Abell Foundation

THE ROLAND PARK Second Presbyterian Church looked absolutely stunning last Saturday for the wedding of Natalia Pia Melanie Sommer and Richard Matthew Dohler. Thousands of wildflowers, miles of lace ribbons and tulle, and window sills decorated with Singapore orchids set the stage for the nuptials of the daughter of pop music star Donna Summer and her first husband, Helmut Sommer,and the son of Dick and Bonna Dohler, he's an Ellicott City builder.The church was filled with the music of German trumpeteer Langston Fitzgerald and selections of Bach, Beethoven and Vivaldi, played by the church's music director Margaret Budd on the organ.

A Baltimore charitable foundation is joining Maryland's main technology development agency to create a $3.3 million investment fund to pump money into new tech startups in the city, officials plan to announce Tuesday. The Abell Foundation is investing $3 million into the newly created Propel Baltimore Fund, with another $300,000 coming from the Maryland Technology Development Corp., a quasi-state agency. The fund will make small, otherwise known as "angel," investments, typically ranging from $50,000 to $100,000, but up to a maximum of $220,000 per company.

Here we go again: Haven't these Move to Opportunity programs destroyed enough neighborhoods ("Closing Baltimore's achievement gap with housing policy," May 30)? It's a crime what the politicians did to Dundalk, Essex and the Patterson Park area, to name just a few. If you are so for this movement of people, move them into your neighborhoods, and those of the judges, lawyers and politicians who approve of this. Stop pushing them on working people. Martin, Fallston

A few weeks back, I wrote about the Abell Foundation funding a survey of Baltimore's tech community, which was being pushed by a new group called the Innovation Alliance . About 170 people responded to the IA's survey . Apparently, we'll get the results soon. And then, the next step is a big town hall meeting. It will be held March 12th, 5:30-7:30pm at the Mount Washington Conference Center . So who is the Innovation Alliance? Says Larrabee: Newt Fowler and Jason Pappas formed the Innovation Alliance to study the needs of Baltimore's innovation community with support from the Abell Foundation, and hopefully the Innovation Alliance will facilitate the creation of a hub facility for the innovation community.

The Abell Foundation has awarded the Baltimore State's Attorney's Office a grant worth nearly $128,000, which will be used to "double the capacity" of an anti-prostitution program, top prosecutor Gregg Bernstein announced Thursday. One of his deputy state's attorney's, Elizabeth Embry, is the daughter of foundation President Robert Embry, who could not be reached for comment. Roughly 1,200 prostitution arrests are logged in Baltimore each year, according to the State's Attorney's Office, which launched the "Specialized Prostitution Diversion" program in 2009 to help offenders break the recidivist cycle, by offering them drug, health and employment services.

When an Abell Foundation study last month called the Morris A. Mechanic Theatre inadequate for large-scale, Broadway-style productions, it warned that efforts to replace the performing arts center need to begin immediately. But no one seems inclined to heed the admonition -- at least not publicly.Indeed, even the staunchest supporters of theater in Baltimore, mindful of the poor economic condition of the state and its subdivisions, are taking a cautious approach to the report, which said the 24-year-old Mechanic needs to be replaced with a larger, up-to-date facility costing a minimum of $25 million.

A struggling, 110-year-old glass manufacturer that employs 300 will remain open in Baltimore after the Abell Foundation made an undisclosed investment to save it.The Carr-Lowrey Glass Co., which makes glass containers for cosmetics and perfumes at a plant at 2201 Kloman St., had been searching for a buyer for months before the Abell Foundation stepped in, said K. Wayne Long, vice chairman of the company's board."

Baltimore's formal application to be host of the 2008 Summer Olympic Games will be filed today, along with a $100,000 application fee funded by the Abell Foundation.The city will join at least six others in seeking the Games, all filing applications with the United States Olympic Committee by the close of business today.Maryland Stadium Authority chairman John Moag will fly to the USOC's headquarters in Colorado Springs, Colo."I'm doing it to deliver it and to indicate a level of sincerity," Moag said.

THE PATTERSON PARK area contains many stereotypical East Baltimore neighborhoods of rowhouses, white marble steps and painted window screens. But as residents have aged, enrollment at the local Catholic school has dwindled and its future is threatened.The Abell Foundation has now come up with an unusual idea to promote both the neighborhood and the school. It is offering up to nine years of free education at the St. Elizabeth School to children whose parents purchase a renovated rowhouse from the non-profit East Fayette Street Community Development Corp.

A scathing report from The Abell Foundation on public housing in Baltimore suggests that the city's housing authority has "abandoned its mission to house the poor" by focusing on the demolition of properties instead of providing new housing. The report, to be published today on The Abell Foundation's Web site, says the number of occupied public housing units in the city has declined by 42 percent in the past 15 years - from 16,525 to 9,625. The report says the authority's plans for new housing are "unclear."

