he would not make the same mistake again.

“When we tried last year, we barely broke 40 percent (of the vote),” he said of the failed attempt to exceed the tax hike limit. “This year, we decided the people spoke. They didn’t want it.” On that premise, the board voted Feb. 6 to notify the state that it would not try to exceed the tax limit.

Sabo conceded that the board’s choices are few. Nearly 40 teaching positions were on the chopping block in the current year’s budget and a number of programs and offerings were eliminated or restructured.

“Not much is left,” he noted. “Last year, it was all flesh and muscle. Next is the marrow.”

But even with the taxing limit, Sabo said voters needed to be aware of what the state allows.

“People don’t know that it’s a ‘soft’ cap, not a ‘hard’ cap,” he advised.

Exclusions allow a district to go beyond 2 percent.

School business executive Kerin Dumphrey said if Niagara Wheatfield is allowed to include all of its budgetary exclusions, the tax cap would be increased to nearly 6 percent of the tax levy.

State law permits each district to adjust the tax limit beyond 2 percent by figuring in various factors such as assessment roll increases, losses from payment in lieu of taxes agreements, budget carry-overs, payments on the interest for capital projects, and increases in the cost of the teachers’ retirement system.

For Niagara Wheatfield, Dumphrey explained that if approved by the state, its tax levy could be increased from $28,661,923 to $30,354,760. The increase amounts to about 5.9 percent or 5.74 percent when the School Tax Relief Program (STAR) exemptions are included, he said. The exclusions for the district amount to an additional total of $1,372,466 toward the levy.

Dumphrey added that the proposed aid package from the state would make the situation worse as its increase is at 1.5 percent or $330,066.

Food truck owners seek lower permit fees

March 9, 2013, 7:12 pm

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Ordering a taco or a hamburger from a truck parked at the Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus or on Hertel Avenue might seem like a simple transaction.

But before that truck can sell anything, there are rules to follow and fees to be paid.

Owners of nine food trucks are seeking relief from the city’s $1,000 annual permit fee, but the fee will likely stay the same for first-time truck owners, said North Council Member Joseph Golombek, who has taken up the issue in the Common Council.

The Council is considering reducing the permit fee to approximately $750 for trucks that have already paid the $1,000 fee once under terms of an extension to the ordinance governing food trucks, which ends April 1. But truck owners are asking that the initial fee be lowered to $300 to $400 and that renewal fees not exceed $250. In exchange, they are not asking for changes to their operating rules.

“Buffalo should not be accruing profits to city coffers by assessing onerous fees upon the backs of small independent start-up businesses,” wrote Mitchell M. Stenger, a lawyer representing the Western New York Food Truck Association, in a letter to Golombek.

Truck owners are seeking changes for several reasons, one being that suburban communities are establishing their own fees and rules and will likely look at what Buffalo has done, Stenger said.

Debate about the trucks was heated leading up to passage of the original ordinance by the Council in January 2012. Golombek is hesitant to make many changes because of the competing interests surrounding the issue, including those of established restaurants, he said.

“Both sides will not be thrilled with this, but neither side will be unhappy with this either,” he said.

The debate could reach Council chambers Tuesday, depending on how far negotiations progress. Stenger’s letter to Golombek is part of the agenda for the Legislation Committee, which meets at 2 p.m. It’s possible the Council could approve new terms before the ordinance ends on April 1, Golombek said.

The trucks are also asking that if a mobile food vending business owns more than one truck, that the business is not charged more than $500 per year.

It is the city’s intention, however, to assess each truck a permit fee, meaning a business that wants a permit for two new trucks would have to pay $2,000, Golombek said.

The coalition is not asking for changes to the rule that prohibits them from being within 100 feet of an open kitchen, though Stenger noted that some cities have no such restrictions.

The Council is also considering a change to allow trucks into Canalside, though they would not be permitted there during special events, and the 100-foot rule would still apply.

Canalside is now under the oversight of Buffalo Place, which has different vending rules, and charges the trucks typically more than $1,000 in additional fees to operate at assigned locations.

Truck owners are also seeking to negotiate with Buffalo Place for better terms, as current fees and rules prohibit many trucks from operating downtown, Stenger said.



email: jterreri@buffnews.com

Picture a penguin and win a prize

March 9, 2013, 7:13 pm

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NIAGARA FALLS – With their comical waddles and sleek, tuxedoed looks, penguins can make inviting photo subjects.

That’s why the Aquarium of Niagara is now inviting photo submissions for a contest to help celebrate the popular aquatic birds.

The first-prize winner in the contest will earn a meet-and-greet with a penguin.

Second prize will be an 8-by- 10-inch unframed penguin art piece from the Aquarium. Honorable mention will earn a 4 x 6 inch art piece.

Winners in the contest will be showcased during a Penguin Days Celebration to be held March 23-24 at the aquarium.

Contestants are allowed to submit up to five photos of penguins – taken locally or anywhere around the world – for their entry. Deadline for the photo submissions is Wednesday. All entries will be returned.

“Most of the photos submitted to us have been taken by locals who take photos here, but we did have someone once who went to the Antarctic and took pictures of other species,” recalled Dan Arcara, supervisor of exhibits for the aquarium.

The aquarium boasts 10 Humboldt penguins, Arcara said.

These include William, who dates back to the aquarium’s original colony settlement in 1978, as well as 7-year-old Bobbi, a female, and Chile, a male.

William is at least 38 years old, but his exact age is undetermined because he was an adult when he was brought to Niagara, Arcara explained.

“They generally live 15 to 18 years in the wild, and much longer in captivity,” Arcara said of the penguins.

Arcara promised many more interesting penguin facts during the celebration, which he called “a very popular event” for the aquarium, typically drawing close to 2,000 visitors over the two-day span.

“The Humboldt penguins are from Peru and northern Chile – from a warmer climate,” he said. “Most people think of snow and ice and cold when they think of penguins because of what we see in the media and in movies, but of the 18 known species of penguins, only a half-dozen are from the Antarctic region. The rest are from warmer climates in South America, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa.”

In order to be part of the contest, all photographs must have the entrant’s name on the back of the photo with location and title. The contest is not open to aquarium employees or their immediate family members.

Photograph submissions must be no smaller than 5 by 7 and no larger than 8 by 10 inches. Digital images may be submitted at 300 dpi or greater.

Photos may be mailed to the Aquarium of Niagara, Exhibits Dept., 701 Whirlpool St., Niagara Falls, NY 14305.

For more information, contact the Exhibits Department at 285-3575, Ext. 211, or email aonaquarium@aim.com.

From the blotter / Police calls and court cases, Feb. 21 to March 2

March 9, 2013, 7:13 pm

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A Buffalo couple told Niagara Falls police that property was stolen from their rental car overnight Thursday while it was in the valet parking lot at the Seneca Niagara Casino & Hotel. A cellphone and a pair of prescription eyeglasses were taken from the car sometime between 11 p.m. Thursday and 11 a.m. Friday, police said, resulting in a loss of $285. Valet parking employees told police the car may have been left unlocked.A burglar stole $480 in cash after breaking into a 19th Street apartment overnight Friday in Niagara Falls, police said.

A resident told police that someone entered the apartment through a side window between 5 p.m. Friday and 12:40 a.m. Saturday.

In addition to the money, which was taken from a bedroom, two cellphones were taken from a living room area. Total loss was estimated at about $700.An Ohio couple lost $100 to a thief while they were at a bar on First Street in Niagara Falls early Saturday, police said. The wife told police that two $50 bills were in her purse when she went to the bar shortly after midnight.

