Preservation board to decide on Herald building

The city of Miami’s historic preservation office has compiled a lengthy, detailed report that substantially bolsters the case for designation of The Miami Herald’s “monumental’’ bayfront building as a protected landmark based on both its architectural merits and its historic significance.

Somewhat unusually, the 40-page report by city preservation officer Megan McLaughlin, which is supplemented by 30 pages of bibliography, plans and photographs, carries no explicit recommendation to the city’s preservation board, which is scheduled to decide the matter on Monday.

But her analysis gathers extensive evidence that the building’s history, the influential executives and editors associated with it, and its fusion of Mid-Century Modern and tropical Miami Modern (MiMo) design meet several of the legal criteria for designation set out in the city’s preservation ordinance and federal guidelines. A building has to meet just one of eight criteria to merit designation.

A spokeswoman for the city’s historic preservation office said there is no obligation to make a recommendation and the city’s preservation board didn’t ask for one.

Supporters of designation, including officials at Dade Heritage Trust, the preservation group that has received sometimes withering criticism from business and civic leaders for requesting designation, said they felt vindicated by the report, even as they concede that persuading a board majority to support it remains an uphill battle.

“It’s important that an objective expert is saying basically the same thing we’ve been saying, particularly in an environment where there is so much pressure,’’ said DHT chief executive Becky Roper Matkov. “It’s very hard to refute. When you look at the building’s architecture and history, it’s so blatantly historic, what else can you say?’’

The report also rebuts key pieces of criticism of the designation effort leveled by opponents of designation, including architects and a prominent local preservation historian hired by Genting, the Malaysian casino operator that purchased the Herald property last year for $236 million with plans to build a massive destination resort on its 10 acres. The newspaper remains in the building rent-free until April, when it will move to suburban Doral.

Citing federal rules, McLaughlin concluded that the building dates to its construction in 1960 and 1961, and not to its formal dedication in 1963. That’s significant because it makes the building legally older than 50 years. Buildings newer than that must be “exceptionally significant’’ to merit designation under city regulations. Opponents of designation have claimed the building does not qualify because it’s several months short of 50 years if dated from its ’63 opening.

The property also has a “minimal’’ baywalk at the rear but there is room to expand it, the report indicates. The building is considerably set back from the edge of Biscayne Bay, between 68 feet at the widest point and 23 feet at its narrowest, the report says. That’s comparable to what many new buildings provide, thanks in part to variances granted by the city, and could blunt criticism that the Herald building “blocks’’ public access to the bay.

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Google launches Snapseed photo editor on Android, makes iOS version free

After acquiring the makers of Snapseed in September, Google (GOOG) on Thursday released the popular photo application for Android smartphones and tablets. Google also updated the iOS version of the app to add Google+ integration and some new filters, and it cut the price of the original app from $ 4.99 to free. Snapseed is a simple yet powerful photo editor from Nik Software that allows users to enhance images with various tweaks and gesture-based touch ups, along Instagram-like filters. Snapseed is available now for the iPhone, iPad and Android smartphones and tablets.

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How They Pulled Off 'The Impossible'

The true story of the devastating 2004 tsunami that consumed the coast of Phuket, Thailand -- and how one family survived it -- is reenacted by Naomi Watts and Ewan McGregor in The Impossible. Watch the video to go behind the scenes...

Video: Tsunami Survivor Petra Nemcova Reacts to Latest Disaster in Japan

In theaters December 21, The Impossible finds Naomi as Maria and Ewan as her husband Henry, who are enjoying their winter vacation in Thailand with their three sons. On the day after Christmas, their relaxing holiday in paradise becomes an exercise in terror and survival when their beachside hotel is pummeled by an extraordinary, unexpected tsunami.

Video: Watch the Trailer for 'The Impossible'

The Impossible tracks just what happens when this close family and tens of thousands of strangers must come together to grapple with the mayhem and aftermath of one of the worst natural catastrophes of our time.

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Woman gives birth at Syracuse zoo

SYRACUSE — An upstate New York zoo got a surprise visit from the stork.

