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A discussion regarding tree-removal permits for Conroe homeowners heated up during Wednesdays City Council workshop as Councilman Duke Coon and Mayor Pro Tem Guy Martin didnt see eye to eye on the issue.

The permitting was part of an agenda item regarding an amendment to the citys vegetation ordinance for residential development. However, Coon voiced his concern about a section that would prohibit existing homeowners from removing trees from their property without a permit.

We have to be careful as a municipality on how far we reach, said Coon, adding he didnt like that requirement.

According to Mikeska, the $25 permit helps ensure the tree or trees would be removed by a professional in the tree removal industry.

However, Martin said requiring the permit is necessary and those permit requests for existing homeowners are rarely denied.

If they are cutting it down themselves or it is someone not qualified, that is the part I am worried about, Martin said. It doesnt negate the ability to cut trees; they just need to do it right. If we dont impose a permit, people will be out there with a chainsaw and there is going to be problems.

But Coon said the city shouldnt tell people whether they can remove trees on their property.

That bothers me, he said.

Martin maintained it was a safety issue.

If one falls on a house, we need to remember we allowed that to happen because we put no safety restrictions on it whatsoever when someone is taking out a big tree, Martin said. It could come down on a neighbors house, a neighbors fence, we dont know.

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Conroe City Council divided on tree permits for homeowners

Though much of Mondays meeting was dominated by a massive appeal from frustrated Malibu school community members, the City Council also deliberated a number of other items, including preferential parking permits at Point Dume and an idea to remove hundreds of eucalyptus trees throughout Malibu that could cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Councilmember Laura Rosenthals proposed eucalyptus tree removal plan for the city which, according to the staff report, could call for removal of over 875 trees, brought out several community members to oppose the idea.

Eucalyptus trees are non-native, highly flammable trees that pose a fire danger, reads the agenda report.

City staff has estimated itcould cost $1,000 per tree, meaning close to $900,000. Many opponents cited environmental concerns, especially for monarch butterfly migration patterns.

Im speaking on behalf of the Malibu Monarch Project, said Pat Healy, the leader of the MMP.

It just so happens that the favorite roosting habitat of the monarchs is eucalyptus trees and sycamores here in Malibu, Healy said, so for these reasons we ask that you do not proceed to go forward with this project to remove the eucalyptus trees.

Council seemed to side with the community, as members Lou La Monte and Joan House did not mince words in their distaste for the tree removal plan.

I think spending all this money to chop down all these trees in Malibu is just not a good idea from my point of view, said La Monte.

This is another one of those issues that, you know, Im not going to support whats here tonight at all. But I can support, when theres time available, sending it to the environmental review board or public works, said House, adding, I dont think we vet things enough and this has to be vetted.

It was still a slight victory for Rosenthal, though, as Mayor Skylar Peak later called for what he named a comprehensive tree plan to be created by public works to study what the impact of the tree removal would be.

Excerpt from:
Council Puts A Cork In Tree Removal Plan

SCOTTSBORO, AL (WAFF) -

The Jackson County Commission is looking to cut down the only remaining maple tree on the square that's nearly 150 years old.

Commission Chairman Matthew Hodges said a limb fell a couple of weeks ago, the tree is dying, and they see it as a safety issue to residents who come to the courthouse.

But some detractors said it's no more of a liability than the many mature pecan trees outside that are prone to shedding limbs.

The Jackson County Courthouse is known for its many mature trees on the square. At issue is the maple tree outside the main entrance that welcomes people to the courthouse.

Residents said at one time there were a total of three, but Mother Nature took its toll on two, and this is the last.

Hodges said they have the okay of the tree commission, but some said it doesn't even look as if the tree is dying. They said the county should have a comprehensive study done before resorting to destruction efforts. Mike Williamson, a concerned resident, said they could have a study done by experts from Auburn.

"I know they did everything in the world they could to try to save the trees that had been poisoned at Toomer's Corner," Williamson said. "There may be some things to be done to save this tree, to give us many more years of enjoyment."

Hodges said the tree is set for removal the weekend of Sept. 5.

Williamson said he plans to present a petition of names opposing the removal on Tuesday. If that doesn't work, Williamson said he's considering legal action.

Originally posted here:
150-year-old Scottsboro courthouse tree at risk of being removed

Washington, D.C. (PRWEB) August 28, 2014

The Francis L. Cardozo Education Campus received LEED Gold Certification for Schools this week from the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), the Department of General Services (DGS) announced today.

