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Thomas J. Dolan of The Buffalo News analyzed police contracts and 2005 payrolls for seven towns and the City of Buffalo and found that “47 officers from Buffalo and the near suburbs broke the $100,000 mark in 2005, the last year for which complete figures were available. And nearly three dozen more are poised to…
Read MoreBob Mahlburg of the Sarasota Herald-Tribune reviewed state financial disclosure records to show Florida’s weak ethics laws and how state and local officials with real estate investments walk a tightrope between their public posts and personal profits. “State Sen. Mike Bennett has made more than $2 million renting office space to a state agency he…
Read MoreRobert Cribb, Fred Vallance-Jones and Tamsin McMahon of The Toronto Star analyzed the aviation data and found that “more than 80,000 passengers have been put at risk over the last five years when airplanes they were travelling in came dangerously close together in Canadian skies.” Between 2001 and mid-2005, there were more than 800 incidents…
Read MoreMichael Mansur and Rick Montgomery of The Kansas City Star used Data Envelopment Analysis to analyze the budget and performance numbers from 18 area cities and rank how efficiently they provided eight municipal services. “Four cities tied in police services: Belton, Grandview, Liberty and Prairie Village. Three cities tied in fire and fire-and-ambulance services: Belton,…
Read MoreBrad Bumsted and Debra Erdley of The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review compiled records from 2,300 receipts filed by Perzel’s chief of staff and found that House Speaker Perzel, Pennsylvania General Assembly’s top fundraiser, “used campaign cash to treat his chief of staff and both men’s sons to Super Bowl trips the past two years.” Campaign money also…
Read MoreScott Finn and Tara Tuckwiller of The Charleston (W.Va.) Gazette analyzed death certificates and found that “patients could die if they take the “usual adult dosage” on methadone’s package insert — information that comes with the prescription and was approved by the federal government.” Methadone, once given mostly to heroin addicts to ease their cravings,…
Read MoreAn analysis of more than 25,000 travel disclosure documents over a 5½-year period by the Center for Public Integrity, American Public Media and Northwestern University’s Medill News Service found that “members of Congress and their aides took at least 23,000 trips — valued at almost $50 million — financed by private sponsors, many of them…
Read MoreMegan Boldt, MaryJo Sylwester, Meggen Lindsay and Doug Belden of St. Paul Pioneer Press analyzed three years of test scores from all 731 Minnesota elementary schools and found that 13 high-poverty schools were “doing better than predicted and seem to have found a way to overcome education’s biggest challenge — teaching high numbers of poor…
Read MoreFarmsubsidy.org has released new data on farm subsidy payments, with an analysis by Nils Mulvad, co-founder of farmsubsidy.org and director of the Danish International Center for Analytical Reporting, analyzed new data on farm subsidy payments in Denmark in 2005 and found that “the new Single Farm Payment Scheme has dramatically increased the number of farm…
Read MoreRick Anderson of the Seattle Weekly reviewed state files and revealed Washington consumer complaints about funeral homes and cemeteries. Consumers were “being ‘penalized’ by funeral homes for buying coffins elsewhere.” There were “complaints about bodies buried in the wrong graves, cremated when they should have been planted, or occupying plots that have been resold” and…
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