City of Buffalo Common Council·September 15, 2026
Nowakowski rewrote the Chippewa under-21 permit on the floor: 11 p.m. close, ID scanners, a security plan, a 120-day review. The Council also ordered Corporation Counsel “once more” to approve its Legislative Counsel law, sent Golombek’s staff-contact “Department Order” and data-center moratorium to committee, denied two food-store licenses, and made two Louise Bethune buildings landmarks. Every vote 9–0.
The permit at issue was filed under the name G. Kales for 69 (a.k.a. 67) West Chippewa Street, in the N-1C zone: a special use permit for “underage of 21 years co-mingling” — the Green Code's term for letting 18-to-20-year-olds into a bar. The applicant, Nowakowski said, wanted 10 p.m. to 4 a.m. on Thursdays for a college night. The Legislation Committee had sent it up on September 8 without recommendation, which in Buffalo practice means the committee took no position and left the decision to the full Council and, in effect, to the district member. Nowakowski took it.
What followed was twelve minutes on the state of the entertainment district. He has, he said, been working since the start of summer with the mayor's administration, police and inspections on a street where “we have different entities running by different permits” — special events permits, special use permits, dance licenses, cabaret licenses — and where, this past Sunday during the Bills game, there was “a fist fight between two establishments' security personnel.” He heard about it from a deputy commissioner, then from the mayor, then from people on a patio who watched. His conclusion, shared he said by the mayor and the police department: “we do not have partners in this street yet.” He is told by some that Chippewa is over-policed and by establishments “in the same breath” that there are not enough officers. The police, he said, are “still spending $50,000 a weekend just to maintain an order of control down there — that is almost over $2 million a year in overtime for one block.” Colleagues who scrutinize police overtime, he predicted, would soon want that foot patrol in their own districts.
The under-21 question he framed as a matter of what gets promoted, not what happens inside one bar. Permit a co-mingling night on the entertainment strip, he said, and “it is going to be promoted that this is an area for individuals that are under 21,” who will then congregate in parking lots and on sidewalks whether or not they cause trouble indoors. Two weeks ago, walking the street at 2 a.m., he saw “individuals with ski masks on.” He acknowledged the generational counterargument — “there are members of this council who used to drink when they had sheriff's cards” — and rejected it: the mix of alcohol and other entertainment on this particular street does not, in his view, allow co-mingling “to be produced in harmony.”
So: “the first thing is make a decision. Number two, make no one happy.” The permit is approved with conditions and the co-mingling use “will cease operation at 11 p.m.” It is conditioned on a security plan approved by the Buffalo Police Department, on handheld or mobile ID scanners at the door to verify every patron's photo identification, and on a 120-day review, at which point — “if everything goes according to plan and there's no issues on Chippewa and we have more cohesion” — he would reopen the hours by resolution. There are seven conditions in all; he filed them with the clerk rather than reading each into the record, and described them as a template. Any operator who wants co-mingling past the stated hours will hear: “Congratulations. I'm Mitch Nowakowski, your council member. Here is the template.” The mayor, he noted, “wants none of them,” and still has to sign the permit.
Halton-Pope's one question was about parking. When the street is blocked off on a busy night, she said, adults who paid to park in private lots — “I'm not talking about children” — have been unable to get their cars out because no attendant was there. Nowakowski's answer was a rule: a lot that is open and collecting revenue “must have an attendant at all times during operation,” or “the mayor and the department of inspections will pull your permit.” The lots that were the problem, he said, were not open for business at all; they were simply letting cars in and walking away. The vote was 9–0. A separate communication from S. Carmina on the Chippewa Entertainment District (Legislation Item 63), pending since September 1, was received and filed.
Council: President Joel Feroleto (presiding); Majority Leader Leah Halton-Pope; President Pro Tempore Zeneta Everhart; Councilmembers Bryan Bollman, Joseph Golombek, Mitchell Nowakowski, David Rivera, Christopher Scanlon, Rasheed Wyatt. All nine present at roll call; all nine recorded on every vote.
Also heard: an assistant corporation counsel, who gave her name as Lisa Yeager[*], on the Legislative Counsel resolution; the Council's chief of staff, on a data request; a pastor who gave the invocation; and Richard Satterwhite[*] of Man Up Buffalo, honored by proclamation for Prostate Cancer Awareness Month.
