Harbor East

The number of movie screens within Baltimore is set to practically double, with the planned Nov. 2 opening of a seven-screen theater in Harbor East, the burgeoning neighborhood between the Inner Harbor and Fells Point. The 1,300-seat facility, to be operated by Los Angeles-based Landmark Theatres, will be part of a 35,000-square-foot commercial and residential complex at Aliceanna and President streets. Its opening will increase the number of theater screens within the city's borders to 15, including five at the Charles, two at the Rotunda Cinematheque and the single-screen Senator.

Money manager Legg Mason Inc. said yesterday that it will leave its Light Street skyscraper for Baltimore's Harbor East when its lease expires in 2009 - a major boost for the accelerating expansion of downtown beyond the boundaries of the old central business district. Legg expects to move nearly all of its roughly 1,000 Baltimore-area employees to a mixed-use complex that H&S Properties Development Corp. will build in the fast-developing Harbor East, a once-industrial area transformed in recent years into a cluster of upscale hotels, residences, offices and retail.

The historic Bagby Furniture Co. building will get a face-lift and new tenants after its sale to Chesapeake Real Estate Group LLC, which plans to turn the first floor into retail while keeping the top three floors as office space. The building, at Fleet and Exeter streets, could open its retail shops as soon as spring, according to Doug Schmidt, principal of Chesapeake Real Estate. No price was disclosed for its sale last week. "It will be part of the whole walking, mixed-use experience of Harbor East," Schmidt said.

The developers of Harbor East want the city of Baltimore to prepare their half-billon dollar property by installing $2.9 million worth of infrastructure and a promenade. H&S Properties and Struever Bros. Eccles & Rouse also seek a 15-year deferral on the taxes for an office building proposed for this property and to pay no taxes on a planned parking garage for 25 years. Those favoring this arrangement argue that such support will keep and expand business in the city and that this development will eventually pay off in jobs and taxes.

Twenty free shows have been added to the lineup for the Paetec Jazz Festival to enliven the open-concert atmosphere over the Inner Harbor, starting Aug. 9. A diverse lineup will headline the festival's free shows. Among the performers are the new-school funk act Soulive; the blues-rock guitarist Anders Osborne; the Latin jazz Rumba Club; a jazz trombone ensemble, Bonerama; and the blues-rock fusion of the Fabulous Thunderbirds and the jam band Rusted Root. The previously announced ticketed portion of the festival will be at Pier Six Pavilion and feature smooth-jazz acts Boney James and Jonathan Butler (Aug.

A Harbor East development that will become Legg Mason's new corporate headquarters appears on the verge of getting millions of dollars in city tax breaks. The City Council's Taxation and Finance Committee approved a bill yesterday that would forgive $33 million in taxes for H&S Properties Development Corp., owned by bakery magnate John Paterakis Sr., to construct a waterfront tower and an underground parking garage. Though the $581 million project also includes another tower for a Four Seasons Hotel and condominiums, the tax break, among the largest granted by the city, applies only to the office portion and the garage.

Plans for a new skyscraper for money manager Legg Mason and a Four Seasons Hotel and condos in Baltimore's Harbor East community passed one of the first hurdles yesterday, getting preliminary design approval from a city panel. That approval clears the way for the $600 million complex to go before the City Council for review, but still leaves a host of design issues to be resolved. Mayor Sheila Dixon is reportedly mulling a financial assistance package recommended by the city's economic development agency, which Harbor East's developer says is necessary for the project to move forward.

When she envisioned a deluxe newsstand, the kind of place to find glossy magazines in dozens of languages, obscure literary journals and fashion quarterlies that cost as much as $90, Christina Cieri thought of only one location. Harbor East. "If I couldn't do it here, I didn't want to do it," the Harbor News owner says. "Do you see it in Federal Hill? In Mount Vernon? In Fells Point? In Canton? I don't." She felt this neighborhood's promise and wanted a part of it. Here, she says, "it's all about the future."

Glarus Chocolatier 644 South Exeter St., Harbor East 410-727-6601 or GlarusChocolatier.com Open 10 a.m.-8 p.m. Monday-Saturday, 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Sunday Don't panic. Sure you're invited to a holiday brunch at noon today and a Christmas Eve open house tomorrow, not to mention Christmas dinner with friends. So you need a last-minute gift when you thought your shopping was done. You don't want to hit the malls at this late date. Glarus Chocolatier recently opened its second store in Harbor East and has just what you need.

The Dallas company that is a partner in developing the Wyndham Inner Harbor East Hotel completed a financial restructuring yesterday that it says virtually assures its future involvement in the $134 million lodging project.Patriot American Hospitality Corp.'s restructuring involves a cash infusion of more than $1 billion from a group of investors led by a New York merchant bank, and a commitment from two other firms to refinance $2.45 billion in debt.The capital from Apollo Real Estate Advisors and pledges to refinance other debt from Chase Manhattan Bank and Bear, Stearns & Co. mean that Patriot American is likely to continue as part of the group constructing the 750-room hotel.