She said she left it on the bar momentarily when she went to check on a lottery ticket. Upon returning to her hotel room at about 1:30 a.m., she said, the money was missing from her purse.Police in Niagara Falls arrested a Canadian woman Friday afternoon, accusing her of shoplifting $62 worth of liquor in her wheelchair. Lori-Ann Bowman, 47, of St. Catharines, Ont., was charged with petit larceny at Supermarket Liquors on Niagara Falls Boulevard. According to reports, Bowman, who is an amputee, tried to conceal several bottles of whiskey, rum and vodka inside a bag underneath her wheelchair. She was stopped after leaving the store at about 5:15 p.m.

• A resident of Chestnut Ridge Road, Gasport, was sleeping late Friday when he heard someone steal his Nissan pickup truck from his driveway, police said. It was just before midnight when the man heard the vehicle start and saw it being backed out of his driveway.

Sheriff’s deputies said the truck had been left unlocked in the driveway, with the ignition key atop a floor mat. An extensive search of the area was conducted but did not turn up the vehicle.

• Three juveniles nearly got away with throwing rocks and eggs at cars in a Cudaback Avenue parking lot Friday afternoon in Niagara Falls, but one ill-advised toss may have sealed their fate. A Toronto man called authorities after his 2003 Toyota was damaged by a rock at about 4 p.m. in the 1700 block of Cudaback Avenue. While officers were interviewing the man at the scene, an egg landed a short distance away, and police spotted a young man ducking into a nearby residence. Officers went to the house and interviewed the boy’s mother, who said that her son was inside with two friends. Police took all three back to the scene, where they were identified by two witnesses. The police Juvenile Aid Bureau is investigating the incident.Police charged a Lockport teenager with assault early Saturday after a 14-year-old Newfane resident reported being assaulted at the Allie Brandt bowling lanes on Lincoln Avenue in the Town of Lockport.

The victim suffered several cuts around his mouth and was treated in an area hospital, sheriff’s deputies said. The suspect was tracked to his home, where police found him holding ice on hand injuries reportedly stemming from the fight. The suspect will be petitioned to Family Court.

• Police arrested a Tonawanda man for driving while intoxicated after a slow, short chase early Saturday in the Town of Niagara. Sheriff’s deputies said they spotted Dwayne T. Wright driving around the Niagara Falls International Airport parking lot at about 4 a.m., before moving on to another parking lot down the street.

When deputies put on their overhead lights and tried to stop Wright’s car, he reportedly drove off at slow speed, driving on the shoulder of the road for about 50 yards before stopping. The 49-year-old resident of Revere Avenue in the Town of Niagara was charged with driving while intoxicated and failure to use a designated lane.

The sky isn’t falling on the Buffalo Niagara job market after all.

March 9, 2013, 7:15 pm

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The sky isn’t falling on the Buffalo Niagara job market after all.

But it isn’t all blue skies and sunshine, either.

That was the bottom line from last week’s updated report from the state Labor Department on the Buffalo Niagara job market.

The good news: Fears that the local job market was losing jobs – as indicated by the Labor Department’s preliminary figures – are unfounded.

In fact, the region has been consistently adding jobs, and our job growth during 2011 was even a little better than initially reported.

“The good news is that we were doing better than we thought we were,” said Gary Keith, the chief economist at M&T Bank Corp. “We’ll take what we can get.”

The bad news: The pace of that job growth still is noticeably weaker than the rest of the state and the country as a whole, which means our recovery from the Great Recession once again is shaping up to be a lukewarm one, at best.

Even more alarming, the pace of our job growth has been slowing, which is exactly the opposite of what you want to see as an economic recovery takes hold.

We got off to a good start on hiring coming out of the recession, with local employers adding jobs at a nearly 1 percent annual pace during 2011. That’s stronger than the 0.8 percent pace initially reported and the strongest annual job growth that the region has enjoyed since 1999.

But the Buffalo Niagara job market couldn’t maintain its momentum last year. While hiring remained strong through the winter, it cooled a bit during the spring and slowed a little more during the summer, before finishing the year with a sluggish autumn.

Overall, our job growth last year cooled to a 0.7 percent annual pace, which isn’t bad by Buffalo standards, but was about a third slower than the 2011 increase. We maintained that pace into January.

And the jobs that are being created are mostly in low-paying service positions, at places like restaurants, hotels and stores. A significant number of the new jobs are temporary positions, a hiring step preferred by employers who are starting to see good things happening within their individual businesses, but aren’t quite convinced that the improvement is going to last.

It’s a story that’s all too familiar for the Buffalo Niagara economy: Take two or three steps forward, then take a couple back.

The optimists among us will look at the job numbers and see a job market that’s stronger than its been in more than a decade. Our job growth during 2011 and 2012, which totalled a little more than 1.6 percent, was the strongest two-year period for employment gains locally since a 2.5 percent growth spurt from 1999 to 2000. Last year’s job growth was the third strongest in the last decade.

The pessimists will snarl that it only takes the country one year to slog out the same gains that the Buffalo Niagara region needs two years to produce. The nation has been adding jobs at an annual pace of 1.6 percent or better throughout all of 2012, although the growth rate slipped to 1.5 percent in January and February.

To our credit, the Buffalo Niagara job market last year was robust by upstate standards, slightly outpacing the 0.5 percent upstate increase.

To our dismay, our growth was less than half of both the U.S. increase of 1.7 percent and the 1.4 percent gain statewide.

People looking at the bright side will see that the region’s private sector service economy is humming along nicely, growing at a 2 percent annual rate during January – almost three times the overall increase in jobs here.

Hiring at leisure and hospitality businesses is up more than 6 percent over the past year. The number of jobs at local stores has grown by 1.6 percent, double the region’s overall employment growth rate.

“You tend to see a lot of growth in those areas coming out of a recession,” said John Slenker, the state Labor Department’s regional economist in Buffalo. “They can absorb a lot of people – either people working a second job or people who are new to the labor market.”

Hiring at temporary help agencies also is strong, growing by more than 2 percent. (It was a sharp upward revision in the temporary help job numbers that accounted for much of the change in the revised employment data for last year.)

“These industries are behaving as you’d expect them to,” Slenker said. “Those are typically the categories that lead us out of a recession.”

Yet doomsayers will point out that jobs at stores, hotels, restaurants and other entry-level hires tend to pay poorly. The workers filling those jobs are gainfully employed, but they’re likely not on a path to immediate financial security.

Slenker said those jobs often are a stopgap, or a springboard to something better. And he said that the fact that the local economy is generating more of those entry-level jobs is a good sign that the job market is beginning to loosen up a little.

“The economy is beginning to produce more entry-level opportunities, and that’s been missing,” he said. “You want the economy strong across the board, but it begins with entry level jobs.”

That private-sector job growth takes on even more significance because the public sector – typically a rock of stability in a troubled job market – is shrinking as tax-strapped governments and school boards deal with sluggish revenue streams.

Government agencies across the Buffalo Niagara region shed almost 2 percent of their jobs last year and are down almost 4 percent from their 2009 peak.

Teachers and others at local schools are especially under the gun. Local schools eliminated 3.4 percent of their jobs last year and have whacked more than 8 percent of their positions since the darkest days of the Great Recession in 2009.

email: drobinson@buffnews.com

Bills to go free agent shopping Tuesday

March 9, 2013, 8:20 pm

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More help for new defensive coordinator Mike Pettine and filling a void or two on offense figure to be targets of the Buffalo Bills when the free-agent shopping season begins Tuesday.

