Saturday, November 4, 2006
On November 13, Torontonians will be heading to the polls to vote for their ward’s councillor and for mayor. Among Toronto’s ridings is Don Valley East (Ward 33). One candidates responded to Wikinews’ requests for an interview. This ward’s candidates include Zane Caplan, Shelley Carroll (incumbent), Jim Conlon, Sarah Tsang-Fahey, and Anderson Tung.
For more information on the election, read Toronto municipal election, 2006.
Friday, March 10, 2006
Buffalo, New York —The Common Council of Buffalo voted on Tuesday to send the Elmwood Village Hotel proposal “to committee for further discussion”, after citing the need for more public involvement.
The Elmwood Village Hotel is a development proposal by the Savarino Construction Services Corporation, a project designed by the architect Karl Frizlen of The Frizlen Group. The hotel would be placed on the southeast corner of Elmwood and Forest Avenues in Buffalo.
To make way for the project, at least five buildings located at 1109 to 1121 Elmwood Ave would be demolished. At least two properties on Forest Avenue could also be demolished. The Elmwood properties, according to Eva Hassett, Vice President of Savarion Construction, are “under contract”, but it is unclear if Savarino Construction actually owns the Elmwood properties. Hans Mobius, a former mayorial candidate, is still believed to be the current owner the properties. Mobius also owns 607 Forest Avenue.
The properties 605 and 607 Forest Avenue could also be included in the proposal according to Hassett.
“We would use a Special Development Plan to rezone 1119-1121 Elmwood and 605 Forest to a C-2 zoning category,” stated Hassett. It is possible that Savarino Construction may try to obtain a variance for 605 Forest, which would allow them to enforce eminent domain, should the hotel be allowed to go forward.
The building at 607 Forest was also discussed to be rezoned, but it is unclear what the plans would be for that property. During the February 28 Common Council meeting, Hassett stated that the properties 605 and 607 were “now off the agenda”.
Pano Georgiadis, owner of Pano’s Restaurant at 1081 Elmwood, owns the property at 605 Forest and attended Tuesday’s Common Council meeting.
“Having a hotel is a bright idea. We all love the idea of a hotel, but the way that it is presented, is wishful thinking. This hotel does not fit. It’s like putting two gallons of water in a gallon jug, it does not fit. At the last meeting, the architect admitted that they are planning to put the undergound parking lot and the hotel, right at the property line. If I open my window, I will be able to touch the wall, that goes fifty feet high”, said Georgiadis.
“There is a problem having a seventy-two room hotel and fifty-five parking spaces. That means that all the other cars will spill all over the neighborhood. The footprint is simply too small. If you have a bigger [parking] lot, and a smaller hotel, I will welcome a hotel. I have a parking lot at my own business, and I am chasing people all day long. Remember, the city says it has ‘zero tolerance [for illegal parking]’. Try telling that to the guy from Albany who came to see his kids, that are going to Buffalo State, who would get tickets totaling over a hundred dollars”, added Georgiadis.
The city’s Planning Board is scheduled to meet on March 14, 2006 at 9:00 a.m. about the proposal. Although a discussion will take place, no vote is expected to be taken.
At the moment, none of the properties are zoned for a hotel. Savarino Construction plans on asking for a C2 zoning permit. If that does not work, they plan to implement a new zoning plan called a “special development plan” which would allow for only a hotel on the site. That zone would not be able to be changed.
“This [project] justifies Mobius’s refusal to invest in any maitenance[sic] or improvements”, on the properties said Clarence Carnahan, a local resident. “Where were the Council persons over the years? Where were the city inspectors over the years, to make sure that he maintained and improved his properties? The government was supposed to be protecting, not being preditorial. I see a predatorial issue here when it comes to this hotel. Over the years: Why has the local government been disfunctional when it came to Mobius’s properties? Refusal to invest in improvements, doesn’t that sound like a slumlord? Maybe I am missing a point here, but what kind of messages does this send to other slumlords that havn’t[sic] been jailed or fined? It’s [the hotel] trying to be pushed through.”
Carnahan also presented signs for residents and or business owners who are opposed to the hotel, that could be placed in windows or on stakes in the yard. Some of the signs said, ‘No tell hotel’, ‘Hans off, no hotel’, ‘It takes more than a hotel to make a village’. and ‘Keep Elmwood free, no hotel’. Carnahan plans on making more signs for a protest to be held on Saturday March 18, at 2:00 p.m. (EST) on Elmwood and Forest. Some signs were given to individuals after the meeting.
