[Chat] random news

[Emil Volcheck]

Here's some random news and happenings that might interest you all.

CVCA

Congratulations to all the officers of the CVCA whose election was
officially ratified at the meeting this week.  (There was no quorum
for elections, so the result was not official until ratification.)

Hey, Sarah!  I can say I voted for you, even though I missed the
elections meeting!

A speaker from the State Dept. of Assessments and Taxation explained
that the City of Baltimore caps the increase in the taxable assessment
base on your primary residence to four percent per year.  Applying the
Rule of 72, that means if the assessed value of your house doubles
(which many of us are seeing), it will take the City eighteen years to
catch up with that.  That's quite a discount.  I didn't realize this
having gone through only one assessment.  The last assessment came in
the year after we bought our house, so we didn't qualify for the
City's cap on the increase -- that applies only if you've been in your
residence for at least a year.  To any former residents of the Golden
State, this is like a mild (and fiscally more responsible) Proposition
13 (the old one from the 70s, not the new one since they renumbered).

Note that the State has no such cap, but their tax rate is much
smaller than the City, so it's not a significant portion of the
tax bill.

Incidentally, there was an interesting talk recently at the Baltimore
Ethical Society by Matt Gardner, the State Tax Policy Director at
Citizens for Tax Justice.  CTJ studies the fairness of tax burdens
in states.  Despite the fact that Maryland is a rather "blue" state,
our state has one of the flattest tax structures in the country.


Images

It's official -- Alice Brock will not renew her lease on Images when
it expires in June.  If you're a patron of Images, you probably saw
this coming.  Alice's sales have been weak, she hasn't been able to
restock merchandise, she's running up debt, and she's been pretty
unhappy about how things are going in general.

Images has a special role in Charles Village because in my experience
it's the only place you can just walk in and find yourself in a public
space where you're likely to meet people interested in community
affairs.  Alice agrees with me on this, but she told me that she only
sells an average of $25 worth of coffee per day and can't see how you
make money off a meeting space.  I find it ironic that a large corporate
chain like Starbucks seems to be able to do this better than Donna's
or XandO's.  A Starbucks is more likely to arrange their shop so that
there is a large space with chairs and small tables at the front of
the store with the counter sitting further back.  XandO's is somewhat
cramped near the front.  When you walk in from 31st Street, you run
right into the bar or the coffee counter.  Donna's is similar having
very little space at the front.  Neither shop welcomes people to just
hang around and chat.  

Hargrove House

An inside source (whose initials are J.S. ;-) ) reports that Hargrove House
is under contract for a prive in the low 400 thousand range.  This
is the residence of the McCarty's at Calvert and 29th (?).  Mack McCarty
passed away a few years ago, you may recall.  His widow will move to
the Carriage House and will keep part of the garden -- so I expect we'll
still see her trimming rose bushes.

Doug Munro

I haven't seen Doug Munro in ages -- has anybody seen him around?
He's the head of the Calvert Institute.  Back when I did Neighborhood
Walking, I used to walk with him a lot.

The Wire

Joel and Sarah continue to graciously allow Kathleen and me to watch
The Wire at their house on Sunday nights.  Did you know that our
former Police Commissioner Ed Norris plays a homicide detective on the
show?  (a minor recurring part) His character has a notable quote from
the first season, speaking about weak leadership in the BCPD: "I'd
give half my overtime pay for a Commissioner that can clean up this
mess" (or something like that).  I wonder why he hasn't been back for
later seasons?  Could it be because he's doing time?  There is such
irony in that quote.


See you around,

--Emil




-- 
Emil Volcheck
volcheck at acm.org
http://acm.org/~volcheck