Village Residents

Baltimore is in "spitting distance" of becoming a great urban place but needs a transportation overhaul. That was a message heard by nearly 100 Charles Village residents who braved snow-covered streets to discuss key local issues late Wednesday at SS. Philip and James Roman Catholic Church in the 2800 block of N. Charles St. On the agenda were joining the North Central Baltimore Transportation Alliance and discussing the new Johns Hopkins University master...

On her first day of work in Charlestown Retirement Community's Fireside Dining Room, Dawn Asbury dropped a steaming plate of shrimp creole onto an elderly resident's arm.Dawn, 18, burst into tears, afraid that she would be fired. But Dawn remembers that the residents were kind to her then, and now three years later, they're helping her pay for college.Elderly residents say the young people who work at Charlestown brighten their lives so much that mistakes can be easily overlooked.The rapport is so special that the elderly residents want to do more than provide good wages to their student employees.

Even before pressing the elevator button to the sixth floor of the courthouse, Jessie Weber and Nancy Eddy were grinning so broadly that fellow passengers guessed their destination: the marriage license office. “I'll marry you today,” a Baltimore circuit judge happily told the two women, who were among the first same-sex couples to get a marriage license on Thursday, the first day they became available under a new Maryland law upheld by voters in November. Actually, same-sex couples have to wait until Jan. 1 to wed, when the law expanding marriage rights to gays and lesbians takes effect.

Charles Village residents will move forward with fund raising and renovation plans for reopening the closed St. Paul Street library building as a learning center after the city's Board of Estimates approved a $1-a-year lease yesterday with two neighborhood groups.The city lease followed by a day approval by the House Appropriations Committee of $60,000 for the center's staffing and educational materials in the governor's supplemental budget. A Senate budget subcommittee approved a separate $156,000 matching grant for building renovation.

Sometimes, it pays to live -- and parade -- in Charles Village.Because of the generosity of Philadelphia photographer Neil Benson and his fellow "Dumpster Divers," the American Visionary Art Museum is offering free admission tomorrow through Sunday to Charles Villagers and others in North Baltimore's 21218 ZIP code.The relationship between the City of Brotherly Love, Charm City, and the museum was launched in the spring when Benson and his team of recyclers -- the Dumpster Divers -- came to Baltimore to enter the first East Coast kinetic sculpture race, which involves creative vehicles that can move on land and float on water.

After facing fierce community opposition, the president of a methadone clinic proposed for Columbia's Oakland Mills village notified the state yesterday that he will not open the facility there. Nelson J. Sabatini, secretary of the state Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, said yesterday that he did not know if Aktam Zahalka, the clinic's president, intended to apply to operate his business at another location. "Hallelujah!" Councilwoman Barbara Russell of Oakland Mills said after she heard the news.

When Andrew Krawiec left for work one recent morning, a small area of land bordering his back yard in Columbia's Long Reach village was lushly green with new spring growth. When he went home for lunch, it was a barren patch of dirt."I couldn't believe it," said Krawiec, who lives on a cul-de-sac on Youngsea Place. "Nobody discussed this with us -- no one even asked us about it. Who made this decision?"Krawiec and his neighbors soon learned that the Columbia Association's (CA) open space management department -- at the urging of two residents from a neighboring cul-de-sac -- cleared the land because its dense undergrowth allegedly had become a haven for teen-agers.

POMPTON LAKES, N.J. -- The Colfax boys know better than to dip their toes in Acid Brook. Never mind that their father splashed in the stream as a child, even drinking from it on steamy summer days. It is off limits now, just like the abandoned explosives plant owned by E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Co., which lies just beyond their yard."Everything around here is contaminated, from what I hear," said Steve Colfax, the father of the two boys. "I'm not taking any chances," he said, peering at the Du Pont property from behind his screen door.

MOSCOW - In the countryside, people fought back with bucket brigades. From above, a huge cargo plane dumped tons of water. And still, the smoke came, pouring into Moscow's subway system, grounding airlines and choking people. With no major rains in the past several weeks, scores of peat fires that have mainly smoldered deep underground near Moscow all summer flared up again last week - smothering a capital already heavily polluted by the exhaust of millions of autos and trucks. In the countryside, the sight of fire crawling across the fields is an eerie one. "There is always smoke coming from the ground and even when a small wind blows the fire comes up, and it is open fire, not smoke," says Yelena Makarenkov, 40, who owns a modest summer house, called a dacha, in the village of Subotino, about 40 miles northwest of Moscow.

Drenched in sweat, Richard Creek heaved another shovel full of dirt from the pile and carefully spread it in front of the Meade Village Community Center.He was celebrating his birthday Saturday sweltering in the heat to fill in the beaten-down lawn. With some grass seed and a fence to keep people from running across the yard, Creek hoped to create a nice green entrance to the dilapidated community center.A half-dozen Meade residents labored next to Creek under the noonsun and teased him about his age. Creek bragged that he got up at 6:30 that morning to decorate his own yard with flowers.