08/26/08 Greenwich Time News Links For Tuesday

Peter Malkin during an edit board meeting explains the Greenwich Arts Center concept.

(Greenwich Time file photo)

Town sees hurdles in arts center plan

By Neil VigdorStaff Writer
Article Launched: 08/26/2008 01:00:00 AM

With a self-imposed deadline approaching, the nonprofit group that wants to convert the town-owned Havemeyer Building into a downtown arts center is denying rampant speculation that it could take out a mortgage to pay for the project and use the landmark as collateral.

S&P: Home prices drop by record amount

Wire report < localnews@scni.com >
Article Launched: 08/26/2008 09:18:22 AM EDT

NEW YORK - A widely watched housing index released Thursday showed home prices dropping by the sharpest rate ever in the second quarter.

The Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller U.S. National Home Price Index tumbled a record 15.4 percent during the quarter from the same period a year ago.

The monthly indices also clocked in record declines. The 20-city index fell by 15.9 percent in June compared with a year ago, the largest drop since its inception in 2000. The 10-city index plunged 17 percent, its biggest decline in its 21-year history.

No city in the Case-Shiller 20-city index saw year-over-year price gains in June, the third straight month that's happened......

COMMENT:

Too bad fired real estate columnist Chris Fountain is not here to say, "I hate to say I told you so, but I told you so and am no longer a newspaper columnist."

Buy Unfortunately, he has posted on his blog....

Gone Fishing

Back Friday - please check in then. Thanks!

It appears that the local Caldwell Banker office and a few other local Real Estate offices did not have their finger on the pulse of the Greenwich real estate market

• Please See Mr. Fountain's recent articles
• So you're thinking of buying a house Okay, perhaps...
  A letter from Nigeria You loved their emails - rel...
  Does the Back Country get a pass in the Police Blo...
  The World's Smallest Violin Our local daily repo...
  They're back! Okay, they may not be as welcome as...
  Tiny Bubbles
  29 Crescent Road, Riverside This new construction...
  $7.2 Million? I recently gave a price opinion for...

Test scores offer mixed picture

By Colin Gustafson Staff Writer
Article Launched: 08/26/2008 01:00:00 AM EDT

Middle-school reading scores reached five-year highs in the 2007-08 school year, while the portion of high school students proficient in writing increased by impressive margins...

• Only a fool would call these results mixed. Here's the truth. That giant sucking sound that taxpayers and parents hear is the sound of failed school administrators flushing their children down the drain. Here is the failed report cards of our high paid school administrators.....
• The Department Of Justice may soon visit the school district, because of the school administrator's failure to start to close the growing the achievement gap between white students and lower-income minorities.
• The Greenwich School Administrators are repeatedly failing to address the longtime "gender gap" between boys and girls in math. and English.
• Greenwich School Administrators allowed elementary and middle-school writing scores to fall for a second year on the Connecticut Mastery Test. (The percentage of students at goal tumbled from 81.2 in 2006, to 79.8 in 2007, to 77.2 in 2008. The "goal" to be satisfactory performance. That means that 23% of Greenwich elementary and middle-school students can not satisfactorily pass the State Of Connecticut's writing test.)
• Elementary scores were a disaster. Only North Mianus School was a success story, as it was the only elementary program in the district where proficiency levels increased on the math, reading and writing portions of the CMT.
• In 2007-08, Hamilton Avenue School posted the lowest proficiency levels of all elementary schools on every CMT test. It also saw the biggest year-to-year declines in proficiency, with the percentage of at goal students in the writing CMT plummeting from 72.7 percent to 48.1 percent between 2007 and 2008.
• The number of black students reaching goal in that test dropped to 32.3 percent in 2008, lower than the at-goal percentages of Hispanics (54.2), whites (82.8) and Asians (87.9).
• The poorest and most disadvantaged members of Greenwich Society are being screwed over as failed school administrators cash big fat paychecks.

Wetlands delays Shemin Nurseries decision

By Meredith Blake Staff Writer
Article Launched: 08/26/2008 02:29:56 AM EDT

A decision was again delayed on a King Street subdivison proposal that has a town agency wanting more answers.

At a meeting Monday, the Inland Wetlands and Watercourses Agency decided to wait to approve a proposal made by Shemin Nurseries Inc.'s to divide its 44-acre parcel in northwestern Greenwich.

Shemin Nurseries, which has operated at 1081 King St. for more than 40 years, has proposed creating four residential lots on its property and maintaining nursery operations on a fifth lot. The residential lots would be off a cul-de-sac at the end of a driveway that would be made off Sherwood Avenue.....

State Democrats head west

By Neil VigdorStaff Writer
Article Launched: 08/26/2008 01:00:00 AM

Attorney General Richard Blumenthal won't let his previous support of another candidate stand in the way of him getting behind his party's presumptive nominee.

"As a delegate who initially backed Hillary Clinton and someone who has known her since law school days, I can tell you I am enthusiastic and energetic as possibly could be in my support for Barack Obama," Blumenthal said in a telephone interview Monday from New York's LaGuardia Airport on his way to Denver for the Democratic National Convention.

Blumenthal, like a number of other convention delegates from the Nutmeg State, downplayed the effects of the hard-fought primary and caucus race between Obama and Clinton for the party's nomination. Some likened the convention to a reunion of a large family with different branches. All declared that they have one common goal.

"I'm excited about electing (Obama) in this historic watershed election," said Blumenthal, a Greenwich resident. "This election is so absolutely critical to our future, and there are so many profound differences between Clinton and Obama on the one hand and (John) McCain on the other when it comes to critical issues like the economy, health care, education and the future of the U.S. Supreme Court that I believe any reservations about Barack Obama at this point would be very self-centered and even selfish on my part."

Town drafts tree ordinance

By Meredith BlakeStaff Writer
Article Launched: 08/26/2008 01:00:00 AM

The town tree warden has taken a major step to ensure community trees are preserved and protected into the future.

Bruce Spaman, the town superintendent of parks and trees has drafted a tree ordinance that would guarantee the maintenance, inventory and conservation of the town's more than 100,000 trees.

The ordinance was passed by the Board of Selectmen last month and will be reviewed by the Representative Town Meeting on Sept. 15.

"I think it's a necessary ordinance," said First Selectman Peter Tesei. ================================================================
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