Public speakers: none. The Common Council's regular session does not take public comment; residents' communications arrive as filed items.
Buffalo's Council works its items in committee on the off Tuesdays, then acts on the committee recommendations at the next regular session. On September 8 the Legislation Committee sent the Chippewa permit to the floor without recommendation — no “rec. approve,” no “rec. deny,” just the file. That is the committee's way of saying the decision belongs to the full body, and by long custom the full body defers to the district member on a local license. It let Nowakowski write the conditions himself, in the week between, and present them as a package. Contrast the six items the Council recommitted Tuesday (sent back to committee for more work) and the one Golombek discharged (pulled out of a committee that had tabled it so the floor could dispose of it). The vocabulary matters: “Received and Filed” means noted, no action; “Tabled” means the item sits in committee; “Ref. to” means the item has not been decided at all.
Resolution 46 was a late file with a pointed title: “Once More Directing Corporation Counsel to Approve as to Form a Local Law Establishing Legislative Counsel for the Common Council.” Halton-Pope moved to adopt it and send the remainder to Legislation, and then explained. The Council had already passed a resolution and submitted the text of a local law that would give the legislature its own attorney; it needed only the Law Department's sign-off “as to form.” Everyone agrees, she said, that the law requires a public referendum. But because the item “was never approved to form,” it “missed the deadline” to be placed before city voters this November. The resolution, she said, is not only about legislative counsel; it lists “several other items” the Council has asked Corporation Counsel to act on — “from property manager issues to other pieces of legislation” — and asks for a response.
Then something unusual for a Buffalo regular session: the administration answered from the floor. An assistant corporation counsel, who identified herself as Lisa Yeager[*], said the Law Department “is not in a position to approve as to form anything that requires a referendum.” The eleven Charter Revision Commission questions on this fall's ballot, she said, were submitted by August 3, a date “the majority leader was well aware of,” and it was not clear to her office that asking for approval as to form meant, in the alternative, “submit it on August 3rd as a referendum item.” She said she had shared a case “exactly on point,” involving the City of Binghamton, with the Council's policy adviser, “a registered attorney,” and that the department “would never approve as to form something that would then be considered illegal.”
Halton-Pope, who had said she wanted the deeper conversation in committee, took the floor back. “Since you decided to speak on this item,” she said, the point was that Corporation Counsel told the Council the law needed a referendum and never told it, in writing, that the item “just needed to go to the clerk by this date.” “Don't just tell me that it needs to go to referendum and then offer nothing else.” The vote to pass the resolution had been unanimous, she noted, “so it's not just me.” The result: “we've missed a deadline and this is something that will have to be addressed next year by the public.” Wyatt, in his twelfth year on the Council, widened the frame: “in many cases you're not our counsel, because it's always a conflict,” and when the mayor disagrees with the Council, “we have somebody that is going to acquiesce.” “That's inaccurate,” the attorney said. “It's inaccurate from your perspective,” Wyatt replied; “I've been here for 12 years, you have not.” Feroleto closed it: Legislation Committee, next week. The resolution was adopted 9–0.
A local law that changes how a city government is structured — here, giving the Council its own lawyer separate from the mayor's Corporation Counsel — is the kind of change New York's Municipal Home Rule Law says must go to the voters. Before any local law is filed, the city's lawyer signs it “as to form”: a certification that the text is properly drafted and lawful, not an endorsement of the policy. The dispute Tuesday is whether the Law Department could sign a text whose adoption without a referendum would be unlawful (its position: no, and it said so), or should have signed it and told the Council the next step was to get the question to the Board of Elections (the Council's position). The step that did not happen is the one with a date on it: referendum questions for a November general election must be certified to the county Board of Elections roughly three months ahead, and the eleven Charter Revision Commission questions made that cut on August 3. The Legislative Counsel question did not, which is why the earliest a Buffalo voter can now weigh in is November 2027. Nothing said Tuesday changes what the law says; it decides who explains that to the voters.
