‘House of horrors’ landlady prosecuted [Edition 2]

0 Comments | Cornish Guardian; Truro (UK), Jul 28, 2010 | by CAROLINE CHICK

A FAMILY is hoping its long battle to improve living conditions could soon be over, after the landlord was fined for failing to make repairs.

Maureen and Fernligh Brown and their son Simon, of Meneage Villas, St Austell, have spent the last four years dodging leaking roofs, windows and doors.

They’ve been told by inspectors the house is a potential firetrap because of old polystyrene ceiling tiles and no smoke alarms.

Some window frames are rotten, exposing the family to draughts and wet weather.

Alzheimer’s sufferer Mrs Brown, 62, said: “When people pick me up I tell them I live down the road because it’s too embarrassing to have them stop here. I’m ashamed I live here.”

The family has had to change settees and carpets in the living room three times over the last few years as the problems remain unresolved.

Rotten In Mrs Brown’s bedroom, the roof leaks and the family has been forced to keep the window open for years for fear it might fall out due to the rotten frame.

Her family has lived in the house for 16 years, and Mr Brown, 77, said: “We love this house, but recently it has been a house of horrors. I feel ashamed, everything smells mouldy.”

“All we want is for the house to be wind and watertight.”

The landlady Ruby Arulanantham, 45, pleaded guilty at Bodmin magistrates on July 20 for failing to comply with a Housing Act 2004 Improvement Notice, requiring repairs to be made to the property.

Arulanantham of West Purley, Surrey was fined Pounds 300 and ordered to pay Pounds 500 costs to Cornwall Council, with a Pounds 15 victim surcharge.

She also entered a guilty plea for failing to comply with a notice requesting documentation by a specified date.

Following a complaint from the family, Cornwall Council inspectors visited the property and issued Arulanantham with an Improvement Notice on July 2, 2009.

Breached The notice required works to be carried out by December 6 that year to remove the identified hazards.

Another inspection on December 11 last year showed work had not been carried out and notice breached.

Arulanantham has still not made repairs and Cornwall Council is considering its next steps.

Mrs Brown said the council had been “absolutely fantastic”.

“I just want her to do the work; we’ve waited so long and I just want a house that I’m proud to live in.”

Arulanantham declined to comment when contacted by the Cornish Guardian.

Deseret News (Salt Lake City), Mar 19, 2009

BAKERSFIELD, Calif. — The Bakersfield Condors defeated the Utah Grizzlies 4-1 Wednesday night at Rabobank Arena.

Trailing 1-0 entering the second period, the Grizzlies tied the game 3:32 into the frame on a power-play goal by Tim Verbeek, who scored his 28th goal of the season. Rob Hennigar and Peder Skinner picked up assists on the play.

The Condors (25-24-6-10) took a 2-1 lead with 28 seconds left in the second period following a couple of Utah power-plays and never looked back.

Bakersfield added an insurance goal 7:03 into the third period and then again in the final minute on the power-play.

Utah goalie Robert Gherson stopped 32 of 36 shots in the loss.

Utah is next in action tonight in Stockton, Calif.

Daily Reporter (Milwaukee), Mar 27, 2009 by Paul Snyder

There is an empty, roughed-out space in the basement of a new building on the University of Wisconsin-Platteville campus.

The floor is part concrete slab, part dirt. The walls are part concrete block, part exposed frame and insulation. Incomplete designs lay scattered on sawhorses and makeshift planning desks.

It was not supposed to be this way. In fact, the unfinished space originally was the centerpiece of Engineering Hall’s design.

But estimates for the state project, which opened in January, were so rough, designers thought it would run out of money. So the university abandoned what was supposed to be a clean room and characterization lab.

Rob Cramer, UW-Platteville’s associate chancellor for administrative services, stood in the room March 20 explaining how the space can be salvaged, but he said the state estimating process that led to the empty room may never be perfect.