The Bills could use help at linebacker and safety for a defense that ranked 31st against the run and 26th in points allowed.

Aside from a quarterback of the future, the Bills’ prime offensive needs are at receiver, tight end and guard.

“We will try to be active in free agency,” said Bills General Manager Buddy Nix. “I don’t know how that’ll work out. We’re not going to go crazy and overspend and get ourselves in a bind where we can’t keep some of our own, but we will be a player. We’ll attempt to make moves in free agency to plug some holes.”

The free agency signing period begins at 4 p.m. Tuesday. The Bills got a jump on the signing derby Saturday by reaching agreement on a deal to keep cornerback and kick returner Leodis McKelvin for four more years.

The Bills need a three-down coverage linebacker to replace Nick Barnett, whom they released. Barnett played 92 percent of the snaps last season. The Bills’ incumbent starters are middle man Kelvin Sheppard, who played 46 percent of the snaps, and Nigel Bradham, a strong-side ’backer in the 4-3 scheme who played 36 percent of the snaps as a rookie. The Bills re-signed nickel linebacker Bryan Scott, who played 54 percent of the snaps, which amounted to most passing downs.

Ideally, the Bills could use someone who is knowledgeable in the 3-4 scheme, which Pettine has run his entire NFL coaching career.

The high-profile options: Inside linebackers Dannell Ellerbe of Baltimore and Brad Jones of Green Bay, and rush linebackers Paul Kruger of Baltimore and Connor Barwin of Houston.

Ellerbe, 6-foot-1, 236 pounds, had a breakout season as a first-year starter for the Super Bowl champion Ravens. He played 99 percent of the snaps over the last 12 games. Jones, 6-3 and 230, offers some versatility to play inside or outside in a 3-4 defense. He shifted inside for the first time last season and excelled while starting 12 games.

The Bills have two starting edge rushers in Mario Williams and Mark Anderson. They like Kyle Moore; he had three sacks for Buffalo last season and is due to be a free agent.

Pettine wants flexibility. Williams can play stand-up rush linebacker in the 3-4, but nobody else on the roster is ideally suited for the job. Kruger had 12 sacks over the last 12 games for the Ravens. Barwin had 11.5 sacks in 2011 but slumped to three last season. He says he wants to play for a winner.

If Pettine follows the philosophy of Jets coach Rex Ryan, for whom Pettine worked the past 11 years, there will be some Jets in the Bills’ plans.

When Ryan and Pettine moved from Baltimore to New York in 2009, they brought with them several Ravens to help the rest of the players learn their defensive scheme.

The most obvious candidate could be Eric Smith, the Jets’ third safety last season. He’s soon to be 30 and is a smart player who could help the secondary adjust to Pettine’s scheme. He would come at a modest price, too.

Smith was cut by the Jets two weeks ago, along with linebackers Calvin Pace and Bart Scott. Pace will be 33 in October and played 94 percent of the Jets’ snaps last year. But he’s no longer a productive rusher. He had three sacks last season. Scott, a former star inside backer, will be 33 in August and is coming off toe surgery.

The Jets’ starting safeties, LaRon Landry and Yeremiah Bell, are free agents, too. Landry, 28, made the Pro Bowl last year and will command a big salary. The Bills have to pay Jairus Byrd a big contract, so it’s questionable whether they’d want to have two safeties making big money. Bell is 35. Quality Jets defensive tackle Mike DeVito is a free agent, but the Bills do not have a need at defensive tackle.

Here’s a look at some of the top free agents available by position, with an emphasis on the Bills’ needs:

Receivers: Mike Wallace (Steelers), Greg Jennings (Packers), Wes Welker (Patriots), Danny Amendola (Rams), Mohamed Massaquoi (Browns), Brandon Gibson (Rams), Braylon Edwards (Jets), Jerome Simpson (Bengals). Wallace is one of the game’s best deep threats, but he will cost more than $10 million a year. Jennings reportedly wants that much, too. He has 50 TDs and almost 5,000 yards in the last 5½ years. He’s 29 and missed half of last season with a groin injury. Among the less expensive options are Massaquoi, a former second-round pick with good size who averaged 34 catches his first three years in a stunted Browns offense. Gibson, a four-year veteran with decent size, is coming off his best season (51 catches for 691 yards). Edwards has done little the last two years and has had off-field issues but is big and has had some good years. Simpson is a talent with a checkered past off the field.

Inside linebackers: Jones (Packers), Ellerbe (Ravens), Rey Maualuga (Bengals), Larry Grant (Niners), Brian Urlacher (Bears), Scott (Jets). Jones is a former seventh-round pick. Ellerbe was undrafted. Can Ellerbe be wooed away from Super Bowl champion Baltimore, where he wants to stay? Maualuga, 26, is a two-down inside backer with a lot of talent. He had a down year in 2012. Grant is a former seventh-rounder who backed up Patrick Willis the past two years. Urlacher is 35.

Outside linebackers: Kruger (Ravens), Barwin (Texans), Philip Wheeler (Raiders), Justin Durant (Lions), Daryl Smith (Jaguars), James Harrison (Steelers), Erin Henderson (Vikings), Pace (Jets), Victor Butler (Cowboys), Shaun Phillips (Chargers), Manny Lawson (Bengals), Erik Walden (Packers). Kruger will be hotly pursued and overpriced after his big season with the Ravens. Wheeler, 28, is a former third-rounder who has played in a 4-3 his whole career. He’s a three-down linebacker who played mostly in coverage but showed a glimmer of pass rush. Durant, 27, is a good player who is strictly a coverage ’backer. Harrison, the Steeler great, is soon to be 35. Henderson is a two-down ’backer. Butler is a lower-priced backup who will be targeted by some 3-4 teams.

Tight ends: Martellus Bennett (Giants), Jared Cook (Titans), Delanie Walker (49ers), Dustin Keller (Jets), Brandon Myers (Raiders), Anthony Fasano (Dolphins). This is a good group of players, and the Bills need help at tight end, where starter Scott Chandler is recovering from a knee injury. Bennett, 26, is a capable receiver and blocker who caught 55 passes for 626 yards. Cook, 26, is a former third-round pick who has 93 catches the past two years in half-time duty.

Walker is really attractive because of his versatility. He can play H-back and fullback, too, and he’s an excellent blocker. He has averaged 22 catches the past four years as the Niners’ No. 2 tight end.

Keller, 28, is a big receiver who plays out of the slot. He had 65 catches for 815 yards in 2011 but barely played last season due to injuries. He figures to be expensive.

Myers, 27, is a four-year veteran who had 79 catches in his first full year as a starter in 2012. He’s a willing but no-so-effective blocker.

Guards: Andy Levitre (Bills), Louis Vasquez (Chargers), Brandon Moore (Jets), Kevin Boothe (Giants), Chad Rinehart (Bills), Ramon Foster (Steelers), Deuce Lutui (Titans).

The Bills must be mindful of their desire to retain center Eric Wood, entering the last year of his contract. How much do they want to invest in the middle three of their O-line? Vasquez is a mauler with 54 starts in four years. Yahoo! Sports reported the Bills are among the teams interested in him.

Moore might make sense. As Jets line coach in 2003, Buffalo head coach Doug Marrone converted Moore from defensive line to guard and molded him into a quality player. Moore, who will be 33 in June, has 142 starts. He was a Pro Bowler in 2011 and had another strong season in 2012. He could have a couple of good years left, and he won’t be a huge expense.

Rinehart has started 17 games for the Bills the past three seasons.