Item 36 on the miscellaneous list is titled simply “Department Order RE: Council Member Contact.” Golombek described it as a memorandum a commissioner sent out earlier this year, around the time, he said, that “the incoming administration” told council members they could contact anyone they wished — “because nobody can tell us what we can and what we can't do” — but that city employees were no longer allowed to respond without permission. He saved the letter. Since then, he said, constituents in Black Rock, Riverside and North Buffalo have told him “you're not helping us like you used to,” and he has been unwilling to press staff who “have been told you are not allowed to talk to council members.”
The examples were specific and small, which was the point. Yesterday, walking to a block club, neighbors stopped him because children were breaking into a vacant house on the corner of his street; he called the police chief and 911, the police came quickly, and he asked “again” for the city to board up what he called a zombie house. A bee infestation on Roesch Avenue[*], a house at 35 Rebecca Park sitting vacant after a fire “for months and months and months and months” — for these, he said, he wants to call the supervisor or the building inspector directly, not route through “the commissioner, the deputy mayor and liaison between the council, which is a redundancy and an utter and a complete waste of time when I need garbage picked up.” He has seen a deputy mayor at a block club once.
His ask: that someone from the administration — he suggested the deputy mayor by name — come to Community Development next week and either rescind the practice or “go on record and say, you know what, Councilmember Golombek is no longer allowed to assist the residents of the North District.” “I want to be able to tell my residents that, look, I'm not lying.” He could follow up under Mayors Masiello, Brown and Scanlon, he said, but not under “the new administration that doesn't know city government.” If nothing changes, he said, he will ask the deputy mayors — “who make an awful lot more money than we do here on this council” — to attend every block club in the city, “but especially in the North District.” No one responded on the floor, including Scanlon, whom Golombek had just listed among the mayors he could work with. The item, and a communication from L. Rubin transmitting the Charter Revision Commission report (Item 37), went to Community Development 9–0.
Golombek's other item Tuesday drew no speech at all. Resolution 42, “Resolution to Adopt a Two-Year Moratorium on Cryptocurrency Mining and Data Processing Centers,” was referred to Community Development on Halton-Pope's motion, seconded by Everhart. The text was not read; the attachment on the docket is titled “Data Center Moratorium Resolution.” A resolution cannot by itself impose a moratorium on land uses under the Green Code — that takes a local law or ordinance amendment with a hearing — so what the committee will be looking at is the Council's statement of intent and, presumably, a request that the administration or the Council's own staff draft the law. This is the first appearance of the subject on a Buffalo Council docket on this page's record; the September 22 Community Development agenda will show whether it was opened.
The Legislation Committee's September 8 recommendations came up as Items 49 through 75, and Everhart asked to explain one. Item 55, a food store license at 896 East Delavan Avenue in the Masten District, was denied “for reasons which are many.” The building's owner came to her office in the spring, she said, and got “the same spiel that I give everyone”: go to the block clubs, talk to the neighbors. “That person did not do that up until last week.” Since then she has received “numerous letters as well as a petition” against the store, and she will file the denial reasons with the clerk and Corporation Counsel — the paper trail a license denial needs to survive a court challenge. Item 54, 2248 Main Street in the Delaware District, was also denied, on Scanlon's motion, without comment. So was Item 57, a garbage collector license for Everything Auto LLC.
Approved: food store licenses at 405 Hampshire (Niagara), 2082 South Park (South; with conditions) and 970 Kensington (Masten); a garbage collector license for Bin There Dump That; a lodging house license at 391 Washington; and, with conditions, tire handler licenses for Extreme Tire & Auto (2284 Genesee) and Xtreme Tires Inc. (740 Walden), both in Lovejoy. Sent back to committee: food store licenses at 3209 Bailey, 3198 Main and 2028 Genesee; two property manager licenses; a tobacco/hookah/vape license at 2531–2533 Delaware; a new lodging house at 12 Brantford Place; and, after a second look, a used car dealer at 1906 Genesee — which the Council first approved with conditions in a block with the tire handlers, then, at the end of the meeting, rescinded and recommitted.
