Pierce County has reopened the Steilacoom ferry terminal after a major remodeling project closed it for nearly five months.

IF YOU GO

What: Ribbon-cutting for the Steilacoom ferry terminal.

When: 3 p.m. Wednesday.

Where: 56 Union Ave., Steilacoom.

Who: Speakers include Pierce County Executive Pat McCarthy, County Councilman Dick Muri, David Jacobsen, ferry liaison for the Anderson Island Citizen Advisory Board, and Deb Wallace, airport and ferry manager for Pierce County Public Works and Utilities.

Contest: The winners of the 2012 ferry photo contest will be announced.

County officials will hold a ribbon-cutting ceremony Wednesday, eight days after the renovated terminal reopened to the public.

Its has never looked better, said David Jacobsen, ferry liaison for the Anderson Island Citizens Advisory Board. Theyve done a beautiful job.

County officials say the project will reduce energy costs, make the building more comfortable and serviceable for customers, give employees more room and extend the life of the building.

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Steilacoom ferry terminal reopens after remodeling; ceremony is Wednesday

Forty feet above America Street, a flag has flown for 21 years. It is a U.S. flag, but then again, it isn't.

With 13 stripes and 50 stars in the black-liberation colors of red, black, and green, the flag is an uncompromising piece of art planted in the historically black East Side of Charleston. Designed by Harlem-based artist David Hammons, it is one of the only pieces that remains standing from an ambitious city-wide art installation exhibit called Places with a Past, which involved 19 artists and took place during the 1991 Spoleto Festival USA.

Flapping above the rooftops of the surrounding houses, the flag is a curiosity to outsiders passing through, causing some drivers to slow down at the intersection to crane their necks and marvel at it. But to the people who live on and around America Street and see it every day, it has simply become a part of the landscape.

On a sweaty spring afternoon, a man (who declines to give his name) who has seen the flag flying for two decades sits in a folding chair on the sidewalk along Reid Street. The man, who doesn't want to give out his name, lives next door to it and knows all about its origin, but he doesn't have much to say on the topic. "It don't mean nothing to me," he says in a voice as dry as cornmeal. "It's just like any other thing around here you don't pay no attention." Jason Cooper, who just got his hair cut at a barber shop on Columbus Street, gives a similar response. "It don't mean shit to me," Cooper says.

Others are more opinionated. A man named Nate who has spent 50 years in the neighborhood says the colors have a clear symbolism: Black for the people. Green for Africa. Red for the spilled blood of African Americans on North American soil. "Well, it tells a story," says Nate, who prefers to just go by his first name. "You can be angry, you can be cool, you can feel whatever you want to. But the thing is, it tells the story of a sojourn of a certain race of people. You can be mad, and it doesn't matter. Nobody's going to listen to you no way if you get mad."

Marvin Smalls, who has lived for 30 years on the East Side, is mending the chain-link fence in front of his house and installing a wooden gate. His shirt is off, exposing a Black Panther tattoo on his bicep. "It's representative of the African American," he says of the flag, squinting down Reid Street toward the tiny park where it stands. "It's bringing the two together. People that don't agree with the American flag, they might be able to agree with that."

Beside the flag stands a one-story billboard, once emblazoned with an advertisement for Newport cigarettes. It now bears a faded, purplish monochrome image of a group of schoolchildren looking up toward the flag with eyes closed and lips pursed, perhaps in a song or a pledge. City ordinances prohibited billboards in residential neighborhoods, and yet, according to the book Places with a Past (about the exhibition of the same title), many existed in the early '90s, and a sizable portion of them advertised alcohol and tobacco in black neighborhoods. When Newport pasted a new, bright-orange advertisement over Hammons' photo a week after the show closed, the city helped Hammons to reclaim the billboard and then started cracking down on other billboards in residential areas.

Jamal Brown, standing outside a fried chicken joint at America and Reid streets, points across the road at the image of his classmates from Wilmot J. Fraser Elementary School, who happened to be at the Mall Playground when Hammons took the photo. Many of them still live in the neighborhood, he says, and are regularly greeted with a blown-up photo of their adolescent selves. Those children are in their 20s and 30s now.