A woman gave birth on a wildlife path at the Rosamond Gifford Zoo in Syracuse on Friday, delivering her baby girl with the help of zookeepers not far from the bear exhibit.

Zoo educator Liz Schmidt tells The Post-Standard that she rushed over from the reindeer pen to find the 21-year-old woman pushing out the baby.

Other zoo workers arrived with blankets to keep mom and baby warm.

The zoo's elephant expert herded away curious zoo patrons.

An ambulance soon arrived to take the newborn to a hospital. Zoo Director Ted Fox says the zoo plans to send a gift to the family.

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Events showcase Miami’s growth as tech center

One by one, representatives from six startup companies walked onto the wooden stage and presented their products or services to a full house of about 200 investors, mentors, and other supporters Thursday at Incubate Miami’s DemoDay in the loft-like Grand Central in downtown Miami. With a large screen behind them projecting their graphs and charts, they set out to persuade the funders in the room to part with some of their green and support the tech community.

Just 24 hours later, from an elaborate “dojo stage,” a drummer warmed up the crowd of several hundred before a “Council of Elders” entered the ring to share wisdom as the all-day free event opened. Called TekFight, part education, part inspiration, and part entertainment, the tournament-style program challenged entrepreneurs to earn points to “belt up” throughout the day to meet with the “masters” of the tech community.

The two events, which kicked off Innovate MIA week, couldn’t be more different. But in their own ways, like a one-two punch, they exuded the spirit and energy growing in the startup community.

One of the goals of the TekFight event was to introduce young entrepreneurs and students to the tech community, because not everyone has found it yet and it’s hard to know where to start, said Saif Ishoof, the executive director of City Year Miami who co-founded TekFight as a personal project. And throughout the event, he and co-founder Jose Antonio Hernandez-Solaun, as well as Binsen J. Gonzalez and Jeff Goudie, wanted to find creative, engaging ways to offer participants access to some of the community’s most successful leaders.

That would include Alberto Dosal, chairman of CompuQuip Technologies; Albert Santalo, founder and CEO of CareCloud; Jorge Plasencia, chairman and CEO of Republica; Jaret Davis, co-managing shareholder of Greenberg Traurig; and more than two dozen other business and community leaders who shared their war stories and offered advice. Throughout the day, the event was live-streamed on the Web, a TekFight app created by local entrepreneur and UM student Tyler McIntyre kept everyone involved in the tournament and tweets were flying — with #TekFight trending No. 1 in the Miami area for parts of the day. “Next time Art Basel will know not to try to compete with TekFight,” Ishoof quipped.

‘Miami is a hotbed’

After a pair of Chinese dragons danced through the audience, Andre J. Gudger, director for the U.S. Department of Defense Office of Small Business Programs, entered the ring. “I’ve never experienced an event like this,” Gudger remarked. “Miami is a hotbed for technology but nobody knew it.”

Gudger shared humorous stories and practical advice on ways to get technology ideas heard at the highest levels of the federal government. “Every federal agency has a director over small business — find out who they are,” he said. He has had plenty of experience in the private sector: Gudger, who wrote his first computer program on his neighbor’s computer at the age of 12, took one of his former companies from one to 1,300 employees.

There were several rounds that pitted an entrepreneur against an investor, such as Richard Grundy, of the tech startup Flomio, vs. Jonathan Kislak, of Antares Capital, who asked Grundy, “why should I give you money?”

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Sea turtles stranded in Cape Cod’s cold water airlifted to Florida

Call them snow-birds of the four-flippered variety.

The Coast Guard on Friday airlifted to Florida 35 endangered sea turtles that got caught up in cold water off Cape Cod, Mass., and suffered hypothermia.

Now in balmier climes, they get medical checkups and rehabilitation , if necessary, before release for a hopefully healthy migration cruising the Caribbean.

Environmentalists turned to the Coast Guard for help when dozens of turtles were stranded in cold weather, said Tony LaCasse of the New England Aquarium, which crammed the hold of an HC-130 “Hercules” cargo plane with 35 boxed and blanketed Loggerhead and Kemp’s Ridley turtles for Friday morning’s flight.

