The NT council has opened countless council meetings throughout the years with a religious prayer, and always of the Christian vein.

Last Tuesday, something different happened.

“Let us not bow our heads, but raise them high with eyes and minds open, striving to avoid personal bias and instead embrace rational, fact-based governance in all matters,” said NT resident Donald Wittcop Jr. (above) in the council chambers on Oct. 6th.

All things considered, it was a refreshing change advocating for logic and equality instead of entreating a higher power to somehow compel the city’s common council to do [...]

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 [...]

It’s the most basic level of transparency.

If you’re an elected city councillor, department head, other city official or member of the community and have something to say at a governmental public meeting, it stands to reason we — the people — need to hear it.

I cover city council and town board meetings in Niagara Falls, Lockport, Wheatfield and North Tonawanda, and I can tell you this is something that afflicts all of them to one degree or another.

Of course, I hold the last group — members of the community — least accountable because they are generally not professionals when it comes to communication nor do we really [...]

Lately, we’ve heard a lot about “fake news” and “alternative facts.”

But there’s another type of dubious journalism that’s not even in the vernacular yet.

I’m talking about “junk news,” and we get too much of it in Niagara County, served to us by the corporate media at the expense of issues that are being kept in the dark — stories that might actually advance the status quo in Niagara Falls, North Tonawanda, Lockport, Wheatfield and everywhere else in Niagara County.

So instead of news coverage the establishment media doesn’t want you to see, we get served up plate after plate of arrests, house fires, DWIs, [...]