The landmark designations were the day's quietest permanent acts. 319 Fourteenth Street, the Benedict Apartment House, and 619 Exchange Street, the Iroquois Door Company Building, are now local landmarks, both on 9–0 votes in a block of six with no discussion; the record shows the Iroquois Door hearing was held September 8. In the same block: special use permits for a tobacco/hookah/vape shop at 489 Grant Street (N-2C); outdoor dining and live entertainment at 1680 Elmwood Avenue (N-3C); outdoor dining at 1966 South Park Avenue (a.k.a. 11 Bloomfield) and at 382 Abbott Road (N-3E). Separately and with conditions: a tobacco/hookah/vape special use at 2034 South Park Avenue (N-3C), which had been discharged from committee on September 1.
To Legislation: six new food store applications — 1076 Sycamore (Ellicott), 761 a.k.a. 755 East Delavan (Masten), 74 a.k.a. 76 Elmwood (Fillmore), 1042 a.k.a. 1044 Fillmore (Ellicott), 523 Starin (Delaware), 1780 Seneca (South); three property board-up and securing contracts (Hannah Demolition, Property Mgmt. Services, Geiter Done of WNY), which the Council first approved and then, at the end of the meeting, rescinded and referred; and a petition from J. Anzalone for a tavern at 462 Niagara Street (N-2C), also referred to the City Planning Board, with a hearing set for October 6.
To Civil Service: appointments of a paralegal, an account clerk typist ($41,887), a Chief Data Officer (exempt; $124,676) and a Fair Housing Officer (exempt; $73,542).
To Finance: Comptroller correspondence on Resolution 26-000395 and the Moody's and S&P ratings on the Board of Education's 2026 school bonds.
To Police Oversight (Sept. 23): a resident's concerns about BPD conduct during the Puerto Rican Festival (T. Febres), and Wyatt's camera-room resolution (below).
Tow-truck transparency (Res. 43). A constituent business owner trying to have cars towed was told by the city to use a licensed Buffalo tow company, Halton-Pope said — and there is no list of licensed tow companies on the city website. The requirement “existed prior to this administration; nobody just paid attention to it.” The resolution asks for the list to be published, with attention to diversity among the licensed operators. Adopted; remainder to Legislation.
Landlord-caused utility shutoffs (Res. 45). The trigger was a multiple dwelling in the Ellicott District whose water was shut off for the landlord's non-payment, leaving seniors, people with disabilities and families without service. Looking further, Halton-Pope said, “I saw one bill that had $96,000 in arrears owed for utility payments.” The resolution asks what the city can do to keep tenants in service when the owner stops paying. Adopted; remainder to Legislation.
Insurance for vacant and newly acquired property (Res. 47). St. Ann's, the large church complex in Halton-Pope's district, “caught on fire” in January; the city was told demolition could cost $2 million; six months later “it was set on fire again.” The property, she said, is owned by several people and an organization and has no insurance, which leaves the city to carry a demolition it may never recover. New York does not require property insurance, but other municipalities have found ways to require proof of financial responsibility from owners of vacant, abandoned or recently purchased buildings. “If that's the intent, to burn a place down so the city will take care of it and then you can rebuild on it afterwards, I have a problem with that.” Adopted; remainder to Finance.
BPD camera room (Res. 49). Wyatt's resolution “Calling for an Investigation into BPD Camera Room” went to Police Oversight, and Rivera — because Wyatt cannot attend the September 23 committee — used the referral to put the department “on notice” to send Internal Affairs. The Council learned of the matter, he said, because Investigative Post obtained records under FOIL; the internal investigation is complete, so “there's no reason they can't share information with us.” The Council wants dates, actions taken, whether the commissioner in office at the time was the current one, and whether money can be recovered “for people that left work and didn't work the hours, or falsified documents.” “When you falsify payroll records, sometimes it can raise to the level of criminality.” He recalled a prior case in which the Council was informed ten months after the fact and policies were changed. Note: the underlying allegations are Rivera's characterization of published reporting, not findings of this Council.
Also adopted without discussion: Bollman's Commissioner of Deeds resolution (Res. 40); Halton-Pope's resolution honoring the life and legacy of Mark L. Gademsky (Res. 44); and two ordinance amendments recorded as approved — Scanlon's to Chapter 264-19, rental dwelling unit registration (Res. 48), and Wyatt's to Chapter 264-18 B(2) (Res. 50). Neither text was read.