When I asked Blake Smith, who has a degree in finance, why he decided to open a pizzeria, he sounded incredulous: "You have to love pizza. C'mon." His new brick-oven pizza place is the Bagby Pizza Co. (1006 Fleet St., 410-605-0444, BagbyPizza.com), just open this week in Harbor East. It's in the old Bagby Furniture building, which is where it gets its name. His chef, if you can call a pizza maker a chef without sounding a little high-falutin', is Kyle Gillies. The menu features gourmet pizza, sandwiches, salads and pasta.

The long-delayed Charm City Circulator Bus made a cameo appearance Friday in Harbor East, as city and business leaders kicked off a campaign aimed at encouraging workers and residents to ease the bustling neighborhood's traffic by taking transit or a water taxi, biking or walking. People who turned out for the event at the Katyn Memorial got a chance to hop aboard the new hybrid bus, but they still can't ride it anywhere. Production problems and a slumping economy continue to hold up delivery of the 21 buses it is acquiring, city officials said.

The roster has some of the biggest names in high-end autos: Ferrari, Lamborghini, Alfa Romeo. On Sunday, dozens of shiny Italian cars worth hundreds of thousands of dollars each will roll into Harbor East for the Viva Italia Concours D'Elegance. Now in its fifth year, the car show raises money and awareness for the Children's Guild, an organization that helps children with emotional disabilities. Patrons can get up close and personal with more than 70 of the most powerful cars and motorcycles ever made and enter a raffle to win a Toyota Yaris.

The plea deal had been negotiated long before John Paterakis Sr. made it official in a Baltimore courtroom on Friday. And the bread man turned Harbor East honcho seemed more than ready to sign off on his guilty plea to a couple of campaign finance violations and move on. Judge Dennis M. Sweeney had just started listing the terms of the agreement and the details of Paterakis' sentence. He had barely ordered the first fine, for $1,000 - and had yet to mete out a second, $25,000 penalty and probation - when Paterakis reached into a pants pocket, pulled out two blank checks and had a pen poised to fill them out. It was an impressively quick draw for the 80-year-old Paterakis, but then, he's written a lot of checks over the years.

John Paterakis Sr., the baker and well-connected developer who bankrolled Harbor East, pleaded guilty Friday afternoon to two misdemeanor campaign finance violations and will pay $26,000 in fines and be barred from donating to Baltimore politicians until his probation ends in January 2012. Paterakis had been indicted on charges that he exceeded the allowable donations limits by contributing $6,000 toward a re-election poll commissioned by City Councilwoman Helen L. Holton. A major political and business power broker, Paterakis usually stays behind the scenes and on Friday declined Circuit Judge Dennis M. Sweeney's offer to address the court.

He was the millionaire businessman Mayor William Donald Schaefer called on more than two decades ago to help out with a big problem. Some 20 acres of lumberyards and warehouses between the then-newly redeveloped Inner Harbor and Fells Point faced an uncertain future. Schaefer wanted John Paterakis Sr., bakery magnate and campaign contributor, to do the city a favor and buy the land. For $11 million, Paterakis did, but the city backed down on a promise to buy back the industrial stretch later.

John Paterakis Sr., the self-made baking magnate and developer of the Harbor East complex, was indicted Tuesday on two counts of campaign finance violations accusing him of contributing $6,000 to help pay for a city councilwoman's political poll. The councilwoman, Helen L. Holton, also was indicted for alleged campaign violations, after winning a dismissal two months ago of bribery charges in connection with the political survey. The new charges were handed up by a Baltimore grand jury at the request of State Prosecutor Robert A. Rohrbaugh, whose three-year investigation of alleged corruption at City Hall has reached the highest rungs of the city's business community.

Just 12 blocks separate the old headquarters of Legg Mason at 100 Light St. in downtown Baltimore from its glassy new headquarters at 100 International Drive in Harbor East. But it's a quantum leap for the global asset manager - and the city that fought to keep it in town. The 24-story Legg Mason Tower is part of a wave of waterfront development that marks an expansion and redefinition of Baltimore's downtown - from a relatively compact core with a well-defined business district to a new, linear city that encircles the harbor, with eight miles of shoreline and companies and residences spread out all along the water's edge.

The push for intense development along the water's edge can be traced largely to the administrations of Kurt L. Schmoke and Martin O'Malley, who recognized the water's ability to draw businesses of all kinds. From the 1960s to the 1990s, the city had strong restrictions on waterfront development. Its master plan called for low- and mid-rise buildings close to the water and taller buildings several blocks inland, a strategy that limited the amount of new construction along the water's edge.

The first wave of Legg Mason employees showed up at new Harbor East headquarters Monday, representing a new start for the struggling money manager while also creating a potential boon for businesses at the waterfront neighborhood. At the same time, Legg's relocation will leave a big dent in the old central business district. The huge vacancy at 100 Light St., where Legg occupied 22 of the 35 floors, has not been filled. For surrounding businesses at Legg's former home, the loss means more bad news during trying economic times.