City Plans

The Baltimore Development Corp. has agreed to sell the historic Senator Theatre to its current operators, officials said Thursday. The BDC's acting president, Kimberly A. Clark, announced the sale to Kathleen Cusack and her father James "Buzz" Cusack at a board of directors meeting but did not disclose the terms of the sale. Reached by phone, Kathleen Cusack said details were still being worked out. "It certainly makes more sense for the city and for us," she said. "It's a step in the right direction.

With plans to demolish 1,500 vacant houses in the next three years, Baltimore officials and the few remaining residents in largely vacant blocks are beginning the early stages of the most delicate of relationships. About 80 residents - each of them representing the last one or two households living in blocks that are otherwise entirely vacant - are to be uprooted this year, the city to take their homes by eminent domain, demolish the structures and establish community gardens. They bring 80 different opinions that the city must respond to. Norma Green, who lives in the West Baltimore neighborhood of Upton, where the city plans to tear down at least several blocks of vacant homes, spoke at a community meeting Tuesday evening in Druid Heights.

Twenty-six years ago this month, Roma Foti's daughter, 23-year-old Nina Schack, was one of four crew members who lost their lives when the Pride of Baltimore, a replica of a 19th century sailing vessel, sank in a sudden storm in the Bermuda Triangle. Foti has always found comfort, she says, knowing that a memorial to the lost stood in Rash Field on the Inner Harbor. That's why she felt so let down last fall when she visited the site and saw it was in disrepair. Two panels bearing the names of the dead were four inches out of alignment, a corner was chipped off the facing, and two large cracks bisected a granite base nearby.

The City of Annapolis will host its second City Fair downtown on Saturday and Sunday. Many of the attractions will have a nautical bent, including the Pride of Baltimore II , which will dock at City Dock at about noon on Saturday. There also will be boats on display in the water and on land from the Marine Corps, the National Sailing Hall of Fame, Chesapeake Region Accessible Boating and the Annapolis Rowing Club. Annapolis Community Boating will offer the chance to use a kayak or canoe, while the Annapolis Sail and Power Squadron will teach knot-tying and the Hospice Cup will have a station for kids to make burgees, which are small flags flown on sailboats.

Whitney Swander woke before dawn three days this week to talk with people who have been sleeping on the city's streets. That's how she met Ron — a man who has moved across the country since becoming homeless and, lately, has spent his days drinking coffee in a McDonald's in southern Baltimore. "He wants a way into a more stable life," she said, pausing. "I keep thinking about Ron. " The Mayor's Office of Human Services-Homeless Services Program and the Baltimore Home for Good Campaign announced Friday morning an initiative to find housing for the 75 most vulnerable homeless people in the city.

Would you buy a used car from this retailer?Circuit City Stores Inc., the giant home electronics chain, startled Wall Street, auto dealers and much of the retail world yesterday with an announcement that it was going into the used-car business.The news, tucked near the end of a news release detailing the company's financial results, overshadowed a 38 percent increase in profits in Circuit City's fiscal fourth quarter."I was a little surprised that the media picked up on that when we announced earnings that were above expectations and described our keymarkets and plans for expansion, all of which will have a big impact on our business," said Ann Collier, Circuit City's spokeswoman.

In an effort to curb rowdiness, the city plans to restrict beer sales at next month's Fells Point Fun Festival, a move that organizers say would depress profits and possibly sound the death knell for the popular event."

The Annapolis administration plans to form two committees by next week to study the construction of a garage on a city-owned site on West Street, as part of a compromise to quell a controversy that has consumed the state capital in recent weeks.Jon Arason, director of the city's Planning and Zoning Department, said he is selecting representatives from downtown Annapolis' residential and business communities to serve on the nine- to 11-member committees. The city also has commissioned a separate study of the historic significance of five turn-of-the-century buildings at the site.

With his $1.7 billion budget nearing final approval last week, Mayor Martin O'Malley tried to reassure union leaders that he would not abandon the city workers who will be laid off early next year. "I promise you that I will do everything in my power to make sure that your members who are affected land on their feet," he said at a Board of Estimates meeting Thursday night to approve the budget. To make good on that promise, O'Malley will have to depend on the Mayor's Office of Employment Development.

Baltimore plans to lay off 27 employees and contract workers, including a Fire Department commander, to help plug a hole in the city's budget created by declining tax revenues, according to a draft agenda for today's Board of Estimates meeting. "Everybody is feeling this," Baltimore Mayor Sheila Dixon said Tuesday. "No one is not a part of this." The layoffs would come from six agencies and, along with a proposed citywide furlough plan and other spending reductions, will be presented to the city's spending panel for approval on Wednesday.