The Finance Committee's block (Items 40–47) passed in one motion by Nowakowski: permission to “piggyback” a Sourcewell cooperative contract with Tyler Technologies for an enterprise ERP software-as-a-service agreement (a substitution filed September 9); a Cheektowaga firing range contract; a Peacemakers contract; sole-source approvals for Berla Corporation and LeadsOnline and a single-source approval for Insight Public Sector; added services to contract 93003679; and an amendment to the Summer Youth payroll administrator contract, which the attachment puts at $2,210,402.20. Item 48, the Police Athletic League's Building Better Readers literacy contract for 2026–27, was first approved in the block and then, on a revisit, denied — see the motions list for why that is less dramatic than it reads.
Dedication of South Park Avenue parcels (fourteen maps, PIN 5751.13); an amended abandonment and transfer of Otto Street and parts of Hayward and Alabama Streets; an Erie County utility easement at 0 Porter; a report of sale to Vision Multi Media Institute; citywide roofing with Weatherproofing Technologies; fire-extinguisher maintenance with Johnson Controls; LaBella's amended contract for PIN 5765.18; Change Order #2, $56,012, on the Shea's roof replacement; CHA Companies for the Kensington Pool; a late-file bid correction on Group 10 tree removals; and Pulse Occupational Medicine for the Fire Department. Received and filed: a notification that metered parking is being installed on Niagara Square; a cannabis establishment notice for 883 Jefferson; a liquor license notice for La Flor, 987 Niagara Street; three seasonal lifeguard appointments at $41,760.
Thirty-seven Civil Service items in eleven motions. Bollman moved the Civil Service Committee's report. Approved appointments as the record names them: a Division Chief (Bourgeois, $123,355), an Assistant Auditor (Chakraborty, $58,535), a Superintendent of Fleet Maintenance ($76,000), a Supervisor of Maintenance I (Maund, $65,194), two Park Supervisors I (Merkl, $61,827; Runge, $55,646), two Supervisors of Streets Sanitation I (Cornman and Zybala, $56,773 each), a Motor Equipment Mechanic (Linkowski, $56,070), an Administrative Assistant (Lopez, $52,685), a Building Inspector (Patti, $49,744), an Electrical Inspector (Gallagher, $61,223), a Boiler Inspector (Twitchell, $68,269), a Head Janitor (Lugo, $48,148), a Compensation and Benefits Specialist (Croom, $54,483), an Animal Shelter Worker (Carter, $41,133), two Laborers II, a General Mechanic status change (Holman, $52,979) and a substituted certificate of appointments for Coles, Bilbraut and Bell — on which Halton-Pope paused, thinking it was headed back to committee, until staff explained the missing signature and salary had arrived. Received and filed, no action: notices for a Deputy Commissioner of Streets and Sanitation (Finnegan; the record's salary figure is garbled), a Superintendent of Streets Sanitation (Fiorella, $60,084), a Senior Engineering Aide, a Senior Account Clerk Typist, two Personnel Assistants ($43,930), a Complaint Clerk, six hourly lifeguards at $20 and several laborers. The Council also appointed A. Falicov to the Buffalo City Court Housing Advisory Council.
The parking bureau letter, discharged. The meeting's first vote, taken out of order, was Golombek's late-file resolution to discharge Item 26-000305 — a resident's communication about the Parking Violations Bureau's enforcement practices — from Community Development, where it had been tabled September 8 after the writer told the committee he had asked the state Attorney General to investigate. Discharged, the item came to the floor and was received and filed. That is the procedural end of it at the Council; whatever the Attorney General does is not.
In memoriam. Before the moment of silence, Golombek remembered a Riverside man from one of the neighborhood's large families and a woman who ran youth programs at the Northwest Buffalo Community Center since the 1990s and made, he said, the best macaroni and cheese he ever had (“she did not make it in the bathtub”). Rivera remembered a disability-rights advocate who lived with spina bifida and earned degrees from Hilbert College and the University at Buffalo. Everhart and Wyatt remembered a Masten District community advocate who taught at Stepping Stone Academy Charter School. The record names only Mark L. Gademsky, honored by resolution; this page follows the record.