The Department of General Services is honored to receive this prestigious certification from the U.S. Green Building Council, and I would like to congratulate our entire design, construction and project team for achieving this distinction, said Brian J. Hanlon, DGS Director. This certification showcases the agencys dedication to build high quality, sustainable schools here in the District of Columbia that can serve as national models of excellence.

According to the USGBC, LEED provides building owners and operators with a framework for identifying and implementing practical and measurable green building design, construction, operations and maintenance solutions. The LEED program provides third-party verification of green buildings. Building projects satisfy prerequisites and earn points to achieve different levels of certification. Prerequisites and credits differ for each rating system, and teams choose the best fit for the project.

The new Cardozo Education Campus, which was first designed a century ago, houses the Academy of Construction and Design, and the TransSTEM Academy. Both academies have expanded and enhanced classroom and laboratory spaces, including a two-story aviation lab, a two-story masonry construction lab and several computer lab spaces. The newly modernized and expanded historic campus in Ward 1 also features two specialized learning academies and a fully restored historic auditorium.

The modernization project marries both high tech advancements such as interactive whiteboards, classroom sound enhancement systems, and computer labs with major renovations to many of the celebrated period features of the original Cardozo, including stone carvings and decorative tile work, an historic lecture classroom, auditorium, and indoor pool.

Some of the design features of the Cardozo Education Campus which lead to the LEED certification include: Design Features:

The modernization of Cardozo also incorporates a number of energy-efficient elements including new mechanical, plumbing, and electrical systems designed to reduce the energy consumption of the building, along with a green roof to aid with stormwater management. The school was designed to achieve a minimum of LEED Silver for Schools rating.

LEED is a point based system where building projects earn LEED points for satisfying specific green building criteria. Within each of the LEED credit categories, projects must satisfy particular prerequisites and earn points.

The categories include: Sustainable Sites (SS), Water Efficiency (WE), Energy and Atmosphere (EA), Materials and Resources (MR) and Indoor Environmental Quality (IEQ). An additional category, Innovation in Design (ID), addresses sustainable building expertise as well as design measures not covered under the five environmental categories. The number of points the project earns determines the level of LEED Certification the project receives. LEED certification is available in four progressive levels: Certified; Silver; Gold and Platinum.

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Cardozo Education Campus Receives LEED Gold Certification

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Ashburn Sunroom (888) 530-9046 - Video

An automatic fire sprinkler stopped a fire from spreading after it was started by a welder's torch early Thursday afternoon.

Damage was minimal and the incident was ruled accidental.

Fire dispatchers were notified at 1:25 p.m. by an alarm company the automatic fire sprinkler system at the Store N Lock at 3350 Sirius Avenue had been activated.

When firefighters arrived, smoke was showing from one unit of a one-story metal building. Firefighters forced open the locked unit and found some items stored in the unit were on fire but was put out by the fire sprinkler.

Damage was confined to the one unit and was estimated at $1000.

Fire investigators determined that a worker was using a welder's torch in the next unit which was vacant. The worker was using the torch to make repairs to the metal wall inside the vacant unit. The metal wall got hot and heated the items on the other side of the wall in the unit where the fire started.

If not for the fire sprinkler, crews said the fire could have quickly got out of control and caused extensive damage

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Automatic fire sprinkler stops fire in storage facility

TAMPA Construction workers renovating the Hillsborough County courthouse accidently activated the sprinkler system on Wednesday night, flooding the courthouse's ground floor with four inches of water.

Though staff worked through the night to clean up the mess, two courtrooms in the annex are closed today, soaked by the sudden downpour. They will remain out of commission for the rest of this week, said courthouse spokesman Jeff Stidham.

"Everything is fine," he said, "It looks pretty clean."

Video taken by County Court Judge Margaret Courtney, who was in the building around 9 p.m. when the sprinklers activated, shows construction workers and a Tampa Fire Rescue crew walking through inches of water in the annex's hallway. No other parts of the courthouse complex were affected.

Construction accident floods Hillsborough County courthouse 08/28/14 [Last modified: Thursday, August 28, 2014 11:42am]

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Construction accident floods Hillsborough County courthouse

The earliest people in the North American Arctic remained isolated from others in the region for millennia before vanishing around 700 years ago, a new genetic analysis shows. The study, published online Thursday, also reveals that today's Inuit and Native Americans of the Arctic are genetically distinct from the region's first settlers.

Inuit hunters in the Canadian Arctic have long told stories about a mysterious ancient people known as the Tunit, who once inhabited the far north. Tunit men, they recalled, possessed powerful magic and were strong enough to crush the neck of a walrus and singlehandedly haul the massive carcass home over the ice. Yet the stories described the Tunit as a reticent people who kept to themselves, avoiding contact with their neighbors.