Shameeka Green is walking south on America Street with her arm around the shoulders of her 13-year-old son, who is nearly as tall as she is. She can see how the portrait of the kids fits with the flag: "It's probably representing his people, wanting to do better for the community," she says. Her son, Cosohn, stops to take a look at it, shielding his eyes from the afternoon sun with his hand. "When I first saw it, I thought it wasn't the American flag," he says.

Mohammed Idris, a community worker known as the Walking Imam, has never been a fan of the installation, and for just the reason that Cosohn pointed out: It's not an American flag. "To me, it looks like a foreign flag, and it looks like some children are up there looking at a foreign flag, and that could almost go for treason," Idris says. "I spoke to the city about that flag. I told the mayor and them they should take it down ... You see the youths looking up, and they've been looking up for years. What are they looking up for?"

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Controversial flag still flying from Spoleto '91

That's because the warm winter weather that residents of southeastern Wisconsin enjoyed also allowed roofing contractors to get a lot more work done than usual. As a result the normal backlog they have heading into the spring was eliminated and roofing contractors are now bidding aggressively against each other for new work.

"New work is really competitive because there isn't a lot of it out there," said John Pilmaier, project manager for Milwaukee-based Langer Roofing & Sheet Metal Inc. "We don't have much of a backlog, but we are moving from job to job, keeping our guys busy."

Waterford-based SRS Roofing & Sheet Metal Inc. had its best first quarter ever, said Mike Hurst, president and CEO. But the warm winter and early spring weather had a lot to do with that, he said, and now roofing contractors are bidding aggressively for new work.

"The local roofing market is super competitive right now," said Tom Bechtel, commercial roofing estimator and director for SRS. "If there's anybody thinking about doing a roof job right now is the idea time to do it," said Hurst.

When there is a lack of rain or snow there are much fewer roof problems and most people don't think about repairing or replacing their roof until it leaks, said Patrick Finger, president and co-owner of Pewaukee-based Velcheck & Finger Roof Consulting & Service.

"Roofers do not like good weather," Finger said. "The industry as a whole I would say is pretty slow because the weather was too warm during the winter. There's no roof damage. It's extremely competitive right now in the industry."

New construction projects, which ground to a halt during the Great Recession, have picked up, but some roofers say the number of new building projects is too low. However, Pilmaier said he has heard that architectural firms are doing increased business.

"At least it's moving in the right direction," he said. "But it's going to be months before it gets to us."

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Warm winter creates competitive roofing market

Seven years ago, several employees of Specialty Associates Inc., a West Allis roofing contractor, made a major decision that would dramatically change their careers.

Specialty Associates Inc. (SAI) was one of the largest roofing contractors in the state and had been through several turbulent years of ownership changes and a Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing. But in early 2005, an even bigger change was coming. Tecta America Corp. acquired General Roofing Services, the parent company of SAI. Tecta is the parent company of FJA Christiansen Roofing Co. Inc., one of Milwaukee's oldest and most prominent roofing companies.

SAI employees knew that Tecta would not maintain two roofing companies in Milwaukee.

"We knew when they were done, the lead entity in Milwaukee would be FJA," said Michael Hurst, who was then the president of SAI. "They were going to merge (SAI and FJA), cherrypick (SAI). Take the best people, the best pieces of equipment and just drop everything they weren't interested in."

Hurst joined SAI in 1996 as an architectural sheet metal mechanic and crew foreman. Seeking a new career path, and with an interest in computers, he moved into an information technology position at the company in 2000. The company was acquired in 1999 by Pompano Beach, Fla.-based General Roofing, then a huge international roofing company, and Hurst traveled around the nation installing, and doing training for, accounting software and developing process improvements and controls. But Hurst had a lot to learn about the roofing business.

"Before 2004, I couldn't have told you much more than a roof goes on the top of a building," he said.

In 2004, General Roofing was acquired by Aurora, Colo.-based investment firm Republic Financial Corp., and Ron Werowinski, who founded SAI in 1975, left the company. Hurst became president of SAI after Werowinski left.

"When Ron left, because of my relationship with all of the other (General Roofing) operators in the country, I really got a good understanding of the roofing business from the business side," Hurst said.

