Baltimore Neighborhoods

This weekend's arrival "Liberty Heights," the new Barry Levinson film, reminds me of my own connection with that name. As a child of 1950s Baltimore, I too was dazzled by the array of totally different neighborhoods and peoples that all came under the shared address of Baltimore.I first got to know the name Liberty Heights from the telephone exchange, specifically that of Pimlico race track, L-I-B-four-two hundred, as my mother dialed it, always phonetically. My father's desk -- then as today -- was there.

You get a taste of it in Fells Point, where Mexican eateries, Syrian-run convenience stores and Greek-owned machine repair shops dot the streets. There's a hint of it inside Goldman's Kosher Bakery on Reisterstown Road. A glimmer among the Vietnamese groceries in Southwest Baltimore.Head outside the city limits. You can sense it in Randallstown and traditionally white Dundalk and Essex, where an increasing number of middle-class African-Americans are buying homes. In the Korean groceries popping up in Ellicott City.

They saw gardens in Federal Hill, renovated homes in Canton, barges in Locust Point, Little Italy, Fort McHenry, Patterson Park.More than 2,100 early-risers bicycled through Baltimore neighborhoods in yesterday morning's Tour du Port, taking in city sights in a way they say would be impossible if pedaling alone in traffic or zipping along in a car."It sounds silly, but it's three-dimensional now. We'd come down here, we'd come to the Inner Harbor. You kind of forget there is a city behind it -- a nice city," said Don Connolly, 47, a Wilmington, Del., engineer, who was biking with his family.

A Taneytown man has agreed to pay $5,500, attend counseling sessions and perform community service as part of a settlement of a complaint that he threatened a local real estate agent to prevent a sale to black homebuyers.Baltimore Neighborhoods Inc., a fair-housing advocacy group, filed the complaint with the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development, contending Allan M. Roberts swore and used racial slurs when he confronted real estate agent Jackie E. Robertson in July and October 1998.

This schedule will be in effect in Baltimore City tomorrow:City offices: closedParking meters: must feedTrash removal: no pickup; Quarantine Road Landfill and Northwest Transfer Station will be closedRecycling: citywide collections for tomorrow will take place TuesdayMayor's cleanup: West Baltimore neighborhoods of Sandtown, Reservoir Hill and Upton will be held Saturday; East Baltimore neighborhoods of Berea, Ellwood Park, O'Donnell Heights and Joseph Lee...

This schedule will be in effect in Baltimore City today:City offices: closedParking meters: must feedTrash removal: no pickup; Quarantine Road Landfill and Northwest Transfer Station will be closedRecycling: citywide collections for today will take place TuesdayMayor's cleanup: West Baltimore neighborhoods of Sandtown, Reservoir Hill and Upton today will be held Saturday; East Baltimore neighborhoods of Berea, Ellwood Park, O'Donnell Heights and Joseph Lee...

A Baltimore nonprofit group that fights racial discrimination in housing has sued the owner of a Ruxton apartment complex, alleging that African-Americans posing as prospective renters were turned away, while whites were offered apartments.Baltimore Neighborhoods Inc. sued the owner of Ruxton Village Apartments in U.S. District Court in Baltimore Thursday, accusing the apartment owners of violating the federal Fair Housing Act of 1968.The suit was filed after black and white Baltimore Neighborhoods "testers" requested apartments on the same day and were told different stories about their availability.

On a chilly autumn morning in 1995, Parkville photographer Huguette May's next-door neighbor asked if she wouldn't mind giving him a ride to his former Highlandtown neighborhood. It was a trip that launched May on a years-long voyage of discovery.As the pair passed the intersection of Madison and Monument streets, she noticed the former Luby Chevrolet showroom, a shuttered art deco masterpiece from the 1940s.May was so taken with the rather forlorn building, which harked back to the glory days of Dinah Shore and "See the U.S.A.

Shirley Hudnall wasn't supposed to fit in this well in her new Pikesville neighborhood. Her neighbors like her, she belongs to the PTA, and her 15-year-old son is doing just fine at Milford Mill Academy.But Moving to Opportunity, the program that brought her from her deteriorating Baltimore neighborhood to a two-bedroom apartment in the suburbs, didn't fare nearly as well.MTO will cease next month, killed by opponents who saw it as a way for Baltimore City to dump its poor and its problems into middle-class neighborhoods.

Baltimore Neighborhoods Inc., a fair housing advocacy group, has opened an office in Carroll County to monitor inequities in home rentals and sales."Our only agenda is to see that fair housing laws are followed," said Patricia Staples, outreach coordinator. "We cannot change negative attitudes, but if landlords or home sellers are breaking the law, we can do something."The private, nonprofit organization, which was started in Baltimore nearly 40 years ago, uses testers -- who assume the role of homebuyers or renters -- to help judge the local housing market.