More than 250 bicycles would be available for short-term rentals at 25 stations throughout Baltimore by this time next year under a bike-sharing program similar to those in Washington and London, city officials said. The city's financial oversight panel approved an agreement with the state Wednesday to establish Charm City Bikeshare. Stations — much like the drop-off and pick-up spots for "Zipcars" — are planned for downtown, midtown and Southeast Baltimore. Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake said the rental bikes build on the city's effort to bolster its renewable transportation system, including on-street bike lanes and bike parking in Charles Village.

Description: Baltimore has a per-person "ecological footprint" that is 13 percent higher than that of the average American, according to a study of local consumption habits led by a researcher at Goucher College. The measure takes into account how large of an area would be needed to accommodate the city's waste and to secure the resources needed to do so. For all of Baltimore, the area is the combined size of West Virginia, Delaware and Rhode Island, the study found. The largest impacts come from traffic and electricity use, according to the research.

Baltimore Police Commissioner Anthony Batts said Thursday that he is planning to change the way police get eyewitnesses to pick out suspects, citing research that shows current techniques can lead to cases of mistaken identity. Batts said he wants officers to show witnesses one picture of a possible suspect at a time, instead of in groups. He said the change, along with a few others. could significantly improve the reliability of the identifications that police use to make their cases.

Baltimore officials hope to draw more money from city-owned garages downtown, raising rates at garages on Caroline, Baltimore and West streets while adding a new monthly overnight plan at the St. Paul Street garage. The city's Board of Estimates is set to vote Wednesday on the proposal, which officials say is necessary to maintain the parking facilities. The Parking Authority of Baltimore City, which recommended the increases, said the new, cheaper option on St. Paul Street will make parking more affordable for people who live nearby.

David Johnson of Fells Point said he and his wife were awakened early on Sunday morning at about 2 a.m. to the sound of revelers' voices in front of their residence. He said his wife asked the group if they could quiet down. When the couple awoke this morning, they found two large planters at the front stoop smashed, the soil spilling onto the sidewalk. "I guess their response was to smash our planters," said Johnson, who said he reported the incident to Baltimore City police.

Hat's off to The Sun editorial board for bringing to light the critical need to end homelessness in Baltimore ("The long journey home," Mar. 11). However, anyone looking at Baltimore's revised 10-year plan to meet that goal would be hard-pressed to call it an "action plan. " Indeed, the revised plan does contain specific statements about creating permanent supportive housing. But it provides no explanation of how those housing units will be funded or developed - or which city agencies will be responsible for their creation.

PHILADELPHIA - Bulldozers may soon come to be as omnipresent here as cheesesteaks. Seeking to reverse a 50-year population decline, this city is embarking on a program to tear down 14,000 abandoned buildings over the next five years, clearing land for the development of housing that would attract new residents. Officials describe the $295 million program, dubbed the Neighborhood Transformation Initiative and funded by city bonds, as a lifeline for long-neglected communities - and, by extension, for the city itself.

There's something fishy going on in Baltimore. The city plans to mount 200 rainbow-colored, rhinestone-encrusted fish statues this spring on busy downtown street corners to boost local morale and reel in tourists. Each of the Ichthyaerius Baltimoris will have its own eccentric, psychedelic design - dreamed up by local artists - and will be about the size and weight of Ravens' lineman Tony Siragusa (boasting, as well, the "Goose's" outsized panache). Mayor Martin O'Malley hopes to make a big splash by announcing plans for the "Fish Out of Water" exhibit at City Hall on Tuesday.

Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller said Tuesday that legislative leaders are working to overhaul Baltimore's proposal for a $2.4 billion plan to rebuild  its crumbling school facilities in way that he's “fairly confident” will win General Assembly approval. Miller, a Calvert County Democrat, had been one of the chief skeptics about the original plan propounded by Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake and city schools  chief executive Andres Alonso. That proposal, involving a block grant of at  least $32 million to the city school system each year for 30 years, has been embraced by House Speaker Michael E. Busch, an Anne Arundel County Democrat.

It remains a mystery why Baltimore wishes to endanger the health and safety of people living in an encampment ("Homeless eviction plan criticized," March 5). Baltimore's "Ten Year Plan to End Homelessness" specifies an effective method to manage encampments: move the residents into permanent supportive housing without requiring them to use emergency shelters. This is the "Housing First" approach that the city adopted five years ago - and refuses to follow today. More than a decade of research has demonstrated the efficacy of the Housing First approach.