Proclamation. Everhart brought down Richard Satterwhite[*], a 19-year prostate cancer survivor, certified lay health advisor and founding member of Man Up Buffalo, whom she had met at her Masten stakeholders breakfast. He had never been in the chambers before. His announcement: Cruising for a Cure, a car show wrapped around free prostate screening, at Roswell Park on September 26, for men 45 to 70 — 40 to 75 with a family history.
Announcements. Wyatt: a meeting for residents who feel “duped by Spectrum,” with company representatives present, tonight at 5 p.m. at Gerard Place, 2115 Bailey Avenue. Halton-Pope: the Ellicott District stakeholders meeting is Saturday, September 19, 10 a.m., at the Roswell Park campus, entrance on Virginia Street. Committee week: Civil Service Tuesday, September 22 at 9:45 a.m.; Finance at 10; Legislation at 1 p.m.; Community Development at 2; Police Oversight Wednesday, September 23 at 11 a.m. — a date Rivera first gave as Tuesday and then corrected.
The City's recorded vote log is the source for every row; the docket number follows the item. All nine members were present and the log records every one of the 125 items as 9–0 with no abstentions. Items are numbered in three overlapping series (the main docket 1–39; committee submissions, Civil Service 1–37, Community Development 38–39, Finance 40–48, Legislation 49–75; Resolutions 40–50), so the series is named in each row. Halton-Pope moved nearly every main-docket and resolution item; Bollman moved Civil Service, Nowakowski Finance, Scanlon most of Legislation. Timecodes are recording positions. Where the tape and the log disagree the row says so.
From Legislation without recommendation (Sept. 8). Seven conditions filed with the clerk by Nowakowski; those stated on tape: co-mingling ceases at 11 p.m.; security plan to be submitted and approved by BPD; handheld or mobile ID scanners at entry; 120-day review for possible modification of hours. The log's mover/seconder fields are blank for this item; the tape has Halton-Pope moving and Nowakowski seconding, then speaking. Flagged as the lead.
Second Wyatt. Floor exchange with an assistant corporation counsel[*] over the August 3 referendum-certification date; Wyatt on the structural conflict of a Corporation Counsel serving both branches. To Legislation Committee Sept. 22 for further discussion. Flagged for the floor dispute.
Second Golombek, who spoke for nine minutes asking the administration to send the deputy mayor to committee to explain, or rescind, the instruction that city employees not respond to council members without permission. Flagged for the request that the administration appear.
Second Everhart. Not read or discussed.
Taken out of order at the top of the agenda. Discharge second Bollman; the discharged communication (tabled in committee Sept. 8) then received and filed, second Bollman.
Second Rivera. No list of city-licensed tow companies exists on the city website; resolution asks that one be published.
Second Rivera. No remarks.
Second Everhart. Prompted by a water shutoff at an Ellicott District multiple dwelling for the landlord's non-payment; one utility bill seen at $96,000 in arrears.
Second Rivera. St. Ann's: two fires (January and about six months later), a $2 million demolition estimate, no insurance, multiple owners.
Second Rivera, who asked that the Police Commissioner, command staff and Internal Affairs attend the Sept. 23 committee. Wyatt to be absent that day.
Seconds Nowakowski and Golombek. Texts not read; the log records both as “Approved.”
Second Wyatt. The log enters the vote twice; one action was taken.
On tape, one motion to deny both, second Bollman; the log records L54 as Scanlon/Bollman and L55 as Halton-Pope/Golombek. Everhart stated reasons for 896 East Delavan — applicant did not engage the neighborhood until last week; letters and a petition in opposition — and will file them with the clerk and Corporation Counsel. No reasons stated on tape for 2248 Main.
Scanlon, second Wyatt. No reasons stated.
405 Hampshire: Scanlon/Everhart. 2082 South Park: Halton-Pope/Nowakowski, with conditions. 970 Kensington: Scanlon/Golombek.
Scanlon, second Bollman.
Halton-Pope, second Wyatt. Moved as a block with L68, which was later pulled back (below).
Tape and log reconciled, but the path matters: first approved with conditions in the 66–68 block at 38:23; at 1:07:50 Halton-Pope moved to revisit, the approval was rescinded (second Nowakowski) and the item recommitted (second Scanlon). The log records only the final state, “Ref. to LEGISLATION,” with Halton-Pope/Scanlon. Flagged for the reversal.
