17 May 12 Marian trips Ladywood, 1-0
What should have been a jubilant victory celebration turned sour Tuesday for the Birmingham Marian girls soccer team.
The Mustangs won their pivotal Catholic League Central Division showdown 1-0 at Livonia Ladywood, but lost starting junior forward Hanna Beck Sawyer to what appeared to be serious knee injury with just over four minutes left in closely contested match which pitted the states top two ranked teams in Division 2.
Marian is now 12-1-1 overall and 9-0-1 in the Central Division, while Ladywood falls to 15-1-2 and 8-1-1.
Unfortunately Ive had too much experience and unfortunately its her ACL, Marian coach Barry Brodsky said of Beck Sawyers injury. It was gut-wrenching. Its just a very hollow victory when you lose a girl like that, whom Ive known since she was a little ninth-grader. You dont care about the game, but Im sorry.
The games lone goal came with 12:23 remaining in the first half when junior forward Katie White one-timed a cross off the foot of Annika Johnson that Ladywood goalkeeper Sara Even had no chance on.
Meanwhile, Ladywoods best scoring opportunity came early in the first half when Marian senior keeper Makenzie Larson robbed senior forward Kelly Capoccia from point-blank range on a sprawling save.
Theres no secret, Ladywood coach Ken Shingledecker said. They (Marian) want to get to the end line and serve balls in front of your goal. It was a great finish. We did the same thing early on and their keeper (Larson) came up huge on Kelly (Capoccia). They finished their chance, we didnt finish ours. Pretty even game other than that. Hopefully we can do it again a week from Saturday (in a possible Catholic League finals rematch) with them.
The two teams tied 1-1 on April 28 at Marian, a game where Ladywood had significantly more quality scoring chances.
In the rematch, the Blazers were missing one of their main offensive targets, junior forward Domenique Sarnecky, who is sidelined with a knee injury.
Doms usually a huge factor because we run a lot of stuff through her, Shingledecker said. When shes not in it changes the way we look. So not having her hurts, but obviously it cant be an excuse. We have a lot of good players who can play up there and get the job done. That (Marian) defense is excellent. I dont want to take anything away from their effort. They played a little bit harder than us.
They (Marian) were organized in the back and did a nice job. It is what it is. Weve got to move on.
bemons@hometownlife.com (313) 222-6851
17 May 12 Roaming charges drop as bill cap covers trips outside EU
The cost of checking Facebook when youre on your holidays is about to fall faster than a tourist looking the wrong way when they cross the road. The European Parliament has passed new regulations to limit phone and data roaming charges in the EU and the rest of the world.
Its the first time caps will be imposed on data roaming, so you wont be hit by a massive bill as soon as you get home and dump your suitcase just because you checked your email a few times. And you wont get a massive shock just because you used Google Maps when you couldnt find the hotel after that second bottle of el vino collapso.
On 1 July the cost of data will be capped at 56p per megabyte — just in time for the summer hols to kick off in earnest and for European tourists to land in Britain for the London 2012 Olympic Games.
Even better, prices will fall over the next two years, to 36p next year and 16p in 2014. And in two years youll be able to choose a roaming deal from a different operator instead of being stuck with the network you use at home.
Call charges will also drop, to 25p from 28p this year, and to 19p over the next couple of years.
Holidaymakers and business travellers have had a raw deal for too long, with phone networks making out like bandits as they charge what they like. Our business-minded buddies at ZDNet revealed last year that the actual cost of providing data-roaming services is between 1p and 3p per megabyte — meaning some networks have hit us with mark-ups as high as 80,000 per cent. Thats more than double the mark-up on cocaine. So we hear. Ahem.
As welcome as this news is, the capped prices only apply to European citizens travelling within the EU. Journeying elsewhere for work or pleasure can still lead to hefty charges — but the £40 cap on your total bill thats currently in place when youre travelling in the EU has also been extended to trips to the rest of the world.
Is it about time someone sorted out roaming? Have you ever been hit with a shocking bill when you got back from your holibobs? Roam on down to the comments or take a trip to our Facebook page to let us know.
17 May 12 Cross-border taxi trips easier from next month
SINGAPORE – From next month, commuters taking cross-border taxis in Singapore and Malaysia will be able to board and alight anywhere on the domestic leg of the journey. This would mean, for example, that a commuter taking a Singapore cross-border taxi can board or alight anywhere in Singapore.
Currently, cross-border taxis are only allowed to pick up and drop off commuters at two designated terminals: Ban San Street terminal in Singapore and Pasar Bakti terminal in Johor Baru. However, commuters still need to board and alight at the designated terminals when they are not on the domestic leg.
The change was announced in a press statement issued after the ninth working meeting of the Malaysia-Singapore Joint Ministerial Committee (JMC) for Iskandar Malaysia yesterday.