Safeties: Dashon Goldson (49ers), Landry (Jets), Dawan Landry (Jaguars), Glover Quin (Texans), Adrian Wilson (Cardinals), Kenny Phillips (Giants), Louis Delmas (Lions), Smith (Jets), Bell (Jets). The Bills need to work out a big-money deal with Jairus Byrd, whose rights they retained with the franchise tag. Da’Norris Searcy is the incumbent strong safety with George Wilson’s departure. Smith seems like a perfect guy to help the Bills’ defensive backs adjust to Pettine’s system. It’s a good year for safeties in the draft.

Quarterbacks: Jason Campbell (Bears), Brady Quinn (Chiefs). Dolphins backup Matt Moore, 28, was due to be a free agent but re-signed with Miami. None of the QBs available is an upgrade over Ryan Fitzpatrick.

Cornerbacks: Sean Smith (Dolphins), Chris Gamble (Panthers), Antoine Cason (Chargers), Keenan Lewis (Steelers), Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie (Eagles), Chris Houston (Lions), Kyle Arrington (Patriots), Aqib Talib (Patriots), Derek Cox (Jaguars), Nnamdi Asomugha (Eagles), Cary Williams (Ravens). This is a pretty deep crop of players. Since the Bills re-signed McKelvin, they probably will look next to the draft for CB help.

Defensive end: Michael Bennett (Bucs), Cliff Avril (Lions), Dwight Freeney (Colts), Kyle Moore (Bills), William Hayes (Rams), Israel Idonije (Bears), Osi Umenyiora (Giants), Trevor Scott (Patriots), Lawrence Jackson (Lions). The Bills’ edge rushers are Williams and Anderson.

Defensive tackle: Desmond Bryant (Raiders), Jason Jones (Seahawks), Richard Seymour (Raiders), Roy Miller (Bucs). It’s not a position of need for the Bills.

Offensive tackle: Jake Long (Dolphins), Sebastian Vollmer (Patriots), Andre Smith (Bengals), Jermon Bushrod (Saints), Phil Loadholt (Vikings), Sam Baker (Falcons). This is a better group of tackles than normal in free agency. The Bills are in good shape at the position, with their top five of Cordy Glenn, Erik Pears, Chris Hairston, Zebrie Sanders and Sam Young.

Running back: Reggie Bush (Dolphins), Ahmad Bradshaw (Giants), Steven Jackson (Rams), Shonn Greene (Jets), Danny Woodhead (Patriots).

Fullback: Jerome Felton (Vikings), James Casey (Texans), Greg Jones (Jaguars). The Bills’ Corey McIntyre is 34. He played just 10 percent of the offensive snaps last year.



email: mgaughan@buffnews.com

Ex-Bill Saimes dies at age 71

March 9, 2013, 8:24 pm

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George Saimes, who many regard as the finest defensive safety in Buffalo Bills history, died of leukemia Friday in his native Canton, Ohio. He was 71.

Not only was Saimes a member of the Bills Wall of Fame and one of 26 players selected to the team’s 50th anniversary all-time team in 2009, he was named to the American Football League all-time team when the AFL merged with the National Football League in 1970. Five times he was selected to the All-AFL team. He also is a member of the Greater Buffalo Sports Hall of Fame.

Saimes was drafted by the Kansas City Chiefs in the sixth round of the 1963 AFL draft. However, Bills owner Ralph Wilson, who had followed Saimes’ career at Michigan State, arranged a deal with Chiefs owner Lamar Hunt for the draft rights to Saimes.

At Michigan State, Saimes was a consensus All-America in 1962, playing as a linebacker on defense and fullback on offense for coach Duffy Daugherty. That was the era of limited substitution rules in college football, which required all but a few players to play both offense and defense. Saimes excelled at both. He was recruited by Hank Bullough, one of Daugherty’s assistant coaches, and a Canton native himself.

Saimes played on outstanding Michigan State teams that included future NFL stars such as Herb Adderley, Fred Arbanas, Dick Gordon, Sherman Lewis and Wayne Fontes. During his three years on the varsity, the Spartans went 18-8-1, 12-7 against Big Ten opponents.“He runs, he blocks, he tackles, he plays defense, he calls singlas, he makes key blocks, he’s our bread-and-butter runner captain and he gives us leadership,” Daugherty said in touting Saimes for the 1962 Heisman Trophy. He finished seventh in the ’62 Heisman voting.

When Saimes came to the Bills, coach Lou Saban gave him a brief trial as a running back but soon found Saimes’ ideal position — strong safety. Saimes was one of the anchors on the Bills defense that led the AFL in 1964 and ’65 and won the league championship year.

Buffalo News sports columnist Larry Felser once wrote that Saimes was “the finest open-field tackler in the league.”

“When he got to you with his arms and shoulder you were more or less tackled,” said Booker Edgerson, who played cornerback in the secondary with Saimes in those years. “I think he went a whole season with just two or three missed tackles. We used to kid him and say: ‘Too bad those hands weren’t as good at intercepting passes.’ He saved a lot of touchdowns, though, knocking down passes.”

As it was, Saimes intercepted 22 passes in the 81 regular season games he played for the Bills, none for a touchdown, however. His only score for Buffalo came on a fumble return.

“He was the most amazing dad,” Saimes’ daughter, Linda Durley, told the Association Press. “He was amazing and strong. he loved his family, he loved his grandchildren and he loved my mom so much.”

Saimes is survived by his wife, Betsy, three daughters and eight grandchildren.

A funeral service is scheduled for Wednesday at the Community Christian Church in North Canton, Ohio.



email: mnorthrop@buffnews.com

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Sabres third line providing pressure

March 9, 2013, 8:26 pm

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PHILADELPHIA — The Buffalo Sabres are 14th in the Eastern Conference and 29th overall in the 30-team NHL, so they have nothing to lose by trying new things. For starters, they have an interim head coach in Ron Rolston and he has shown no qualms about changing his personnel.

In particular, Rolston will likely scratch veteran Jochen Hecht for the second straight game tonight when the Sabres meet the Flyers in Wells Fargo Center. Then he hopes to see his newest forward line continue to control play when it’s in the offensive zone.

Rolston has paired two recent Rochester call-ups, center Kevin Porter and winger Brian Flynn, with pre-lockout Amerk Marcus Foligno and the trio has given the Sabres plenty of time with the puck in scoring range.

Foligno spent time in Rochester playing with Flynn and Cody Hodgson. Porter played mostly with Mark Mancari. The three never played together in the AHL but Rolston liked their dynamics when he started tinkering with combinations here.

“They’ve been one of our better lines,” Rolston said Saturday after the Sabres’ practice in Riverside Rink. “They’ve got a good combination of speed and Marcus plays big, so we have some size. Hopefully that will continue.”

“We’re creating some energy, getting into the offensive zone and getting a good forecheck,” Porter said. “That’s what our line needs to do. Keep it simple, not make any mistakes. We’re all pretty good skaters who can handle pucks.”

Flynn had several good scoring chances Tuesday in Carolina and had even more Thursday in New Jersey. He finally broke through for his first NHL goal to give the Sabres their short-lived 2-0 lead in the third period of their 3-2 shootout loss to the Devils.

“I was getting a lot of shots on goal,” Flynn said. “I thought our line was generating some pretty good chances. It definitely felt good to get the first one out of the way there.”

“I thought someone on our line was going to get one,” Porter said. “I knew it was coming sooner rather than later. It was great to see him get his first goal. That’s always pretty exciting.”