Many researchers dismissed the tales as pure fiction, but a major new genetic study suggests that parts of these stories were based on actual events.

In a paper to be published Friday in Science, evolutionary geneticist Eske Willerslev and molecular biologist Maanasa Raghavan, both of the University of Copenhagen, Denmark, and their colleagues reveal for the first time that the earliest inhabitants of the Canadian Arctica group that archaeologists call the Paleo-Eskimoslived in isolation from their neighbors for nearly 4,000 years, refraining from any mixture with Native Americans to the south or with the ancestors of the modern Inuit.

"Elsewhere, as soon as people meet each other, they have sex," says Willerslev. "Even potentially different species like Neanderthals [and modern humans] had sex, so this finding is extremely surprising."

The new study also proposes a previously unknown migration. Research by other scientists has shown that the first Americans entered the New World at least 15,500 years ago, and that two smaller migrations of hunter-gatherers from Asia followed. The new study indicates that the Paleo-Eskimos entered the Arctic some 5,000 years ago, in a separate migration.

Only One Woman?

Moreover, the team's analysis of the diversity in maternally inherited DNA in their samples suggests that these Paleo-Eskimo migrants included extremely few women. Indeed, it's possible there was just one adventurous female among the founding population. "I can't remember any other group having such low diversity," says Willerslev.

Geneticist and anthropologist Jennifer Raff, at the University of Texas, Austin, who was not a member of the team, thinks the new analysis is a major step forward in Arctic studies.

"This research has answered several important questions about North American Arctic prehistory," she says. The study now shows, for example, that the Paleo-Eskimos arrived separately from the ancestors of the Inuit, and remained genetically distinct.

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Ancient DNA Sheds New Light on Arctic's Earliest People

By RYAN J. FOLEY Associated Press

IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) - A University of Iowa professor who donned a robot costume to heckle Bill Clinton and Michele Bachmann has now set his sights on one of his school's famous quirks: the visiting team's pink locker room at Kinnick Stadium.

Kembrew McLeod is organizing what he jokingly calls a "Million Robot March" to coincide with an annual celebration Friday honoring legendary Iowa football coach Hayden Fry, who had the opposing team's locker room painted pink in 1979. McLeod wants the school to ditch the pink, which he says amounts to a school-sanctioned taunt that exudes homophobia and sexism.

Fry has said pink is a calming color meant to make Hawkeyes' opponents passive. But he also noted in his biography that it was the color of little girls' bedrooms and some considered it for sissies. The tactic has rattled some opposing coaches, with the late University of Michigan coach Bo Schembechler having student managers put white paper over the walls.

The paint became part of Hawkeye lore. A 2005 renovation added pink across brick walls and shower floors and installed pink metal lockers, carpeting, sinks, showers and urinals.

Many opposing players have shrugged off the color, with Michigan quarterback Devin Gardner recently calling it the best locker room in the conference because of its spaciousness.

Some feminists, lawyers, gay rights activists and editorial boards have criticized the gimmick over the past decade. But previous protests, including a longstanding threat of a discrimination lawsuit, haven't changed anything.

Fans have generally opposed the various efforts to get the color changed, saying it's a tradition that isn't meant to be a gender-based putdown.

McLeod, a communications studies professor, hopes his absurd approach will draw attention to the issue. He said people dressed as robots will meet on top of a hotel parking garage, and then march through FryFest, an annual event that draws up to 20,000 Hawkeye fans. They plan to hold signs and chant slogans such as, "Binary code yes! Gender binaries no!" and "Delete the pink locker rooms!"

McLeod, 43, was dubbed "Roboprofessor" after he heckled Clinton during a 2008 speech in costume. He followed that up in 2011 when Bachmann, then a Republican presidential candidate, visited an Iowa City diner. Video of McLeod dressed as a "gay robot" accusing Bachmann of being a "robophobe" and a "homophobe" - before getting booed and escorted out - quickly went viral.

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'Robot march' to protest Iowa's pink locker room

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CHAZZ RESTAURANT IN INNER HARBOR EAST

Client: The Vitale Family Architect: Rita St. Clair Associate, Inc.

TWO BOOTS RESTAURANT

Client: Two Boots Pizza Architect: Curry Architects

SALT

Client: SALT Restaurant Architect: Rohrer Studios

PETITE LOUIS FRENCH BISTRO

Client: Charleston Restaurant Group Architect: Rita St. Clair

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Restaurant & Bar Construction Maryland | Hencken & Gaines