To boost connectivity between Iskandar Malaysia and Singapore, Malaysias Land Public Transport Commission and Singapores Land Transport Authority have awarded a tender for the Malaysia-Singapore Rapid Transit System (RTS) link joint engineering study to the consortium of AECOM Singapore, AECOM Perunding and SA Architects.
It will determine the technical parameters for the RTS Link between Singapore and Johor Baru to achieve a convenient and cost-effective system that is well-integrated with public-transport services on both sides.
This will be done in two phases. In Phase 1, which is expected to be completed by the end of this year, the consultant will look into technical parameters and propose options for the link.
The Malaysia-Singapore JMC for Iskandar Malaysia will decide on the option that will be studied further in the second phase.
The meeting was co-chaired by Mr Nor Mohamed Yakcop, Malaysias Minister in the Prime Ministers Department, and Mr Khaw Boon Wan, Singapores Minister for National Development. Also present were the Chief Minister of Johor, Mr Abdul Ghani Othman, and Singapores Minister for Transport, Mr Lui Tuck Yew.
17 May 12 Mother’s Day trips and destinations
Its Mothers Day in much of the world this weekend, but if you havent got anything planned yet, dont panic.
Few Moms would say no to being pampered with a luxury travel experience — here, our pick of some of the best around the world.
The London West Hollywood – Los Angeles, CA
The Queen Mum package includes a night in a suite, champagne and chocolates on arrival and a manicure or pedicure in the hotel. Gordon Ramseys restaurant at the hotel is cooking up Mothers Day brunch on the sunday, complete with free-flow champagne, mimosas and Bloody Mary’s.
16 May 12 SIT chief’s foreign trips sponsored by Modi?
Raising doubts on the impartiality and objectivity of the investigation carried out by the SIT headed by Dr RK Raghavan into Gulbarg society massacre case, the Gujarat government has been accused of sponsoring Raghavans frequent foreign trips.
Gujarat Congress president Arjun
16 May 12 Tigard-Tualatin School District hopes to include more students, address ‘donor …
TIGARD — Students in the Tigard-Tualatin School District may be staying closer to home next year, under a new field trip policy designed to make extracurricular trips equally accessible for all students.
The cost of field trips was becoming prohibitive, school board members said before approving the new policy. Families were choosing not to participate in clubs and activities that included fancy trips and heavy fundraising. Local business owners, responding to many requests for financial support, complained of donor fatigue.
Concern about the haves and have-nots across the district of 12,000 students prompted the board to draw the line on whats reasonable. The board voted in March to adopt new restrictions for extended school-sponsored trips.
Under the old policy, trip costs were capped at $700 per student, a sum that has fluctuated by hundreds of dollars over the years. Effective next fall, there will be no dollar limit, but trip destinations must be within 1,300 miles.
Previously, the board could — and nearly always did — approve trips where the cost exceeded the guidelines. The new policy turns over final authority to make exceptions to Superintendent Rob Saxton.
Saxton said he wants to uphold the policys intent. Despite the boards history of saying yes, Saxton said he would say no when appropriate.
I want to make sure the students are able to have invaluable experiences and that were able to work to accommodate field trips, he said. At the same time, its really important that prices arent exorbitant and all kids have an opportunity to participate.
Districtwide, a third of the students receive free or reduced price lunch, but in some pockets of the district, its more than 50 percent.
When you think about the number of students who are on free and reduced lunch and their ability to fundraise, board Chairwoman Maureen Wolf said during the March meeting at which the policy was changed, I have the responsibility to think of all the students and all the families in the district.
She added, Its like parenting. Someone has to say no, and draw the line.
The issue has long been a sore topic for district officials. In 2009, the district provided interest-free loans to cover a trip to New York City.
The board unanimously approved a $54,000 loan to the Tualatin High School choir and a $20,000 loan to the Tigard High School choir. Both groups were invited to perform at Carnegie Hall but couldnt raise enough money to cover the trip, which cost Tualatin High $114,000 — $2,000 per student. The loans since have been paid off.
Board member Barry Albertson, who was on the board when it approved the loans, was the lone dissenter in the March vote. He said while he agrees there should be general parameters, he disagrees with limits in the field-trip policy.
I do not want it to be restrictive, he said. I do not want a financial impasse.
Every trip should be evaluated on its own merit, he said, and all the students should fundraise collectively so no one is left out. But Albertson acknowledged the reliance on donors.
The kids are put in a horrible situation, trying to generate capital, he said.
One of the most generous donors, district officials said, for such requests has been The Garden Corner in Tualatin. Owner Jonn Karsseboom said he gets a call from a student or parent at least once a week, and as often as every day during peak fundraising season, which also happens to be peak gardening season.
