About

Data sources

Grand Island Link builds its directory from open data and official pages, checks every address against public records, and credits each source here.

Business listings

© OpenStreetMap contributors. OpenStreetMap data is available under the Open Database License (ODbL) 1.0.
Overture Maps Foundation Places, available under the Community Data License Agreement (CDLA) Permissive 2.0 or Apache 2.0, depending on the contributing dataset. Contributors include Meta, Microsoft, Foursquare (© 2024 Foursquare Labs, Inc., Apache 2.0), BrightQuery, DAC, and AllThePlaces (CC0 1.0).

Town offices, schools, churches and groups

We research these listings by hand from official pages and each organization's own site: the Town of Grand Island, the Grand Island Central School District, Erie County, New York State, the state's child care licensing data, and the groups' own pages. Each listing links to the page its details were checked against. We don't contact anyone to build them, and we never publish a volunteer's personal phone number or home address.

Address checks

We show a street address and map pin only when the address matches New York State's public records and isn't a home. We never show a PO box, a private mailbox, or the address of a home-based business.

Address points from the NYS Streets and Address Maintenance (SAM) program, NYS Office of Information Technology Services.
Tax parcel data from the NYS Department of Taxation and Finance's Office of Real Property Tax Services and Erie County, through the NYS GIS Clearinghouse.
The Town of Grand Island boundary from the U.S. Census Bureau (TIGER).

History timeline

Every entry on the timeline cites its sources. A researcher drafts it from public records, histories and archives; two fact-checkers verify it independently; a skeptic looks for myths and overreach; and a person reviews and approves it before it appears. Each entry shows how well its facts are documented, and where sources disagree we say so.

News

We write our own short summaries and link to the full story at the outlet that published it. We never republish another outlet's articles.

Map

Map rendering by MapLibre GL JS.
Map labels in Noto Sans (SIL Open Font License); map icons derived from Mapzen's Tangram icons (MIT License). Site icons from Lucide (ISC License); typefaces Fraunces and Inter (SIL Open Font License).

Corrections

Listings are refreshed from these sources regularly. Something wrong or missing? A way to suggest corrections is on its way.