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Scorecard: The Week's Winners and Losers

The Week's Winners & Losers

Double Standards

Maryland officials on Dec. 16 extradited Gary Korkuc, the Cheektowaga man accused of marinating his cat in red pepper flakes and oil with the intent of eating it, back to Buffalo on Dec. 16 to face charges of animal cruelty. In other news, chickens, cows and fish are apparently unworthy of such protection.

Detention

A 30-year-old Buffalo middle school teacher was arrested at the Canadian border on Dec. 16 and charged with allegedly trafficking ecstasy pills. Victoria Minella, who teaches 7th and 8th grade English (your basic ABC’s and XTC’s) at School 79, is now facing some pretty serious detention time.

Our New Queen

Move over MaryAlice Demler, there’s a new Miss Buffalo in town. On Dec. 19 Sabres goalie Ryan Miller proposed to his girlfriend, the smoking hot actress Noureen DeWulf of Ghosts of Girlfriends Past fame, at the Mansion on Delaware. Women this hot just aren’t supposed to exist here.

Trickle-Down Effect

Congressman Brian Higgins of Buffalo joined rank-and-file Republican millionaire Chris Lee of Clarence on Dec. 16 in voting to extend the Bush tax cuts on income exceeding $250,000. Cheers go out to Louise Slaughter, who voted no and had the sense to see through the folly of Reagonomics.

Gerrymandering

According to Census figures released on Dec. 21, New York will likely lose two seats in Congress in the upcoming reapportionment, dropping to its lowest representation since 1823. Who else is thankful the newly anointed Republican majority in the State Assembly is now in control of the redistricting?





By the numbers...

74

Score of the Buffalo metro area on the Brookings Institution’s index of black/white segregation in America, based on census figures released on Dec. 16. Of the 100 metro areas surveyed, Buffalo was the sixth highest, trailing five other Rust Belt cities traditionally plagued by white flight. Buffalo’s score did drop four points from 2000 census figures.

13

Months former Niagara Falls mayor Vincent Anello will spend in federal prison after being sentenced on Dec. 16 of defrauding a local electrical workers pension fund. Anello was also ordered to repay the union $55,273. No stranger to corruption investigations, earlier this year Anello dodged charges from a 2008 probe into a $40,000 loan he received from a local businessman with city contracts.

0.07

Parts per billion of hexavalent chromium—the carcinogenic made famous by Erin Brockovich—discovered in Buffalo drinking water according to a study released Dec. 20 by the Environmental Working Group. There is no current law regulating the level of hexavalent chromium found in tap water. Of the 35 cities surveyed, Buffalo had the 11th lowest measure, just above the 0.06 ppb limit currently being considered in California.


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