“They’re being distributed to five different marine rescue centers,” he said, noting that “even New Englanders are little surprised that we have sea turtles. They’re supposed to be summertime-only visitors.”

But this year, the aquarium has been grappling with a record 150-plus strandings of mostly young turtles inside Cape Cod’s hook. Rather than swim north and around Provincetown for the annual migration, they followed their instincts to swim south, and got stuck. Volunteers of the Massachusetts Audubon Society saved them — malnourished and hypothermic — and turned them over to the aquarium’s rescue facilities.

By Friday the first 35 were deemed healthy enough for the Coast Guard airlift to Orlando, for distribution to five different sites.

“It’s exciting. We’re getting ready for the ‘snow turtles,’ as I like to call them,” said Nadine Slimak at the Mote Marine Lab in Sarasota, whose animal hospital was taking three Loggerheads among the 40- to 100-pounders arriving from Massachusetts.

SeaWorld in Orlando was taking 20 of the young Kemp’s Ridleys, a smaller species, that weigh 2 to 12 pounds, said LaCasse. The remaining 15 Loggerheads were being distributed among Mote, Tampa’s Florida Aquarium, Volusia’s Marine Science Center and the Loggerhead Marinelife Center in Juno Beach for care that could take months.

“Once they’re healthy and not showing any kind of medical conditions or any other problems, they are released off the east coast of Florida,” said Slimak. “Some of the turtles end up in Cuba or the Caribbean.”

The Kemp’s Ridleys mostly end up in the Gulf of Mexico.

Those that don’t fully recover effectively retire to Florida aquariums.

In Boston, LaCasse said, environmentalists in other years had used a network of private plane owners from Long Island to Maine to shuttle three or four turtles at a time to Florida, as they headed to vacation. There were so many turtles this year, he said, that NOAA’s Fisheries division arranged for the Coast Guard to collect them as part of a pilot’s routine training mission.

Distressed turtles are often found in Florida waters, too. The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission asks those who see stranded, distressed or dead sea turtles to call Wildlife Alert at 1-888-404-3922. For more information about cold-water stunning of sea turtles, the FWCC provides this factsheet here.

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Lea Michele Holy Night Being Good Performance Glee Swan Song

Every week, ETonline selects a scene that is so magical, it demands watching, and re-watching, from fans and non-fans alike. This week, that honor goes to Glee!

VIDEO - Kate Hudson is 'All That' on Glee

In Thursday's episode, titled Swan Song, Rachel Berry was gifted one of 10 Golden Tickets to perform at NYADA's elite Winter Showcase and the audience was gifted with a pair of performances that were richer than Willy Wonka's most decadent delights.

AUDIO - Exclusive First Listen To Glee's Jingle Bell Rock

While Lea Michele's once-in-a-lifetime talent has never been in question, it's felt like eons since Glee focused its lens on Lea, and just let the camera roll. The chills begun quickly into her first song, Being Good Isn't Good Enough by Barbara Streisand, and had developed into full body goosebumps by the time she hit Holy Night as an encore.

The power of Glee has always stemmed directly from tapping into the audience's veins and filling them with its unique blend of camp and heart, but last night, we were fed pure, unfiltered talent and I found myself joining in the NYADA audience's standing ovation when all was said and done.

Glee airs Thursdays at 9 p.m. on Fox.

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SC governor seems to shut door on Colbert to Senate

COLUMBIA, SC — South Carolina's governor appears to have closed the door on appointing Stephen Colbert to the US Senate, all because the comedian didn't know the state drink was milk.

During "The Colbert Report" on Thursday, Colbert urged his fans to send Gov. Nikki Haley messages on Twitter with the hashtag "SenatorColbert" telling her why he would make a great senator from his home state. Haley is appointing a senator after Jim DeMint announced he is resigning at the end of the year.

Colbert, who plays a mock conservative pundit on his show, also gave Haley four reasons he was the perfect choice.

UPI

Stephen Colbert

"You want somebody young, somebody conservative, somebody from South Carolina, maybe somebody who had a super PAC," Colbert said, ticking off the choices by putting down a finger until the final one was left pointing at himself.