Flynn was pumped to give the Sabres a two-goal lead on the road but he said the luster of his first goal definitely dropped with the way the team collapsed. Still, he’s happy his comfort level is increasing during his first trip to the NHL.

“The game is starting to slow down a little bit,” said Flynn, a free-agent signee last year out of the University of Maine. “The first two games things were happening obviously faster than I was used to. I wasn’t making the pretty plays I think I’m capable of but hopefully now I can make more.”

“When you step into a new team, it’s always going to take a little bit,” Foligno said. “Now he’s making plays, hanging on to the puck more and that’s when he’s most dangerous.”

Porter has no points in his eight games but has averaged 15 minutes, 22 seconds of ice time and given the Sabres a two-way presence at center. Flynn is averaging 12:33 in his four games and the goal is his lone point.

Foligno is still trying to make his mark in the stats, as he has just one goal and a minus-7 rating in 24 games in Buffalo. But the numbers are bound to increase if the line plays as it has the last two games.

“This line has been good for me,” Foligno said. “They’re both fast players and smart, heads-up guys. It’s been easy for me.

“We’re not gonna make the prettiest plays but we’ll get the puck deep,” Porter said. “Marcus is good in the corners and Flynn and I are skating pretty well. We’re beating their ‘D’ to pucks, cycling really well. We have some chemistry going.”

...

There’s a chance defenseman Andrej Sekera, injured late in the third period Thursday night and ruled out by Rolston after practice Friday, could be ready to play tonight. Sekera started practice Saturday on a regular pair with Robyn Regehr and then was sent off the ice when the team started one-on-one battle drills.

That likely means he won’t play until Tuesday’s visit from the New York Rangers, although Rolston said he’s encouraged by Sekera’s progress and wouldn’t totally rule him out for tonight.

“We’ll see how he’s feeling,” Rolston said. “I like the way he’s moving. We just wanted to keep him out of battle stuff.”

Adam Pardy, a scratch the last two games, was on a pairing with Mike Weber on Saturday. He could return in place of T.J. Brennan.

...

The Sabres probably can’t get the new HarborCenter project up and running fast enough after struggling to find ice in town the last two days. They were at Cazenovia Rink on Friday and followed that with the trip to Riverside — two places in which they have not practiced in years.

First Niagara Center has been unavailable due to a Rihanna concert and a Bandits game, and a youth tournament has made the Northtown Center at Amherst, their normal alternate site, also a no-go. The Buffalo State Ice Arena, another previous option, was occupied by the Canisius College-Bentley playoff series.



email: mharrington@buffnews.com

Business Calendar

March 9, 2013, 7:33 pm

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Monday

Business groups

• The Erie County Industrial Development Agency Policy Committee Meeting, 8:30 a.m., ECIDA, 143 Genesee St., Buffalo. Confirmations, 856-6525, Ext. 136 or chocieni@ecidany.com.

• The Finance and Audit Committee meeting of the Erie County Industrial Development Agency, Buffalo and Erie County Regional Development Corp. and Buffalo and Erie County Industrial Land Development Corp, 10 a.m., ECIDA offices, 143 Genesee St. Confirmations 856-6525, Ext. 136.

Tuesday

Business groups

• BNI Executive Marketing Team, breakfast meeting, 6:45-8:30 a.m., Milos Restaurant, 5877 Main St. Williamsville. Information 818-2526 or www.bniemt.com.

• Pro-Net Professional Networking Group meeting, 8 a.m., today; 8:30 a.m. Wednesday, Amherst Chamber of Commerce, 350 Essjay Road, Suite 200, Amherst. Reservations 632-6905.

• The Amherst Chamber of Commerce, The Emerging Business Leaders monthly Coffee Connections event, 8-9 a.m., Corner Bakery Café, 1551 Niagara Falls Blvd., Amherst. Registration www.amherst.org or 632-6905.

• The Parachute Group, a networking group for downsized employees and career changers, 10 a.m., Lakewood Town Offices (upstairs), 20 W. Summit St., Lakewood. Call 276-1127.

• Cheektowaga Chamber of Commerce, NetWorks!, 5:30-7:30 p.m., Tully’s Good Times, 1449 French Road at Transit, Cheektowaga. Hors d’oeuvres and drink specials, $5. Reservations 684-5838.

• Executive Taking Action Forum, Life Coach Roundtable, a leadership and personal development networking group, 7 p.m., Holiday Inn Buffalo Airport, 4600 Genesee St., Cheektowaga. Reservations 202-8423.

Seminars and classes

• World Trade Center Buffalo Niagara and HSBC Bank Spotlight on U.S. Trade: Upstate New York – Buffalo, 8-9:30 a.m., The Buffalo Club, 338 Delaware Ave., Buffalo. Information, 852-7160.

• The University at Buffalo School of Management’s Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership, Allstate Minority and Women Emerging Entrepreneurs Program information session, 5-6 p.m., UB Downtown Gateway, 77 Goodell St., Room 205, Buffalo. Thomas Ulbrich, executive director and Alex Cleary, program coordinator, provide an overview of the program and answer questions. Registration email mgt-cel@buffalo.edu or 885-5715.

Wednesday

Professional groups

• Western New York Venture Association, WNYVA, company presentation forum, 7:30-9 a.m., Buffalo Club, 388 Delaware Ave. Free, WNYVA members. Information and nonmembers, Jack McGowan or Andrea Mayer 636-3626.

• BOMA Greater Buffalo, monthly meeting, 11:30 a.m.-1 p.m., Chef’s Restaurant, 291 Seneca St., Buffalo. Tickets $25, BOMA Member and employee of BOMA member company; $30, nonmember. Required pre-registration 856-5700.

Business groups

• The Advantage Business Networking Group of Niagara County, 6:45-8:30 a.m., Wheatfield Community Center, 2790 Church Road, North Tonawanda. Call 433-2402.

• The Lancaster Area Chamber of Commerce, morning business exchange networking group meeting, 8 a.m., Dutch Mill Family Restaurant, 5259 Broadway, Lancaster. Call 681-9755.

• Waring Financial Group breakfast meeting, 8-10 a.m., Salvatore’s Italian Garden, 6461 Transit Road, Depew. Speaker: Tom Stebbins. Reservations Laurie Syta, 648-2412 or email LSyta@WaringFinancialGroup.com.

• Women’s Business Center at Canisius, Women In Networking-South meeting, 8:15-9:30 a.m., Colonial Wine & Spirits, 3211 Southwestern Blvd., Orchard Park. Topic: “Why Granite, Marble & Soapstone Counter Tops?” Reservations wbcinfo@canisius.edu.

• The Parachute Group, a networking group for individuals in career/job transition, 10 a.m., Harlem Road Community Center, 4255 Harlem Road, Amherst. Call 276-1777.

• The Hamburg Chamber of Commerce, “Making Dreams Come True: The Development of the Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus,” 11:30 a.m., Armor Inn Tap Room, 5381 Abbott Road, Hamburg. Speaker: Patrick Whalen, chief operating officer, Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus. Cost: $20, Chamber members and guests; $25, prospective Chamber members. Information and advance registration www.hamburg-chamber.org or 649-7917.

• Kiwanis Club of Buffalo, 12:10 p.m., Holiday Inn Downtown, 620 Delaware Ave., Buffalo. Program: The Incredible Egg, Kreher Farms. Reservations 854-4034 or www.buffalokiwanisclub.com.

• The Buffalo Niagara Chapter of the National Association of Women Business Owners, Each One Reach One Women’s Mega Mixer, 5-7:00 p.m., Windows on the Green at Westwood Country Club, 772 North Forest Road, Williamsville. Cost: $40, member; $45, guest. Registration www.nawbowny.org.