“First things first, Hans is the problem, and I don’t think it has been addressed. Let’s roll back the clock on this project. What can we do with Hans? There is such thing as eminent domain, which could be of greater interest to the community, to seize the property at its lowest assessed value”, said Nancy Pollina, co-owner of Don Apparel with Patty Morris at 1119 Elmwood. “There are so many ideas that have not been explored and we are about to give this parcel away, to a big developer.”
Mobius has not returned any calls by Wikinews regarding the situation.
A freelance journalist writing for Wikinews has obtained a letter, exclusively, addressed to one of the five business owners from Hans Mobius stating:
There is a proposal to develop my property which you are currently renting. Because of opposition to this development, it does not look like it will happen. I will let you know if there any changes.
Despite the letter, there have been no plans or decisions made to end the proposal.
To date, none of the business owners or residents of 1119-1121 Elmwood have received an eviction notice.
Business owners and residents gave an indication of what they would like to see happen at the corner; a project similar to one done locally last year. There, developers renovated two buildings on Auburn and Elmwood Avenues, merging the buildings into one thus allowing for more shop space. Among some of the shops to move in after the development were Cone Five Pottery, The Ruby Slipper, and Abraham’s Jewelers. Prior to the renovation work, the left building in the picture was boarded up for several years. Many of the concerned locals would like to see a similar development on Forest and Elmwood.
Rocco Termini, a developer in Buffalo, proposed a similar design at the February 28 community meeting
In an interview after the February 28 meeting, Termini stated, “I will be willing to take a look at this myself, or I would be more than happy to be partners with Sam, Sam Savarino”, who is President and Chief Executive Officer of Savarino Construction Services Corp.
So far Savarino Construction has no plans to team up with Termini.
Friday, November 3, 2006
On November 13, Torontonians will be heading to the polls to vote for their ward’s councillor and for mayor. Among Toronto’s ridings is Don Valley West (Ward 26). Four candidates responded to Wikinews’ requests for an interview. This ward’s candidates include Muhammad Alam, Bahar Aminvaziri, Orhan Aybars, Michele Carroll-Smith, Mohamed Dhanani, Abdul Ingar, Geoff Kettel, Debbie Lechter, Natalie Maniates, John Masterson, John Parker, David Thomas, Csaba Vegh, and Fred Williams.
For more information on the election, read Toronto municipal election, 2006.
By Dan Stodan
Let me start out this article by describing the Wii FIt. The Wii Fit is white, Dimensions (Height x Width x Depth): 13.00 x 20.00 x 3.00 inches It uses power of 4 x AA batteries and the unit weighs 4.5 kg. First of I want to say the the Wii Fit balance board is top notch in quality. Very Durably built, rubber feet on the bottom of it to make sure that it does not move around while in use.
If you haven’t heard, the Wii Fit is latest device to take the wii consumers by storm. This changes everything from a pure games console perspective. The notion that game consoles are just for sit down on the couch and play type of situation has just been turned on it’s head. Let me try to describe the core of the Wii Fit the inner functions, is called the balance board. What is the balance board you ask? Well it is a multi point electronic sensing weigh scale. Basically what that means it not only is able to measure your weight but it also can detect changes in your weight and pressure when your are standing on it. There is a sensor built into that checks weight changes many times a second.
NOw next question what is this thing going to do for me? Included with the wii fit are several games. The main game takes you through some exercise training drills, strength training, aerobic exercises,yoga, or even just balance training. The first thing when you switch it on it asks you a few things about your height and weight and age. This is to calculate your BMI aka body mass index. This is password protected in case you are shy and don’t want others to know how much you weigh or your training scores. NOw while this is all good and dandy, I would take the Wii BMI reading with a grain of salt, for one it may output that you are a 20 year old with a BMI of a 45 year old does not mean that the unit is correct. The Wii BMI calculation does not factor in your muscle mass or heavier bone structure, so like I say don’t take the readings to heart.
