Acquire

Klaff Realty LP said yesterday that it had closed on a $5.9 million deal to acquire 11 sites from Hechinger Co., the bankrupt home improvement retailer. At seven of the sites, Klaff will assume Hechinger leases. At the other four -- including a 0.6-acre parcel on Security Boulevard in Woodlawn -- Klaff is acquiring vacant land. The sites were among more than 100 locations put up for sale last fall, after Hechinger Co. ended efforts to reorganize in bankruptcy and ceased operations, Matthew Feldman, a New York lawyer representing Hechinger, said yesterday.

Taking steps toward meeting its goal of doubling in size by the year 2000, Spectera Inc., a health services company with headquarters in Woodlawn, announced yesterday that it has acquired Group Vision Associates, a Philadelphia-based vision plan.Terms were not disclosed."GVA is the first in a number of vision care companies we plan to acquire in the next two years," said David T. Hall, chief executive officer of Spectera.GVA covers 550,000 people nationally, bringing the total enrolled in Spectera vision plans to about 2.5 million.

Hoping to set the stage for the future renewal of one of the city's most distressed areas, officials are moving to acquire about 200 abandoned properties around the historic American Brewery building in a long-neglected corner of East Baltimore. The 30-odd properties closest to the brewery - which has been vacant for more than three decades but is slated to be renovated as the local headquarters of a nonprofit social services agency - will be shored up to prevent further deterioration, while the rest will be held until the city decides what to do with them.

IT WOULD be easy "to end welfare as we know it," as President Clinton promised to. It's primarily just a matter of defining our terms."Welfare" is shorthand for the program known as Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC).The first thing I would do if I were president is to write into the U.S. Code a non-cash definition of "Aid." Henceforth, the poor would get a credit card that entitled them to buy all the things that they needed for their "welfare," which would also be defined in the Code:"the state of faring well or doing well: thriving or successful progress in life"Thus one could buy -- or, rather, acquire -- milk, but not beer, for example.

After a year of layoffs, restructuring and a management overhaul, Baltimore biotech Guilford Pharmaceuticals Inc. announced yesterday its sale to cancer-drug maker MGI Pharma Inc. of Bloomington, Minn., in a deal worth $177.5 million in cash and stock. Guilford shares jumped 41 percent yesterday on the Nasdaq stock market, rising 99 cents to close at $3.40 on the news after months of revitalization efforts under Dean J. Mitchell, the chief executive officer brought in from Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. MGI, with about 300 employees, said it plans to maintain the Baltimore operation and retain many of Guilford's 250 staff members, particularly those in research and development and sales.

ANAHEIM, Calif. -- The Chicago Cubs have emerged as the most active team at baseball's winter meetings, and why not?This is the team that went from the playoffs to the National League cellar in the space of one season. Now, general manager Ed Lynch and new manager Don Baylor are trying to deal their way back into contention just as quickly.The Cubs completed a major deal yesterday morning, acquiring starting pitcher Ismael Valdes and second baseman Eric Young from the Los Angeles Dodgers for right-handed relievers Terry Adams and Chad Ricketts and a player to be named.

Everyone knows Dave Johnson pitched a marvelous game for the Orioles the day they were eliminated from the AL East race last September. But what would have happened if Mark Langston had faced Toronto instead?Don't laugh. The Orioles actually tried to acquire Langston at the last possible moment from Montreal, according to a published report confirmed yesterday by general manager Roland Hemond.Club president Larry Lucchino described the idea as "somewhere between creative and absolutely bizarre," yet Hemond nearly pulled off what would have been one of the most unique trades in major-league history.

Baltimore, which for decades has relied on the power of condemnation to shape its much heralded renaissance, will continue to seize properties when necessary to assemble parcels large enough to attract private development, officials said yesterday. Yesterday's Supreme Court decision backing localities' use of eminent domain to foster economic revitalization removes any lingering doubt about the future of Baltimore renewal projects that depend upon the city's ability to acquire private property, development officials said.

The Orioles need help. They need more depth and more talent -- more of everything than meets the eye to have any hope of eclipsing the Toronto Blue Jays in 1994.The good news is that they know it and new managing general partner Peter G. Angelos has said that he is going to do something about it.But what? He told reporters last week that he hopes to acquire two -- and maybe even three -- front-line players to beef up an Orioles roster that pales next to the Blue Jays'. It will take that kind of aggressive spending to put the club in position to win the American League East next year, but it might not be a matter of simply writing a bunch of big checks.

Jimmy Carter, former Democratic president and Georgia governor, couldn't be more adamant in his contempt for the voter identification law in his home state. He called the requirement for a hard-to-get, state-issued photo ID that would have to be purchased an "abomination," "directly designed to deprive older people, African-Americans, [and] poor people of a right to vote." Even so, Mr. Carter backed a similar, though weaker, requirement as part of a package of election reforms recommended by a commission he chaired with former Secretary of State James A. Baker III, a Republican insider.