Scanlon, second Everhart. Discharged from committee Sept. 1.
Halton-Pope, second Bollman. No discussion. The docket dates the Benedict hearing “9/8/22,” a probable typo for 9/8/26 (the Iroquois Door hearing is dated 9/8/26).
Moved as “recommit” on tape (Scanlon; 12 Brantford by Halton-Pope); the log records each as “Ref. to LEGISLATION.” Same meaning: back to committee.
Scanlon, second Rivera. Filed Sept. 1; in Legislation Sept. 8.
Read this with Item 33. Finance Items 40–48 were approved in one motion at 35:16. Halton-Pope then moved to revisit 48: “We were working with a brand new system and reading this isn't as easy as it used to be.” The approval was rescinded (second Golombek) and the item denied (second Rivera). No reason was stated. Ten minutes earlier the Council had approved the same program's 2026–27 contract as main-docket Item 33 (26-000599, “Police Athletic League-Literacy (Building Better Readers)”), after Wyatt confirmed he had received the reading-outcome data he had asked for. The record therefore shows one PAL literacy contract approved and an earlier-filed version denied; the tape is consistent with clearing a duplicate, but no one said so. Flagged for the reversal.
Nowakowski, second Rivera, one motion. The log enters the Tyler vote twice; one action was taken.
Approved at 24:11 in a block “30 through and including 33.” Wyatt's question (“on mine it just says legislation”) went to Item 33 instead. At 1:07:04 Halton-Pope revisited 30–32, rescinded (second Golombek) and sent them to Legislation (second Rivera). The log records only the final referral. Flagged for the reversal.
Approved in the 30–33 block; Wyatt asked to revisit to confirm he had received reading-outcome data he requested. The chief of staff: received by email earlier today. Left approved. The log's mover/seconder (Halton-Pope/Scanlon) reflects the block.
Halton-Pope; seconds Golombek (Item 1) and Everhart (3–5 as a block).
Halton-Pope; seconds Rivera (12–13), Nowakowski (15), Wyatt (19–22).
Log has Golombek moving Item 11 (second Bollman); the tape is consistent with Halton-Pope continuing to move.
Halton-Pope, second Scanlon.
Halton-Pope; seconds Bollman (23–24), Everhart (26–29, 39). The items log shows 39 “Ref. to LEGISLATION”; the minutes and tape add the Planning Board.
Halton-Pope, second Rivera.
Halton-Pope; seconds Nowakowski, Everhart, Scanlon, Bollman. No discussion.
Approved: CS3 Assistant Auditor (Chakraborty, $58,535); CS4 and CS6 Supervisor of Streets Sanitation 1 (Cornman; Zybala; $56,773); CS5 Motor Equipment Mechanic (Linkowski, $56,070); CS8 Superintendent of Fleet Maintenance ($76,000); CS9 Administrative Assistant (Lopez, $52,685); CS10 Animal Shelter Worker (Carter, $41,133); CS11 Laborer II seasonal (Heath, $41,133); CS12 Building Inspector (Patti, $49,744); CS13 Supervisor of Maintenance 1 (Maund, $65,194); CS16 Laborer II (Watson); CS20 status change, General Mechanic (Holman, $52,979); CS28–29 Park Supervisor I (Merkl, $61,827; Runge, $55,646); CS30 Head Janitor (Lugo, $48,148); CS31 Division Chief (Bourgeois, $123,355); CS32 Electrical Inspector (Gallagher, $61,223); CS33 Boiler Inspector (Twitchell, $68,269); CS34 substituted Certificate of Appointments (Coles, Bilbraut, Bell) — Halton-Pope moved to revisit 34 believing it should go to committee; staff said the updated, signed certificate with salary had arrived; left approved; CS37 Compensation & Benefits Specialist (Croom, $54,483). Received and filed: CS1 Complaint Clerk (Feeney, $40,242); CS2 Laborer II (Colbert Jr.); CS7 Laborer II seasonal (McCants); CS14 Sr. Account Clerk Typist (Dugo, $44,371); CS15 Superintendent of Streets Sanitation (Fiorella, $60,084); CS17 Deputy Commissioner of Streets & Sanitation (Finnegan; salary field garbled in the record); CS18 Laborer II seasonal (Oshirak); CS19 Senior Engineering Aide (Rivera Arroyo, $48,558); CS21 status change, Laborer II (Candelario, $19.70/hr); CS22–27 six hourly lifeguards at $20 (Edwards, Lloyd, Fekula, Ologbenla, Weatherston, Towles-Schwen); CS35–36 Personnel Assistants (Monegro; Welch; $43,930). The log carries an empty second vote line under CS29; one action was taken.