Does the Wii Fit actually work? Will I be able to lose weight with it and slim down. Well Let’s put it simply it is like everything in life. The more effort you put into it, the more return you will get. The Wii Fit games have been testes by many and found that they were effective. The onscreen trainer instructs you to do sit-ups and push-ups and run in one place. While the balance board will measure how good a job you are doing or how poorly you are doing with the exercises. The balance board detects small changes in your weight on the board and it will move the onscreen figure accordingly. The way it works you start off by doing some simple exercises and move to more complicated ones the higher a ranking you achieve. You can set a female or a Male trainer, who will help you with the exercises. The trainers will also tell you if you are not doing well enough and areas were you should improved, so the interactivity is very good.
Don’t be fooled by the Nintendo Wii name and the game console ring to it. Most of the exercises are very real and demanding,if you are not used to working out you will work up a sweat for sure. Some of the activities included aerobic and balance activities that let you do anything from rotating a hula hoop around the onscreen figures hips, by moving yours with the same circular motion, to doing a downhill snowboarding race. Like all games you could probably cheat after awhile by knowing exactly when you have to shift your weight around, but what would the point of that be. You would cheat yourself out of a good exercise and would be waisting your own time.
Some Negative points is that you can’t just turn it on and start exercising, Also to customize your own exercise schedule is also not possible. For example you wanted to start of just doing yOga to worm up, then do some muscle toning exercises and then move on to aerobics exercise. Instead you will have to access the menu to go from one type of exercise to another which can get in the way of your workout.
To sum things up a bit the nintendo wii Fit is a very entertaining way to get fit, no it does not replace a full scale Gym. but on the other hand, being able to train in your own home or anywhere else for that matter. You can put the unit in a small satchel and take it to your friends house and train with a partner. These features alone make it worth. Many have said Exercising is boring, well the Wii Fit had been able to turn the tables on that old adage and find a way to make exercise fun and innovative.
About the Author: I purchased a Wii fit and I am very happy with it. It is a great workout tool and there are definitly benefits to be gained by using it.
To buy the wii fit. have a look at buycheapwiigames.stodan.com
there towards the bottom you will find lots of links to places selling it.
Source:
isnare.com
Permanent Link:
isnare.com/?aid=271645&ca=Computers+and+Technology
Due to the damage by Hurricane Katrina and subsequent flooding, a number of colleges and universities in the New Orleans metropolitan area will not be able to hold classes for the fall 2005 semester. It is estimated that 75,000 to 100,000 students have been displaced. [1]. In response, institutions across the United States and Canada are offering late registration for displaced students so that their academic progress is not unduly delayed. Some are offering free or reduced admission to displaced students. At some universities, especially state universities, this offer is limited to residents of the area.
Due to the damage by Hurricane Katrina and subsequent flooding, a number of colleges and universities in the New Orleans metropolitan area will not be able to hold classes for the fall 2005 semester. It is estimated that 75,000 to 100,000 students have been displaced. [1]. In response, institutions across the United States and Canada are offering late registration for displaced students so that their academic progress is not unduly delayed. Some are offering free or reduced admission to displaced students. At some universities, especially state universities, this offer is limited to residents of the area.
Thursday, March 24, 2005
San Jose, California — A woman eating a bowl of chili at a Wendy’s restaurant bit into a chewy bit that turned out to be a human finger. She immediately spat it out, warned other patrons to stop eating, and upon recognizing the object as a finger, vomited.
“I’m more of a Carl’s Jr. person,” the 39-year-old Las Vegas woman, Anna Ayala, told Knight Ridder. She said this incident was her first visit to a Wendy’s restaurant. Ayala described how she found the finger, “Suddenly something crunchy was in my mouth,” she continued, “and I spit it out.”
According to Devina Cordero, 20, after Ayala found the finger, she ran up to her and Cordero’s boyfriend and said, “Don’t eat it! Look, there’s a human finger in our chili.”
“We went up to the counter and they told us it was a vegetable,” Cordero continued. “The people from Wendy’s were poking it with a spoon.”
The restaurant is located at 1405 Monterey Highway, just south of downtown San Jose.
Wikinews reporter David Vasquez drove his car up to the drive-thru menu and found that chili was still on the menu, at a price of US$1.19 for a small serving. He also witnessed workers unloading supplies from a semi-trailer truck in the restaurant’s parking lot, and carting them into the back door of the establishment.
According to Ben Gale, director of environmental health for Santa Clara County, the finger did not come from any of the employees at the restaurant. “We asked everybody to show us they have 10 fingers and everything is OK there,” he said. The found portion of the finger likely belonged to a woman because of its long and manicured fingernail, also found in the food.