Hurst led SAI through turbulent times. Right after it acquired the company, Republic had General Roofing file to reorganize the company under Chapter 11 of the bankruptcy code. As a result, some SAI vendors did not get paid, damaging their relationship with the company, Hurst said. Some vendors who did not get paid demanded payments from homeowners who had already paid SAI.

"Trying to run the company with those kinds of things going on, it's a nightmare," Hurst said. "The construction trade is really a relationship business. You've got to do what you say and say what you do."

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Climb to the Top : Roofing Company Overcomes Adversity

A parking consultant for the would-be developers of CentroVerde, a complex of three six-story buildings to be built in Montclair's Central Business District, tried to reassure the municipal Planning Board on Tuesday that the proposed development would have more than enough parking.

STAFF PHOTO BY DAN PROCHILO

This illustration depicts the proposed third building, at the corner of Orange Road and Bloomfield Avenue, in CentroVerde. The Planning Board heard from the parking expert for the project developers, Montclair Acquisition Partners, on Tuesday.

Tom Calu, the interim executive director of the Montclair Parking Authority, spoke on behalf of Montclair Acquisition Partners (MAP), the company seeking to build the massive project on a 3.3-acre lot where there are now vacant Bloomfield Avenue car dealerships, between Valley and Orange roads.

Calu had been retained by MAP, composed of the Montclair-based Pinnacle Companies that developed The Siena and DCH Auto Group, to provide a vision of how shared parking would work within the Orange Road Parking Deck, which will serve CentroVerde.

A shared parking scheme assumes that the peak parking needs for various uses relying on one parking area - in this case, offices, stores, restaurants and apartments - will occur at different times. For example, the parking demand for the residences could be expected to be lower during the daytime hours, when tenants would be at their jobs, freeing up spaces for workers bound for the offices and retail establishments inside CentroVerde.

Calu said that, once planned additions are put onto the deck, the available parking inside it would be 523 spaces if motorists were permitted to park their own cars, which is what the arrangement would be after the first phase of the project is completed. Phase One calls for the construction of two buildings with a mix of uses, including 262 apartments, to be constructed on Valley Road and at the corner of Valley Road and Bloomfield Avenue.

The parking inventory of the deck would be considerably higher - 686 spaces - if the developers were to introduce almost across-the-board valet parking. A mix of valet and self-parking is expected to be rolled out once the second phase of the project is completed, which calls for either an eight-story hotel or another mixed use building, with 67 dwelling units, at the corner of Orange Road and Bloomfield Avenue.

Calu told board members that, even after the development was fully constructed, its parking needs would not push the deck to its full capacity. During the first phase, the maximum required amount of parking at any one time is estimated to be 460 spaces, Calu said - more than 60 spaces fewer than the allotted amount in the deck.

If there were no shared-parking scenario, which had been encouraged by municipal officials' redevelopment plan for the site, and the developers provided separate sets of parking spaces for each use, the total required number of spaces once the project was totally completed would be about 720, according to testimony at the meeting - a figure not far off from the total spaces provided under the valet-parking situation, Calu said.

Continue reading here:
Plenty for all? Montclair Planning Board reviews parking needs of huge project

Longtime French Quarter resident and activist attorney Stuart Smith received the Elizebeth T. Werlein Award, the highest honor given by the Vieux Carre Commission, when the commission presented architectural awards last week for the second time since Hurricane Katrina. The awards covered projects completed in the French Quarter from 2008 through 2011.

In presenting the Werlein award, Nathan Chapman, the 2008 recipient, described Smith as "tireless in his pro bono legal work for the French Quarter." Smith has helped create and set preservation law through his lawsuits, "some of which have gone to the state Supreme Court, setting important precedents," Chapman said.

Smith has often battled what he considered illegal commercial intrusions into residential parts of the Quarter and businesses that he said create excessive noise. In 2003 he led an effort to expand the commission's authority over changes of use in historic buildings. Previously, the commission took the position that it had no authority to authorize or block a change of use, only to regulate architectural changes.

The Werlein Award, established in 1986 as part of the commission's 50th anniversary celebration, honors individuals and groups who have made "distinguished contributions to the preservation of the Vieux Carre." It is named for Elizebeth Werlein, who in 1936 led the successful effort to amend the state Constitution to authorize creation of a body to oversee preservation of the Vieux Carre.