The Abell Foundation, a decades-old Baltimore philanthropic institution that increasingly invests in technology startups to spur economic growth in Baltimore, said Monday it is paying $75,000 to fund a study to investigate the needs of the city's technology and innovation community. The newly formed Innovation Alliance, a group of technology veterans and entrepreneurs led by attorney Newt Fowler, will lead the study. "If Baltimore is going to progress economically, it needs to focus on startups and transferring the large amount of [university]

Hope, humor and determination abounded at the unveiling today of the " Healthy Harbor " plan. Now comes the hard part - following through, so kids like 12-year-olds Dana and Diamond Johnson can feel safe swimming and fishing in Baltimore's waters by the time they're adults. The plan produced by the Waterfront Partnership - a coalition of businesses, nonprofit groups and city agencies - lays out a detailed roadmap for attacking the sewage, trash and storm-water runoff that makes the harbor and the region's streams risky for wading or other recreation.

The Abell Foundation has awarded the Baltimore State's Attorney's Office a grant worth nearly $128,000, which will be used to "double the capacity" of an anti-prostitution program, top prosecutor Gregg Bernstein announced Thursday. One of his deputy state's attorney's, Elizabeth Embry, is the daughter of foundation President Robert Embry, who could not be reached for comment. Roughly 1,200 prostitution arrests are logged in Baltimore each year, according to the State's Attorney's Office, which launched the "Specialized Prostitution Diversion" program in 2009 to help offenders break the recidivist cycle, by offering them drug, health and employment services.

A 13-year-old Romesh Vance sat on a Baltimore carousel eight years ago, spinning slowly as he predicted his future. "I think all our lives [are] going to be bad now," he said. The statement was captured on camera by the documentary filmmakers following his journey - and its premature end - at the Baraka boarding school in Kenya, which gave a handful of disadvantaged city boys the chance to study in Africa. The school was unexpectedly closed in 2003. On Wednesday, a 21-year-old Vance pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court to participating in a drug conspiracy involving nearly two dozen people who allegedly sold cocaine and crack out of the Gilmor Homes public housing complex.

A federally mandated tutoring program targeting thousands of students who attend Baltimore City's worst performing schools is shelling out millions of dollars annually to organizations that are operating in the district with little oversight and virtually no academic accountability measures, according to a report released Tuesday by the Abell Foundation. In the report, titled "Sending out an S.O.S. for the SES (Supplemental Educational Services)," researcher Joan Jacobson - whose complaints against her son's special education tutoring service resulted in the provider facing fraud charges and jail time - found that Baltimore is a burgeoning marketplace for the tutoring companies because it holds the bulk of the state's underperforming schools and low-income populations.

Concerned about the academic achievement of students at Baltimore City Community College, Gov. Martin O'Malley has overhauled its board of trustees, replacing the majority of its members. "The governor has been monitoring the overall situation at BCCC, particularly student achievement and the relationships between faculty, students and administration," said Raquel Guillory, a spokeswoman for the governor. "The governor has been disappointed with the lack of progress, and he believes now is the time to infuse the board with new leadership.

Two private organizations announced separate initiatives yesterday to pay for programs designed to revamp the Baltimore Police Department, reduce crime and cut the city's homicides substantially by the end of 2002.The Abell Foundation is paying $140,000 to a team headed by crime consultants Jack Maple and John Linder to study police operations and implement a new crime-fighting strategy. The consultants are already at work at the behest of Mayor-elect Martin O'Malley.The Greater Baltimore Committee -- a group of business leaders who challenged the community to cut the city's annual 300-plus homicides in half in two years -- is giving the city's Safe and Sound Campaign $145,000 to pay for a special prosecutor and surveillance equipment.

Baltimore City Community College took out a word-packed, half-page ad in The Sun yesterday, starting an advertising campaign to improve the school's image after a recent report criticized low student achievement and inadequate leadership. The ad acknowledges some of the problems - that the school has the lowest graduation and transfer rates of any of the state's community colleges - but also praises advances such as more online courses and computer programs, which are designed to help more students pass remedial courses.

If Lainy LeBow-Sachs and Zelig Robinson want to kick off the third member of the new William Donald Schaefer Foundation — longtime friend of the deceased mayor and governor, Gene Raynor — they probably have the power to do it. It is a private foundation, they control two-thirds of the votes on the board, and if they believe the first order of business ought to be to shrink the governing body from three to two, with Mr. Raynor being the unwilling casualty,...

Here we go again: Haven't these Move to Opportunity programs destroyed enough neighborhoods ("Closing Baltimore's achievement gap with housing policy," May 30)? It's a crime what the politicians did to Dundalk, Essex and the Patterson Park area, to name just a few. If you are so for this movement of people, move them into your neighborhoods, and those of the judges, lawyers and politicians who approve of this. Stop pushing them on working people. Martin, Fallston