Seminars and classes

• U.S. Small Business Administration, free SBA’s 8(a) BD Program: Eligibility and Application workshop, 10 a.m.-noon, Federal Building, Room B0350, 100 State St. Rochester. Reservations, Pamela Andolina, 551-4301 Ext. 301 or pamela.andolina@sba.gov.

Thursday

Professional groups

• Niagara Frontier American Society for Training & Development, “Initiatives Addressing the Workforce Skills Gap in Western New York” 7:30-9:30 a.m., Larkin Building, Barton Room, 726 Exchange St., Buffalo. Cost $20, members; $30, nonmembers. Registration http://astdniagara.org.

Business groups

• BNI Platinum, networking meeting, 6:45 a.m., Milos Restaurant, 5877 Main St., Williamsville. Information 864-0478.

• BNI Pinnacle, networking meeting, 6:45-8:30 a.m., Transit Valley Country Club, 8920 Transit Road, East Amherst. Reservations 585-704-4383.

• BNI Signature, networking meeting, 6:45-8:30 a.m., K of C Banquet Facility, 2735 Union Road, Cheektowaga. Information 886-1257, Ext. 201.

• The WNY Business Alliance, business-to-business networking meeting, 7:30-8:30 a.m., Millennium Hotel and Resort, 2040 Walden Ave., Cheektowaga. Call 310-3235.

• The Western New York Business Network Group for professionals, 7:45 a.m., Comfort Inn, 1 Flint Road, Amherst, Information 553-8883.

• Rotary Club of Buffalo, 12:15 p.m., Templeton Landing, 2 Templeton Terrace, Buffalo. Program: Better Business Bureau with Warren Clark. 854-3397.

• Working for Downtown, Thursday in the City, 5-8 p.m., Papaya, 118 W. Chippewa St. Information www.workingfordowntown.org.

Seminars and classes

• Women’s Business Center, SBA, PTAC, SBA Business Matchmaker, Awards Luncheon & Expo, orientation and education on Contracting Programs, 9 a.m.-noon, Small Business Administration District Office, 130 S. Elmwood Ave., Suite 423, Buffalo. Registration: www.canisius.edu/wbc or 888-8280.

Friday

Business groups

• BNI Enterprise, networking meeting, 6:45-8:30 a.m., Fairdale Banquet Center, 672 Wehrle Drive, Amherst. Information, 316-2302.

• BNI Circle of Excellence, networking meeting, 6:45-9 a.m., Milo’s Restaurant, 5877 Main St., Williamsville. Call 408-2525.

• Buffalo Niagara Partnership, How to Use Social Media to Actually Get New Business, 8-10 a.m.,

Buffalo Niagara Partnership Knox Room, 665 Main St., Suite 200, Buffalo. Speaker: Seth Greene, Market Domination. Free for Partnership members. Registration www.thepartnership.org.

• Buffalo Urban Development Corporation Real Estate Committee meeting, noon, BUDC/ECIDA, 143 Genesee St., Buffalo, followed by Buffalo Brownfield Restoration Corporation meeting. Confirmations 362-8367 or chocieni@ecidany.com.

Seminars and classes

•The Amherst Chamber of Commerce At-Home Business “U” program workshop, 8-9:30 a.m., Amherst Chamber of Commerce at 350 Essjay Road, Suite 200 in Williamsville. Program: “How to Finance a Small Business,” presented by Paul Hoffman, specialist, U.S. Small Business Administration. Cost $30. Information or reservation 632-6905 or log on to www.amherst.org.

• Buffalo Niagara Partnership, Economics of Smart Growth: Village Center and Urban Core Revitalization panel presentation and discussion, 8:30-10:30 a.m., Burchfield Penney Art Center, 1300 Elmwood Ave., Buffalo. Free and open to the public. Required registration www.thepartnership.org/eventscalendar.

Saturday

Seminars and classes March 19

Professional groups

• The Western New York Paralegal Association, general membership meeting, noon, Phillips Lytle, 3400 HSBC Center, Buffalo. Topic: Wright-on-the-Road: Frank Lloyd Wright’s Graycliff Estate. Lunch provided. Reservations sueannsarra@gmail.com; information www.wnyparalegals.org.

• Buffalo Chapter of Project Management Institute, monthly dinner meeting, 5:30-8:30 p.m., Classics V Restaurant, 2425 Niagara Falls Blvd., Amherst. Program: “Why Agile has Become Mainstream!” Earn 1.5 PDUs. For more information visit www.pmibuffalo.org.

Business groups

• Buffalo Urban Development Corporation joint meeting of the Finance and Audit Committee and Governance Committee, noon, ECIDA/BUDC, 143 Genesee St., Buffalo. Confirmations 856-6525, Ext. 136 or chocieni@ecidany.com.

March 20

Professional groups

• Buffalo Chapter of Project Management Institute, Spring Professional Development Day workshop, 8:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m., Classics V Restaurant, 2425 Niagara Falls Blvd., Amherst. Program: “Command Course in Agile Project Management,” hands-on training in how to apply Agile in many project situations. Earn 12.0 PDUs. For more information, visit www.pmibuffalo.org.

Four shot, one fatally, in city’s Bailey-East Delavan area

March 9, 2013, 6:08 pm

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Four people were shot, one fatally, overnight Friday in three incidents within a 10-block area of the city’s Bailey-East Delavan neighborhood.

A 22-year-old man who was shot drove a couple of blocks before crashing his vehicle. He later died. The man, identified as Michael D. Smith, was shot once while driving a Dodge Durango in the area of Lang Avenue and Hagen Street shortly after 8:30 p.m. Friday.

He crashed into another vehicle at Newburgh and East Delavan avenues, about two blocks from the shooting scene. The victim, who was bleeding badly, was taken to Erie County Medical Center, where he died, police said.

“He had a single gunshot wound to his thigh area, and he succumbed to his injury,” Buffalo Chief of Detectives Dennis J. Richards said.

Two other shootings involving three victims occurred nearby, in the Bailey-Schreck and Roslyn Street areas. “Our Homicide Squad and district detectives are looking into any connection between these three shooting incidents,” Richards said.

The second shooting occurred about 10:10 p.m. on Roslyn. Robert Proctor was shot in the right rear thigh. He was taken to ECMC, where he was treated and released.

At about 12:30 a.m. Saturday, Tevin Sapp and Seth McMorris were struck in a drive-by shooting in the Bailey-Schreck area. Sapp was wounded in the lower left leg and McMorris was shot twice in the buttocks. Sapp was treated in ECMC, then released. The hospital had no information on McMorris.

Anyone with any information on any of the shootings is asked to call or text the Buffalo police confidential tip line at (716) 847-2255 or email the department at www.bpdny.org.



email: gwarner@buffnews.com

Dismissed coach files petition to get job back

March 9, 2013, 7:24 pm

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The Billies of Williamsville South High School opened their varsity basketball season with three straight wins en route to another league title a year ago.

But not even some lopsided scores could mend coach Allan Monaco’s fractured program during the 2011-12 season, when jealousies drove a wedge among teammates, and parents in the bleachers also were divided. After a district investigation, Monaco’s 24-year coaching career at the school ended.

Now, Monaco has filed a petition in State Supreme Court, calling the district’s investigation flawed and asking to be reinstated.

“It is apparent that the district conducted a one-sided investigation, giving preference and credence only to the handful of disgruntled parents and student athletes,” according to Monaco’s court papers.