Commission Chairman Ralph Lupin and Director Lary Hesdorffer presented the architectural awards, which recognize excellence in restoration, renovation, reconstruction, rehabilitation and new construction.

The commission formerly presented awards every year, but since Katrina it had held only one previous ceremony, in 2008, honoring projects completed during 2004-07.

Certificates of honor, the commission's top architectural awards, went to the following properties:

1218-20 Burgundy St.: Jon Kemp and John Reed, owners; Frank Masson and Rick Fifield, architects. A certificate of honor was awarded for preservation of this c. 1810 cottage, outbuildings and double courtyards. Built for Jose Antonio La Rionda, it was later used as a school, and it was known for many years until its sale in 2006 by the city as the Cabrini Doll Museum. (Masson, an architect with Barry Fox and Associates, began work on this and two of the other award-winning projects before his death in 2009.)

618-22 Gov. Nicholls St.: 618-20 Gov. Nicholls LLC, owners; Frank Masson and Robert Cangelosi Jr. (Koch and Wilson Architects), architects; Alvarez + Basik Design Group, landscape designers; Paddison Builders & Associates, contractor. A certificate of honor was presented for restoration and renovation of two buildings as a family home: a c. 1870 Italianate building at the rear of the property and an 1828 Creole-style brick double townhouse at the street constructed for Mrs. John Clay, sister-in-law of U.S. Sen. Henry Clay. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the buildings housed the Notre Dame Academy of the Sacred Heart.

910 and 914 Toulouse St.: Tooloose LLC, owner; Trapolin-Peer Architects, architect; Rene Fransen, landscape architect; Vintage Construction, contractor. A certificate of honor was presented for restoration of two c. 1815 brick-between-posts Creole cottages, a service building and a spacious courtyard.

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Vieux Carre Commission honors work to preserve French Quarter

May 30, 2012 - Texas Collegiate League (TCL) Victoria Generals Opening day of the 2012 summer season is just days away for the Victoria Generals. The team has finalized its opening day roster with the addition of three local products. Victoria natives Kevin Daniels and Hayden Vesely will join Shiner native Blue Hybner to give the Generals some much needed depth across the board this summer.

"We're very fortunate to have such a hotbed of baseball talent right here in our backyard to choose from," commented Blake Koch, Victoria's general manager. "Kevin, Hayden, and Blue are quality players from the area that will fit in well with the pieces we already have in place."

Kevin Daniels, a 2010 graduate of St. Joseph High School, just completed his sophomore year at Blinn College. Daniels put together a solid sophomore campaign, batting .336 with six doubles, one triple, 20 RBIs, 16 stolen bases, and 24 runs scored. For his efforts, Daniels was named to the Region XIV South All-Conference team.

As a freshman, Daniels hit .275 with three doubles, one triple, 28 RBIs, 14 stolen bases, and 28 runs scored. He also was named to the Region XIV South All-Conference team as a freshman as well.

In 2011, Daniels was selected to play in the Texas/New Mexico Junior College All-Star Game played at Baylor Ballpark in Waco.

Daniels is currently undecided on which university he will be transferring to in the fall to continue his collegiate career.

"Kevin is a solid defensive outfielder that handles the bat well," stated Koch. "He works hard and plays the game the right way."

Hayden Vesely, a 2011 graduate of St. Joseph High School, followed in the footsteps of his high school teammate Daniels and chose to attend Blinn as well. Vesely hit .267 as a freshman this year with six doubles, one home run, 19 RBIs, five stolen bases, and 34 runs scored.

Vesely showed his versatility defensively by playing multiple positions, seeing time at second and third base as well as in the outfield.

As a senior at St. Joseph, Vesely compiled a 10-2 record on the mound with a 1.97 ERA. He had 74 strikeouts in 71 innings pitched. He also led the team at the plate with a .456 batting average and 23 RBIs. For his efforts, Vesely was named to the Advocate All-Area Baseball First-Team, the TAPPS District 4-5A First-Team, and the TAPPS All-State First-Team.

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Generals Finalize Opening Day Roster with Local Additions

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The Hyundai looks sharper and more upmarket, but feels familiar to drive.