The emptiest neighborhood in the Baltimore region is not an area hit by foreclosures or years of decline. It's a U.S. Army base, and the nearly 39 percent vacancy rate at Aberdeen Proving Ground is part of a trend of fewer soldiers living there. But the rest of the top five vacant areas in the region, measured in an Associated Press study by census tract, all are in East Baltimore neighborhoods that have weathered declines for decades. "It's a continuation of what has been a long, sad story," said John McIlwain, a senior resident fellow for housing at the Washington-based Urban Land Institute.

Bond Transfer files for bankruptcy Bond Transfer Co. Inc., a 61-year-old, family-owned trucking business in Baltimore, has filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection, listing $3.3 million in debts and $220,000 in assets. Company officials could not be reached Monday. Under Chapter 7, businesses typically shut down and liquidate assets. The company's Web site says it employs about 100 drivers who operate about 90 tractors and 275 trailers. The business specialized in next-day deliveries to metro areas including New York and Philadelphia.

Salary: $84,000 Age: 55 Time on the job: 15 months How he got started: After moving from Detroit to Baltimore to take a teaching position, Doran found that his job had been given to a recently laid-off teacher. So instead he went to work for a nonprofit organization as its director of camping and recreation. He then worked part time for another nonprofit, the Maryland Center for Independent Living, while attending the University of Baltimore to earn his master's degree in public administration.

Forget the glitzy attractions along the Harbor East waterfront. If you want a real sense of East Baltimore, check out The Rumors Are True: Megan Hildebrandt & Christine Sajecki, a new exhibit at the Creative Alliance at the Patterson. With paintings, photographs and other media, artists Hildebrandt and Sajecki offer different takes on the same East Baltimore neighborhoods, based on their tenure as resident artists at the Creative Alliance. The result is an endearing and illuminating show - sometimes whimsical, sometimes sobering - that just may tell you more than you ever wanted to know about Charm City (like, what does that roving Tastee Freez truck really deliver at 3 a.m.?

Confront violence throughout the city I applaud The Sun for the article that did an excellent job juxtaposing how violence is viewed in two very different Baltimore neighborhoods ("2 neighborhoods, 5 dead," June 24). The writers were able to show the divisions that exist in this city based on race, class and neighborhood - and how those divisions are being perpetuated by the behavior of the neighborhoods' residents as well as by the power structures that dominate our city. The Bloom Street residents, if not accustomed to living in the midst of the madness of drug-related violence, are at least comfortable enough with it to erect quickly "the kind of street memorial that is all too common in inner-city Baltimore."

You can rent a house. You can buy a house. Or you can do both. Rent-to-own - a contract that gives a renter the option to buy at a set price - is a niche part of the housing market. But it is one that more would-be sellers might consider in these slow times. Be aware, though, that you will have more issues to work through than you would in a straight rental or regular sale. You will want a contract, most likely one put together by an attorney, said Barbara Nichols, a California real estate broker who wrote The No Lawsuit Guide to Real Estate Transactions.

As Baltimore's mayor, William Donald Schaefer set up a community pot of sorts from which neighborhood leaders could draw $25, $50, $100 or more to pay for soda for a summer picnic or a brass band for the annual fall festival. It didn't matter how they spent the money, as long as it was for the good of the neighborhood and less than $500. "Anyone who wanted some money, we would look for it," Schaefer recalled yesterday. "If they asked for too much money, we wouldn't give it to them. But most of the time, it wasn't a big deal.

What can you do if the heater in the apartment you're renting conks out and your landlord won't fix it? Or if you're facing eviction? Or, for that matter, if you're a landlord with a nightmare tenant? A local group has answers. Baltimore Neighborhoods Inc., a nonprofit that works statewide, counsels renters and rental owners alike. "The majority of the calls we get on a regular basis, day to day, are rent court issues," said Stephanie D. Cornish, program manager for the tenant-landlord counseling department.

The news that Ed Rutkowski would be helping other Baltimore neighborhoods get back on track reminded me of just how much additional work needs to be done here. Ed worked miracles in East Baltimore in and around Patterson Park as director of one of Baltimore's glowing success stories, the Patterson Park Community Development Corp. He knows that you have to work house by house -- and that you have to expend patience as well as money. He's an accomplished player in keeping houses out of slumlords' hands.

GRAY FEBRUARY days aren't ideal for looking at Baltimore real estate, but then again, my father and I were not buyers. He had heard about, as had I, a row of houses being constructed on Race Street in South Baltimore. We were both curious. So, that afternoon, after a big family gathering at his boyhood home on Poultney Street, we took off in search of the $500,000 rowhouses being built along the CSX tracks. The price of rowhouses in what is called Federal Hill always amazes us. But that's nothing new now. We looked the group over and he observed the site at least was free of the natural gas tanks that once stood not so far away from the new kitchens in these pricey abodes.