Having spent a good portion of his life outdoors as an excavator, Roger Storey, in a field on Stone Road in Pendleton, knew enough to get the heck out of there.

Outside that Friday morning in Niagara Falls, the beagles were barking at the bitter cold and biting wind. Which is not unusual for Western New York. Still, Charles Clark, a snowplow operator getting ready to go to work, had a feeling he should make an exception and put the hounds in the basement with plenty of food and water.

Something was brewing, and it [...]

Friday afternoon, Niagara County Legislature chairwoman Rebecca Wydysh delivered a COVID-19 update that started with a direct appeal to New York Governor Andrew Cuomo.

Wydysh: “The governor mentioned that he’s going to sign an executive order that would require upstate areas such as ours to send unused ventilators down to the downstate area because they have an immediate need for those ventilators as their numbers are so high and they are seeing those surges and peaks that we know are coming for us in the future.”

“Very concerning to me. I implore the governor on behalf of this legislature and our residents to really come up with a plan to [...]

Fusion voting is a scourge on New York State and needs to be eliminated to help stop the party-invasion tactics that have corrupted the Conservative and Independence parties and makes a mockery of our electoral system.

Fusion voting is also an important vehicle for allowing choice among voters, gives third parties a stronger voice influencing the platforms of major parties and has been constitutionally protected by the courts since 1910.

Those were some of the arguments made at Tuesday’s NYS Fair Elections Hearing, the last of four taking place across the state ahead of a Dec. 1 deadline for creating a public finance program.

The aim is to limit the [...]

The most-watched TV series on the planet — which is wrapping up a record-breaking eight-year run — isn’t really about dragons, knights or wights in George R.R. Martin’s fictional Westeros, which itself is loosely based on England’s “War of the Roses.”

Given that, not surprisingly, it’s really all about politics: family dynasties, secretive back-room bargaining and backstabbing as well as plenty of revenge served up with ice and fire.

As we dive into the last epic season of GOT, can local fans of the record-breaking series — which hasn’t aired new episodes in almost two years — find insights and parallels between Niagara County’s 2019 political scene and [...]