Korean maker's popular small car has come a long way since its launch five years ago.

Hyundai has high hopes for the second generation of its strong-selling small car, the i30, and not without good reason.

The nuggety hatch is the Korean company's strongest seller by a long margin, and a big driver of the company's inexorable growth in Australia over the past three years.

The all-new model arrives just five years after its predecessor was launched, a comparatively short model life in car terms. Indeed, Hyundai points out that every i30 model on Australian roads is still covered by its five-year factory warranty.

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But five years is also an eon in terms of the design, equipment and dynamic improvements its competitors have delivered.

So has the i30 got the chops to not only hold its ground in Australias largest and most competitive segment, but also to steal sales from its highly credentialled competitors?

In a word, yes.

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Driven: Hyundai i30

The use of hormone replacement therapy to treat symptoms of menopause has been hugely controversial. Once touted as a godsend for women with menopause-related hot flashes, night sweats and vaginal dryness, use of the therapy has dramatically declined since July 2002.

That was when research through the Women's Health Initiative was abruptly halted because an elevated number of cases of breast cancer was detected in the study participants. With that, women began to worry whether the therapy had put them at increased risk, a concern that appeared to be justified when a subsequent decline in breast cancer incidence was linked to widespread cessation of the therapy.

The July issue of a Climacteric, the journal of the International Menopause Society, revisits the topic 10 years later to sort out the therapy's actual effect on women's health. In more than a dozen articles focusing on hormone replacement therapy's relationship to breast cancer, cardiovascular disease, dementia and other conditions, the authors (some of them involved in the original Women's Health Initiative work) conclude that for younger women using the therapy close to the time of menopause, benefits generally outweigh the risks.

A common theme in the articles is that the initial finding that the therapy increases breast cancer risk didn't hold up; the increased risk was actually quite small among younger women, rising among the oldest. The data also revealed a "window of opportunity" during which the therapy's benefits outweigh its risks, one of the articles notes. That window occurs before a woman turns 60 and/or within 10 years of entering menopause.

Here's a summary of some of the journal's findings:

- Women whose breast cancer risk is otherwise low and who suffer from lots of menopausal symptoms may benefit from the therapy.

- It appears that women using hormone replacement therapy have a large reduction 40 percent in colorectal cancer risk.

- The therapy appears to offer substantial bone-health benefits, including a reduction in fracture risk.

- The therapy appears to increase risk of dementia, though it's not clear how that relates to the age at which a woman starts such therapy.

- A small increased risk of stroke is associated with hormone replacement therapy initiated near menopause.

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Hormone Replacement Therapy, 10 Years Later

May 30, 2012 12:15 am

By Joe Smydo/Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

A proposal to extend building and home construction incentives got off to a rocky start Tuesday when Councilman Patrick Dowd declined to introduce authorizing legislation submitted by Mayor Luke Ravenstahl.

Council's agenda called for Mr. Dowd, chairman of the Intergovernmental Affairs Committee, to introduce two bills extending the life and provisions of various property-tax abatement programs through June 30, 2017.

Mr. Dowd declined to introduce that legislation and two other bills, also submitted by Mr. Ravenstahl, that would set up a tax-increment financing program for a Buncher Co. development in the Strip District. Mr. Dowd said he had questions about the bills and wouldn't introduce them until Mr. Ravenstahl's office provided answers.

Mr. Ravenstahl's legislation would extend tax incentives for commercial, industrial and residential construction. The amount of the tax break would vary by the type, size and location of projects.

The legislation appeared on council's agenda on the same day that Buncher unveiled plans for 750 units of housing as part of its Strip District project.

Tax abatement has helped at least 13 major developments since 2007, according to the city's Urban Development Authority. The projects include Jack Benoff's development of 19 condominiums at 941 Penn Ave. in the Cultural District and the conversion of the old Otto Milk Co. building into 60 condominiums in the Strip District.

"I can tell you there are people who wouldn't have bought from us if we didn't have it," Mr. Benoff said.

Currently, the city has six construction incentive programs administered by the URA. In July, two programs will expire and two others will revert to less generous incentives without council action, according to information provided by the URA.

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Councilman shelves mayor's tax-break bill