There is no question about turmoil on the team that season.

Varsity players screamed at each other and nearly came to blows at one practice.

Sophomores bullied eighth-graders on the junior varsity team, according to a parent.

A sophomore damaged a locker room after the coach promoted several eighth-graders over him to the varsity squad late in the season.

Parents, too, grew entangled.

The father of one player complained that Monaco cursed at his son during a game.

Another parent accused the coach of bullying his son about his weight.

A parent who liked the coach said he moved from his regular spot in the gym during several games to avoid other Williamsville South parents making “cruel, demeaning and condescending comments” about players on the South team.

At the end of the season, Monaco’s boss got a call from a player’s father.

“What are you going to do about that coach?” the father asked the athletic director.

What happened that season led to investigations by the school principal and superintendent and even the Amherst Police Department.

Williamsville Superintendent Scott G. Martzloff decided to find a new coach for the varsity basketball team, telling Monaco that his actions, or lack thereof, “caused a great deal of unnecessary disruption in the program.”

Monaco was out, after a record of 364-211 in 24 seasons at South, including several league championships and coach-of-the-year awards.

Monaco also lost his position as varsity golf coach.

But Monaco’s lawsuit contends that he never got a fair hearing from the school superintendent.

“He would not even allow me to describe my side of this story and to reflect on the difficult season we had just completed,” Monaco said of Martzloff in his affidavit.

What’s more, Martzloff sent the wrong message about student bullying by supporting older players who bullied the eighth-graders, Monaco said in court papers.

Those who tried to get to the bottom of what happened that season looked at what Monaco said to his basketball players as well as how players and their parents acted amid the discord.

The investigations exposed divided opinions about the coach among players, parents, boosters and administrators.The court file includes affidavits, filings and copies of email messages from school administrators, parents, players and others who provide accounts of a Billies basketball season riven by player jealousies, accusations of bullying, and some parents’ complaints.

Over the summer, as Monaco’s coaching positions hung in the balance, his athletic director sent Martzloff an email message supporting the coach.

“This was about playing time and future participation in our basketball program,” Williamsville South athletic director Kevin M. Lester told Martzloff in an email message. “It is always about playing time.

“I know that Al is accused of bullying and harassing. I don’t believe it,” Lester said. “I, as his athletic director, would never let him or any coach do that to a student athlete and I have never seen him do the things he is being accused of. This is a situation where a parent believes that his child has been wronged by Mr. Monaco and he/they will not stop until Mr. Monaco has been fired. I honestly believe that Al did not bully or harass any of these student athletes.”

Lester told the superintendent that “Monaco is being unfairly maligned by several parents and/or student athletes.”

“I have known Mr. Monaco for twenty-five years and as his athletic director I do not believe that he should be dismissed from his coaching duties for either golf or basketball,” Lester said.

Lester told the superintendent that he was familiar with the investigation by then-South Principal Dan Ljiljanich into the parent complaints.

“I believe that based on the results of his investigation and what he shared with me that Mr. Monaco did nothing wrong and I expressed this to him,” Lester said.Monaco points to his coaching evaluation as proof of his abilities.

His March 2012 evaluation, signed by Lester, said he “continues to do a very good job developing South’s basketball program.”

He received a satisfactory – the highest mark possible – in all 13 areas of the evaluation.

Monaco said he was asked to sign a revised evaluation in June after the principal completed his investigation.

The revised evaluation gave him a satisfactory grade in 11 of 13 areas but indicated improvement was needed in two areas: maintaining individual and team discipline and morale and also showing self-control and poise as a coach.

In none of the areas was he graded unsatisfactory – the lowest mark available.

Monaco, in his court papers, said he met with Ljiljanich, the principal, and Lester, the athletic director, to review the revised evaluation report and was told Ljiljanich’s investigation was finished. Monaco said he was told “this is all over” and that he would continue coaching.

“I must admit that the meeting with Lester and Ljiljanich and signing off on the revised evaluation report was a tough pill to swallow,” Monaco said in an affidavit. “Then, as now, I firmly believe that I handled what was a difficult season to the best of my ability.

“Nevertheless, I believed sharing some level of responsibility and taking on a level of self-examination and dedication to growth for next season was a good compromise and allowed everybody to move past what was a very difficult year,” he said.

But despite the principal’s investigation and revised coaching evaluation, “this small group of parents persisted in their complaints – this time focusing their complaints towards the superintendent of schools, Dr. Scott Martzloff – whom I had never had any sort of meaningful interaction or relationship with previously, and the Amherst Police Department,” Monaco said.In court papers replying to Monaco’s court action, the Williamsville Central School District said Ljiljanich’s investigation findings and recommendations were not favorable to Monaco.

In his investigation, “Ljiljanich interviewed several student athletes and parents, along with (Monaco) himself,” according to the district’s court papers.

“Contrary to (Monaco’s) allegations, Mr. Ljiljanich found (Monaco) to be recalcitrant and unable to assess the damaging effects of his conduct. Based on his investigation, Mr. Ljiljanich expressed to Superintendent Scott Martzloff in writing that he unequivocally supported a decision not to appoint petitioner as the boys’ basketball coach for the 2012-13 season,” the response states.

When Ljiljanich left Williamsville South in June, Martzloff continued to investigate the complaints about Monaco’s conduct toward his players, the district said.

“Over the course of several months, Dr. Martzloff met with students, parents, district employees, the Amherst Police Department and petitioner as part of his investigation,” according to the district’s court papers.

Martzloff personally met with Monaco three times, the district said.

“During each of these meetings, (Monaco) rejected the complaints and refused to assess his own role in creating a hostile environment for his student athletes,” according to the district’s reply.The district “made the prudent decision not to appoint” Monaco to the golf or basketball coaching positions, according to its reply papers.

In Martzloff’s Aug. 24 letter to Monaco, the superintendent said the district’s decision not to reappoint him was not based on complaints about playing time or the advancement of younger students over older students.

“My concern, however, is that along with making those decisions comes the responsibility to appropriately anticipate and handle the team dynamics surrounding those issues,” Martzloff said in the letter. “Both your actions in this regard, or lack thereof in certain situations, caused a great deal of unnecessary disruption in the program as a whole.

“It also appears to me that you are unable to recognize that your use of sarcasm with players is often perceived as condescending and mean-spirited,” the superintendent wrote. “This is an area in which you have been previously counseled in relationship to your teaching duties.”

Monaco is a health teacher at the high school.

In his letter to Monaco, Martzloff said he talked with Ljiljanich about problems in the program and “it became clear to me that you did not appropriately characterize his statements to you about team management issues both during the school year and related to the summer program.”

“Given all of this, I have no choice but to move forward with new coaches for both programs,” the superintendent wrote.Player jealousies appear to have been a big part of the team dissension.

Two junior transfers made the basketball team in 2011-12, both of whom were “top performing athletes,” Monaco said.

“The inclusion of these student athletes caused some internal strife on the team. I would describe the team as fractioned,” Monaco said.

One of the transfers emerged as the team’s best player, and when he was named player-of-the-game at the Cataract Classic, a senior who had expected to be the team’s star player “was clearly down about it,” according to notes taken by Scott Horton, a Williamsville Teachers Association union representative, who sat in meetings Monaco had with district leaders.

The senior’s father later complained Monaco cursed at his son during a Jolly Boys Tournament game against Williamsville North. Monaco denied it and said the senior’s father “had been after him” from the time his son was in the seventh grade, according to Horton’s notes.

Some players welcomed the transfer students and others did not. The friction culminated in players screaming at each other and getting “in a near-physical fight in the gym,” Monaco said.