"Wait a second," Colbert said, as his crowd cheered.

Thousands of messages poured into the governor's official Twitter account. She responded on her favorite social media site, Facebook, writing on her page that she appreciated Colbert's interest and all the tweets.

"But you forget one thing, my friend. You didn't know our state drink. Big, big mistake," Haley wrote, adding a link to a video of her April appearance on Colbert's show where the host did not know milk was the official state beverage.

On that same show, however, Colbert stumped Haley with the state amphibian — the spotted salamander.

Colbert was born and raised in Charleston, and he still has family in the state. He gently mocks his home, and has made a couple of faux runs for president during the state's early primaries. He also put on a crown and declared himself governor of South Carolina in 2009 when then-Gov. Mark Sanford disappeared for several days while visiting his mistress in Argentina.

On his show Thursday, Colbert also gave one other qualification he had to be a U.S. Senator.

"When I look at the U.S. Senate, I say to myself, you know what they could use?" Colbert said. "Another white guy."

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Miami Beach Walgreens property sold for $30 million

Marcus & Millichap Real Estate Investment Services said Friday that it has arranged a $30 million sale of a 22,857-square foot Walgreens drugstore at 5th Street and Collins Avenue in Miami Beach. The price, which equates to $1,312 per square foot, is the second highest paid for a drugstore in the United States this year, the real estate firm said.

Trans World Entertainment Corp. was the seller of the property, which was purchased by an unnamed international investor, who paid all cash, Marcus & Millichap said.

Walgreens will continue to lease the property, thorugh a 60-year triple-net lease that began in July 2008, with 25 years firm, the company said.

INA PAIVA CORDLE

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State lawmakers cautious about projected $437 million budget surplus

TALLAHASSEE --
Initial, positive indications about Florida’s budget for the coming fiscal year could be overtaken by events if the Florida Supreme Court strikes down changes to state employees or the nation plunges over the fiscal cliff, the state’s top economist warned Wednesday.

Speaking to the first meeting of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Amy Baker — coordinator of the Legislature’s Office of Economic and Demographic Research — told lawmakers that the current projection of a $436.8 million budget surplus could still change.

"I think the message is that this is not a large cushion," Baker said. "It could evaporate on you if economic circumstances turn against us."

Lawmakers have long watched a decision in the case challenging a 2011 law that required employees to contribute 3 percent of their income to their retirement funds, along with other changes. It could cost the state around $2 billion if the Supreme Court strikes down the law.

A Leon County circuit court judge voided the changes for employees hired before July 1, 2011; justices seemed hesitant about upholding that ruling at oral arguments earlier this year.

But Baker said the so-called "fiscal cliff," a package of federal spending cuts and tax increases set to take effect on Jan. 1 unless Congress and President Barack Obama can reach agreement, also looms large.

If there is a long delay in reaching a deal — one that stretches past January and into March — it could cost the state as much as $375 million, Baker said, comparing it to the debt-ceiling fight in August 2011 that dragged down the state economy.

Even if there is an agreement, it is likely to include some measures that will reduce estimated state income by hundreds of millions of dollars, Baker said.

"There is no likelihood that Florida will escape from the final decision with no changes to our budget," Baker said.

The uncertainty has pushed lawmakers who are optimistic about the numbers to nonetheless urge caution. Senate Appropriations Chairman Joe Negron, R-Stuart, told the committee that he wanted to boost the budget stabilization fund, one of the state’s reserves, to $1.5 billion. That’s at least $500 million over where the fund is projected to be, Negron said.

After the meeting, Negron told reporters that might be as much as the Legislature can do.

"You can never have too much in a reserve, but realistically I think $1.5 billion is a reasonable target to shoot for," he said.

Sen. John Thrasher, R-St. Augustine, said the situation should send a message to advocates for various state agencies in the audience.

"They need to be on notice that there is a lot of uncertainty out there and that this budget if these two things come to fruition is going to be very, very difficult to put together," Thrasher said. "And I think either one of them could devastating to us."

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