Officials seized the food supply at the restaurant and are tracing it back to the manufacturer, where they believe the finger may have gotten mixed in with the raw ingredients used to prepare the chili. The restaurant’s operators were later permitted to re-open after preparing new chili prepared from fresh ingredients.
As this story was filed, there was no mention of the incident on the Wendy’s corporate web site. Wendy’s issued a statement through a spokesman.
“Food safety is of utmost importance to us,” said Wendy’s spokesman Joe Desmond. He referred to the incident as an “unsubstantiated claim.”
“We are cooperating fully with the local police and health departments with their investigation. It’s important not to jump to conclusions. Here at Wendy’s we plan to do right by our customers,” Desmond said.
According to county health officials, the unfortunate woman who bit into the finger is doing fine, despite her initial reaction. Officials also noted that the finger would have been cooked at a high enough temperature to destroy any viruses.
The Santa Clara county medical examiner reported that the finger had a solid fingerprint, although investigators did not say if a search of fingerprint databases would be performed to find the owner of the finger.
If you’re looking for natural remedies for acne treatment, you have come to the right place. I will mention a couple of remedies that seem to work extremely well for a lot of people. I always recommend that people try out natural remedies before they resort to more drastic surgical or chemical guru methods that could actually harm you or increase the amount of scarring. Here are the two methods that you can try out.1. The tea tree oil acne remedy that is natural :It should be quite easy for you to find tea tree oil at your local natural and herbal products store. This tree has amazing properties and it is found in Australia. It seems to fight the bacteria that causes pimples to form. This oil will either outright kill off the bacteria or it will weaken it enough so that your antibodies can attack it. What’s great about this technique is that there are rarely any side effects.2. Using aloe vera on your pimples and blemishes :You probably already realize that this method is very natural since aloe vera is able to condition skin in general. The procedure that you should use is to break off the top corner of an aloe vera plant and to rub the sticky substance onto your pimples and zits.Good luck with your goal to eliminate your acne once and for all, just remember to never give up, there are ways of dealing with your pimples and zits that will work for you personally.
Saturday, October 20, 2007
Dell Inc. announced on Tuesday that it will partner up with the Microsoft-Nortel Innovative communications alliance (ICA) team to sell Unified Communications and VoIP products.
The announcement on Tuesday the 16th of October 2007 includes Dell selling VoIP, data and wireless networking products from Nortel and the Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 and other unified communications products.
The partnership with both manufacturers should allow Dell to provide a pre-integrated solution.
In March 2007, competitors IBM and Cisco announced they would join in the competition for developing unified communications applications and the development of open technologies around the unified communications and collaboration (UC2) client platform an application programming interfaces (APIs) offered by IBM as a subset of Lotus Sametime.
“We want to make it simple for our customers to deploy unified communications so their end users can get access to all their messages in one place – whether its e-mail, phone or mobile device. This will pave the way for more business-ready productivity tools,” said vice president of solutions, Dell Product Group, Rick Becker.
Saturday, March 28, 2009
The 108-floor central component of the new World Trade Center in New York City has been officially renamed 1 World Trade Center, ending the Freedom Tower moniker it had sported since 2003.
Freedom Tower was envisioned as a symbol of America’s victory over terrorism. It is currently on track for completion in 2013, with 10 floors partially finished so far.
Port Authority Chairman Anthony Coscia commented on the change, “It’s the one that is easiest for people to identify with — and frankly, we’ve gotten a very interested and warm reception to it.”
Former Governor George Pataki, who revealed the Freedom Tower name nearly six years ago, was critical of the switch, saying “The Freedom Tower is not simply another piece of real estate and not just a name for marketing purposes.”
1 World Trade Center has been the building’s legal name and address for the past two years, with the public change precipitated by the ramp up of construction and the commencement of lease marketing.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg seemed ambivalent to the change, saying “I would like to see it stay the Freedom Tower, but it’s their building, and they don’t need me dumping on it. If they could rent the whole thing by changing the name, I guess they’re going to do that, and they probably, from a responsible point of view, should. From a patriotic point of view, is it going to make any difference?”
The change was approved following the signing of a two-decades-long lease by a Chinese real estate company, which plans to occupy floors 64 through 69. Other future tenants include the U.S. General Services Administration and the New York State Office of General Services.