Our store really only makes money 12 weeks out of the entire year, he said. They all want to be a part of gardening during those critical 12 weeks, and so I have to share my livelihood with the fundraisers and with the community. Its a delicate balance, because we have to survive, too.
Karsseboom, who lives in Tualatin and has kids in the district, said he doesnt keep track of how much hes given. He doesnt give cash outright but said he tries to work with every request and helps as much as he can.
Everyone has a part to play to help, he said. Its also on the part of the community to raise the children.
– Sally Ho
Follow @TigTuReporter
14 May 12 Live: Donovan Trips Out Easy at Deepak Homebase
The psychedlic folkie Donovan celebrated his recent induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame yesterday with an intimate concert and QA at his friend Deepak Chopras hangout space in a Union Square home-furnishings store. Tucked into the mezzanine of ABC Carpet Home, the Deepak Homebase is a chic New Age lounge used to host events like this chat between the two spacey philosopher kings.
The evening began with a short Donovan set; he played seven songs, solo on acoustic guitar, the best of which was the simple and pretty Sleep from 1996s Rick Rubin-produced Sutras (which, with his accent, I thought he called Citrus); he also nailed Mellow Yellow, his closer, getting the audience of 100 or so well-off-looking, mostly white people (including John Sebastian!) to clap and sing the chorus so he could whisper the quite rightlies.
Donovan mostly stuck to the hitshe was celebrating his induction, after all, as well as the recent release of The Essential Donovan. He played Catch the Wind, Sunshine Superman, and There is a Mountain, but he had a little trouble singing them. Perhaps he has lost his upper range to age and hasnt modulated his arrangements, or perhaps he just didnt really care. Later in the evening, he played a few measures of George Harrisons Somethingor, at least, he tried to. Im making it up, by the way, he said. I dont know the chords. Who cares? You know what he means! Plus, hes Donovan! And he was here less to perform than he was to hang out and celebrate the old days.
He and Deepak shared stories about The Beatles (whom Donovan also impersonated) for most of the evening: how Donovan taught them fingerpicking and descending bass notes, which led to Dear Prudence, While My Guitar Gently Weeps, and Blackbird; how he helped Paul by writing a verse for Yellow Submarine (the sky of blue one, of which Paul said, thatll do); how he watched a policeman park Pauls car for him after the Beatle had left it half on a sidewalk, with the doors open and the radio blasting; and how he took George to see the Maharishi in Holland in 1989, where the three of them meditated together for 20 minutes.
14 May 12 Fluvanna school cuts include all field trips, adult education, new high school
FORK UNION The Fluvanna County School Board voted late Wednesday night to mothball the countys newly constructed high school and include $1.5 million worth of cuts to programs and personnel in its fiscal year 2013 budget.
The School Board was forced to revisit the budget after the Fluvanna County Board of Supervisors adopted a tax rate of just under 60 cents per $100 of assessed property value to fund a $66 million budget last week rather than a proposed 68-cent rate and $68.5 million budget.
The surprise, last-minute move translated to a sudden shortfall of at least $1.5 million for the schools.
Cuts made by the board included restructuring the divisions alternative education program and moving to a distance-learning program; ending instructional software subscriptions; eliminating all field trips; restructuring the early retirement and extended service programs and issuing furloughs of two days for teachers and three days for administrative staff.
No matter what you put on the list, theres no way with a shortfall of this magnitude that were not going to touch the lives of hundreds of children and hundreds of parents and hundreds of community members, said Superintendent Gena Keller.
The vote came after more than an hour of discussion among board members.
That followed about two hours of public comments from more than 25 teachers, students, parents and community members.
About 200 people attended the meeting, many at them at the urging of an organization called Save Our Schools, leaving standing room only in the cafeteria and auditorium in Fluvanna Middle School. Additional attendees listened to the proceedings from the hallway.
In addition to cutting $1.2 million, the board was faced with eliminating between $300,000 and $600,000 based on three cost-saving plans.
The options included not opening the high school at a cost of $300,000; closing Fluvanna Middle School, Columbia Elementary School and Cunningham Primary at a cost of $400,000; and Fluvanna Middle at a cost of $600,000.
Those options avoided spending $700,000 to open the new high school. The associated costs were for maintaining the buildings after closing and moving grades among the schools.
In my opinion, Plan B and Plan C arent even an option simply because of the implications of closing these buildings, said School Board Chairwoman Camilla Washington, amid groans and sighs from the audience. Our facilities study told us that if we did any of these that in three to five years wed be looking at building a new middle school. Wed have to go back to the supervisors to ask for construction of a new building when we dont know where we stand with the high school at this point.
The program cuts were met with similar dismay.