Monaco said he called a meeting with the players “to work through their differences and move forward as a team with no further similar incidences.”

“In my opinion, Coach Monaco handled this situation well and tried to keep the team on track so that we could all enjoy playing the game,” Patrick Stasiak, a junior on the 2011-12 varsity team, said in an affidavit.

Stasiak, who said he was not one of the team’s stars, said Monaco “dealt with a difficult team dynamic because of the attitudes and opinions of a number of players, and their parents, related solely to their disagreement with the players’ respective playing time.”

Paul Stasiak, Patrick’s father, said he watched nearly all of his son’s games but had to move from his regular seat during several games because of malicious comments from some South parents about South players. The coach also drew their ire.

“One of the comments I overheard at a game during the 2011-12 season from one of the parents was that ‘we’ve got to get him out this year.’ ”

Despite the strife, “we really did have a successful season,” Monaco said, pointing to the team’s third straight ECIC Division 2 championship.

Monaco fared far worse with sophomores on the junior varsity team.Monaco was not aware of bullying on the junior varsity team until the mother of an eighth-grader alerted him in February 2012.

“I investigated the allegations of bullying and harassment and determined some or all of them to be true,” Monaco said in his affidavit.

Monaco chose not to promote several of the older junior varsity players to the varsity squad late in the season, taking into account the bullying and the players’ skill. He instead promoted several eighth-graders, whom he said demonstrated “outstanding skill and character.”

Monaco said the school’s principal and athletic director supported his decision.

Monaco said he met with parents of sophomores upset by his decision not to promote them or by their sons’ playing time.

The allegation from a parent that Monaco bullied his son about his weight followed amid other complaints.

“The false allegations against me by the parents were made in retaliation against me due to my decision not to promote the children of said parents to the varsity team, and due to the opinion and false allegations of a few disgruntled parents and students related almost entirely to dissatisfaction with playing time and perceived entitlement to certain accolades,” according to Monaco’s petition.



email: plakamp@buffnews.com

Rihanna bumps and grinds in Buffalo

March 9, 2013, 10:08 am

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Opening nights of massive pop-spectacle tours can be dicey endeavors. The variables can seem endless, the opportunities for things to go wrong - cues to be missed, wardrobes to malfunction, risers to fail descending on cue - all but infinite.

Rihanna, the marquee pop princess of the moment, an analog in 2013 of what Lady Gaga was in terms of public obsession in 2011, kicked off her “Diamonds” tour at First Niagara Center on Friday evening. Aside from the star taking the stage an hour later than her scheduled time, this “open dress rehearsal” went off without a hitch.

The rabid, capacity crowd certainly helped, as did the fact that Rihanna and her entourage had been in Buffalo for most of the week prior to Friday’s show, rehearsing the ins and outs of the massive production repeatedly - reportedly, right up until the moment the gates were opened and the fans swarmed the Arena on Friday.

This clockwork precision was essential to the show’s success, certainly, for what Rihanna is selling to her fans is, much more than music, the idea of glamour, an assumed exotic and clearly jet-setting lifestyle, and perhaps most prominently, sex.

All of Friday’s impressive choreography conspired to cast the star as her generation’s version of Marilyn Monroe, a Hollywood starlet for the social media age. So the songs, and the mostly bump-and-grind-based choreography that accompanied them, presented an attitude of narcissistic sexual obsession that even a second-year psychology student could have a field day with. None of this happened in an organic fashion - it was clear that Rihanna, her eight dancers, twin background singers, and four-piece band, all needed to hit their marks exactly for it to work. On Friday, they did so.

Simulated masturbation moves and incessant pelvic thrusts aside, there was the music itself. Rihanna has managed to find a middle ground between contemporary hip-hop, classic pop, electronic dance music, and watered-down reggae and dancehall sounds. In a pop music world that is traditionally far from daring in its musical construction, the confluence of these myriad influences lends an air of eclecticism to Rihanna’s music. In short, her stuff is kinda weird - though she does favor the big pop chorus, many of her tunes on Friday seemed to meander somewhat listlessly toward some non-specified goal. The multi-tiered stage, levitating circular lighting rig, and non-stop choreography either distracted from the somewhat directionless amalgamation of musical stylings, or simply added to the power of the songs, depending on one’s personal tastes.

Rihanna took to the stage clad in a black robe, black curtains falling on cue to reveal her kneeling on a pillow, with vaguely religious symbolism redolent of Madonna circa “Like A Prayer.” The robe didn’t last long - nor did the pillow, which in a hilarious Spinal Tap-ish moment, was reeled off the stage via a piece of fishing line by a roadie who spent the rest of the set hovering in the pit with a water bottle, attempting to anticipate when his boss might need a drink.

“Phresh Out the Runway” erupted into a skull-rattling sub-bass cacophony that would last for the rest of the set, at first obfuscating the groove, but later - and kudos to the soundman for this - finding its prominent but proper place in the mix.

Having sufficiently grabbed the attention of the full house, which offered unison screams that were at times almost as deafening as the synthetic bass booms, Rihanna then got down to business with the first of several songs celebrating sexuality in various forms.

“Birthday Cake” offered a thinly veiled metaphor, but more importantly, a relentless, sensuous groove that had the assembled dancing in the aisles. “Talk That Talk” found Rihanna acting as coquette, while “Pour It Up” owed more to strip club pole-dancing than to more traditional modes of choreographed dance, its bawdy beat pulsating in a sort of electro-burlesque.

The multi-act show - each act denoted by the lowering of risers holding band members and the temporary disappearance of Rihanna, who would then commence the next act in a new, but similarly skimpy, outfit - concentrated on material from the recent “Unapologetic” album. There were some cool additions to the program, however - a take on Eminem’s “Love the Way You Lie,” for example, which showed up to open act 4 - and they abetted the forward momentum of the set.

Somewhat incongruously, Rihanna’s primary on-stage foil, aside from her troop of dancers, was guitarist Nuno Bettencourt, formerly of power-pop/metal band Extreme and, more recently, Perry Farrell’s Satellite Dance Party.

Bettencourt is a flashy virtuoso, but he was kept on a short leash here, taking only a few scripted solo spotlights, the most impressive of which came during “Numb.” Bettencourt was joined by a keyboardist, a bassist who doubled on synth-bass, and a drummer who split his time between a number of impressive drum kits, all of which featured electronic triggers that buried any potential acoustic nuances beneath the uniformity of techno. So this was a live band, yes, but it was sometimes hard to tell as much, particularly when one factored in the liberal use of vocal harmonizers and samples, which routinely made Rihanna’s voice sound like the work of four or more singers.

The music felt synthetic and boasted a plasticity that made it difficult to embrace, but incredibly easy to dance to and sing along with. Which was exactly the point.

Though Rihanna showed up an hour late, she didn’t cut the show short, performing for nigh on 120 minutes, with the expected final encore of “Diamonds” providing an emotional high point for the assembled, who sang along with an emotional investment that appeared genuine.

A very strong show, then, and one which presented Rihanna as a confident and fully in-control performer. What was the message behind it all?

In truth, it’s probably not worth pondering. A graduate thesis could be written on the conflicting sexual semaphores in Rihanna’s songs, and the effect they may or may not be having on her audience, which appears to be comprised more of worshippers than of mere fans. But this is pop music made to dance to, after all. It conjures a world that values the body over the mind, and sees no conflict in doing so. And in this world, as Friday’s show made plain, Rihanna is Queen.

jmiers@buffnews.com