Bollman, second Rivera.
Minutes: Halton-Pope, second Nowakowski. Late files accepted without objection; the President noted the agenda would be heard in its entirety without prejudice to any member's right to pause. Adjournment second Golombek.
What this is built from. The City posted video of the session on its CivicClerk meeting portal; this page extracted the audio and transcribed it. The 70.7-minute recording opens six and a half minutes before the roll call; the meeting ran about 64 minutes to adjournment. The City's structured agenda, which carries a recorded roll-call vote for every item, and the summary minutes are the ground truth for the All Motions section; the tape supplies the discussion. Timecodes are recording positions, not clock times. Buffalo's regular session takes no public comment, so there are no public speakers to report.
Where the tape and the record differ. Three times the Council voted, then rescinded and re-voted: the board-up contracts (Items 30–32, approved then referred to Legislation), the PAL literacy contract on the Finance list (F48, approved then denied) and the 1906 Genesee used-car dealer (L68, approved with conditions then recommitted). The City's log records only each item's final state; the rows above give the path. The same PAL literacy program was approved as Item 33 and denied as F48; the log offers no reason and none was stated on tape. The log's mover and seconder fields are blank for the Chippewa permit (L75) and for the second on Item 16, and it enters two votes twice (Tyler Technologies, F40; Commissioner of Deeds, R40) and one empty vote line (CS29); one action was taken in each case. The docket dates the Benedict Apartment House hearing “9/8/22”; 9/8/26 is almost certainly meant. The salary on the Deputy Commissioner of Streets and Sanitation notice (CS17) is printed as “1339460” and is not reported. Petition 39 is “Ref. to LEGISLATION” in the items log and “LEGISLATION & CPBD” in the minutes; the tape says both.
Names. Council members and districts are from the verified roster and the City's roll call; Whisper's renderings (“Bowman,” “Farrell Leto,” “Gollum back,” “Houghton Pope,” “Noakowski,” “Ever heard,” “Wyeth”) are corrected without flags. Appointees are named and salaried as the City's record names them. Two people who appear only on the tape carry [*]: the assistant corporation counsel who spoke on Resolution 46 (name as heard) and the proclamation honoree (name as read by Everhart). The pastor who gave the invocation, the Council's chief of staff, the police chief and the deputy mayor Golombek named are identified by role only, as are the four residents remembered in memoriam, whose names are not in the record; this page names only Mark L. Gademsky, who is. A prior police case Rivera cited by name is likewise described, not named.
Streets and entities. Entity names follow the City's items text over the audio: Hannah Demolition (“Hanna”), Geiter Done of WNY, Shea's (“Shays”), Elmwood (“M wood”), Kensington (“kids attend”), Fourteenth Street (“14 street”), “food store” (“full star”), “lodging house” (“larger house”). Golombek's “West Hurdle” is West Hertel, per the corrections file. His “Resch” is rendered Roesch Avenue, the only close match in the city street index and a Riverside street in his district; it is flagged because the index, not the tape, supplies the spelling. The street check's one suggestion, “Gerard Place → Girard Place,” was not applied: Wyatt was naming a venue at 2115 Bailey Avenue, not a street. Bailey Avenue, Main Street, Niagara Street, South Park Avenue and Virginia Street validated. Yeager's Binghamton case is not named here because the tape's rendering of the caption is unreliable.
Other checks. The interests watchlist was run against every entity, address and applicant on the docket; no match. The scanner address cross-reference was not available for this brief; the properties at the center of these stories are listed for the editor in the page source. The [*] flag marks a name or spelling taken from audio or inference alone; verify against the City Clerk's record before quoting.