“Construction is such a global market now,” he said. “It’s hard to project three or four years out. And the fact of the matter is something like the market in China affects the price of steel in Platteville.”

The state is trying to deliver more accurate estimates by performing more pre-design work before project approval. The UW System is helping to steer the conversation after several of its projects lost scope or were significantly altered due to rough estimates driving fixed budgets.

“You put together these estimates based on nothing more, really, than square footage,” said David Miller, UW System vice president for capital planning and budget. “The project is enumerated, and then an architect is hired to design to the number.

“It’s about a one-in-a-million shot that they’ll be able to hit that number with everything you want.”

Recovering lost space

Engineering Hall is not a one-in-a-million project.

The clean room and lab were supposed to be a nano-research center for engineering students. But when the state approved $27.9 million for the building in the 2005-07 budget, it did so with only a rough idea of what the building would cost.

“And early on in the design process,” Miller said, “we started getting reports that we were going to run over budget.”

So the university reduced the project scope by cutting, among other things, the clean room and lab, said Peter Davis, UW- Platteville’s interim director of facilities management. He said the university and the project’s architect, La Crosse-based River Architects Inc., whittled the project down to meet the $27.9 million estimate.

In a cruel twist, the bids for the project came in at about $23 million, leaving more than enough money for the clean room and lab space if they were included in final designs. But those items already had been tabbed for future completion, and $1 million of the money saved through the lower bids was set aside for the work.

“It’s not like they cut a wing off the building, but you can’t just add that space back,” Davis said. “If you’ve moved a wall in 2 feet, it becomes very expensive to redesign or move that wall back 2 feet.”

Now the university is stuck trying to build out the space, Cramer said.

“But because it was never scoped out in detail,” he said, “you realize a lot of things now that you would’ve done differently when you built the building in terms of mechanical systems and square footage.”

Cramer said the completed lab and clean room likely will need an HVAC system, and some of the completed work in the room will need to be redone.

The university wants to complete the work for the fall semester, Cramer said, but is still working through the design. Builders, he said, will now have to contend with student traffic whenever construction starts.

Cramer gave no timeline for the project.

Fixing a flawed system

David Helbach, an administrator for the state Department of Administration’s Division of State Facilities and secretary to the state Building Commission, recently convinced the commission to release $500,000 in state money for more pre-design work to attain better project estimates.

Helbach is still working on recommendations for better estimates and project delivery methods and is expected to discuss those ideas with the commission in April.

“The whole process of estimates needs improvement,” said state Rep. Dean Kaufert, R-Neenah and member of the commission. “We can’t keep missing them and saying, ‘Oh well.’”

Cramer, who served as secretary to the Building Commission, said proposing change is easy, but finding agreement and implementing a plan are difficult
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The topping on the cake was when

Posted on July 29, 2010
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The topping on the cake was when Paris Hilton appeared on the cover of Seventeen magazine and later tried living The Simple Life on Fox TV with Tinkerbell, her pet Chihuahua. Celebrities have discovered what many pet owners already knew: Chihuahuas are the best dogs to own and care for. In the process, they?ve set off a Chihuahua Craze that is reaching towering proportions.

When most people think of Celebrities and their toy dogs, Yorkshire Terriers, Toy Poodles, Pekinese, Lhasas and Shih Tzus usually come to mind. That?s because famous folks like Audrey Hepburn, Zsa Zsa Gabor and Mia Farrow were regularly photographed with their beloved pets. In Audrey?s case, it was a Yorkie.
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Ethos Environmental, Inc. Inks Merger Agreement With Network Marketing Stalwart AL Global Corporation d/b/a Youngevity

Posted on July 29, 2010
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--  Youngevity shareholders will receive 60% of the post-transaction
    entity.
--  Restructuring of all Ethos shareholder debt into equity.
--  The transaction remains subject to the satisfaction of customary
    closing, including regulatory approval as necessary.