This impacts up to 80 students per year, Keller said about restructuring the alternative education program. My concern is a significant negative impact on graduation rates.
She said cutting the adult literacy and education program eliminates the opportunity for adult residents to improve their financial situation and be connected with the schools.
The School Board decided not to include in the cuts two options passionately defended by speakers during the public comment period, including eliminating the pre-kindergarten program and discontinuing all but varsity-level sports.
A meeting earlier in the week between Keller, Washington and Board of Supervisors Chairman Shaun V. Kenney included discussion of an extra $600,000 appropriation for the schools.
Kenney said on Thursday that he intends to continue discussions with the schools.
Were aware of the funding situation and will make a decision accordingly, he said.
Washington said an extra $600,000 would not be enough for the schools.
They say thats a compromise, she said. I say we need more. We recognize that this is not a sustainable budget for the schools.
The board voted, if the supervisors made the appropriation at their upcoming meeting next week, to redirect funds to the early retirement and extended service programs.
The budget discussion included analysis of a memo from Kenney to the School Board that recommended a number of cuts.
Keller refuted the feasibility of each cut, calling several of them baffling.
The information is misleading and in some cases inaccurate, she said of the memo.
School Board Vice Chairman William Hughes also criticized the memo.
Id venture to say, and were not trying to tell them how to spend taxpayer dollars, but I dont know if anyone in this room can tell us whats in [the supervisors budget for the county], he said.
Keller encouraged the schools to keep advocating for more funds.
We need to continue the movement to regain funds so that we can bring these things back into the budget, she said. We need to keep moving forward.
12 May 12 SEC: Company paid for Kilpatrick trips
DETROIT, May 10 (UPI) — Federal regulators say former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick took lavish trips paid by a company managing real estate for the city Police and Fire Pension Fund.
A lawsuit filed Wednesday by the US Securities and Exchange Commission names Kilpatrick, former Detroit Treasurer Jeff Beasley, Chauncey Mayfield, a Detroit businessman, and his company, MayfieldGentry Realty Advisers LLC, The Detroit News reported.
The SEC charges that MayfieldGentry got business with the pension fund in return for its generosity to Kilpatrick.
It is a disappointing day when pension fund trustees such as ex-Mayor Kilpatrick and others corrupt the investment process by selling out hardworking police officers, firefighters and other municipal employees for the price of a few vacations and paltry extras like concert tickets and rounds of golf, said Robert Khuzami, head of the SEC enforcement division.
The trips included one to the Bermuda Music Festival where Kilpatrick hobnobbed with local leaders and celebrities. He played golf with comedian Steve Harvey and had his picture taken with members of the band Earth, Wind Fire.
Kilpatrick, 41, pleaded guilty in 2008 to obstruction of justice and resigned as mayor. He is scheduled to stand trial in September on federal racketeering charges for allegedly running a criminal enterprise through his office to enrich himself.
His father and two others — Kilpatrick friend Bobby Ferguson and former city employee Victor Mercado — also are charged. Two others — former aide Derrick Miller and ex-fundraiser Emma Bell — have pleaded guilty.
12 May 12 GET UPDATES FROM Miguel De La Torre, Ph.D.
I was sitting on the dirt floor with about a dozen of my seminary students. Bugs crawled along the walls of the shack constructed of discarded wood, cardboard and plasterboard. Empty plastic bags and trash littered the flimsy structure, hugging the hut as if they were adornments. The owner of the house, an indigenous woman who had been aged prematurely by the ravages of poverty, patiently engaged us in conversation.
Routinely, I bring my students to Cuernavaca, Mexico on missionary trips. Usually, the purpose of missionary trips in these parts is to evangelize non-believers; to convince them to accept the doctrines of the missionary, worshiping and believing like North Americans. My missionary trips are somewhat different. We go to be evangelized by the poor; to learn from the disenfranchised and dispossessed who God is. We go to get saved.
Our host welcomes us into her home and offers us hospitality. She prepares a snack of jam on stale saltine crackers, giving what she can barely afford to give. As in past encounters, I encourage my primarily Protestant Euro-American students to ask this poor, illiterate, Catholic indigenous woman about her faith. With me translating, my students begin asking, Who is God? Who is Jesus? Who is the Virgin Mary? What is the Church? Like a teacher instructing the young, she begins to provide us with her understanding of faith, doctrine and church teachings.
As I translate her responses, I am struck by how illogical, uninformed, superstitious and syncretistic is her faith. This mixture of local indigenous teachings, medieval Roman Catholicism and a sprinkling of self-help New Ageism is more than my trained theological mind can handle. I fight the urge to correct her, to reveal the incongruities in her beliefs. I find myself slipping back into the traditional missionary role of becoming her savior and righting her theological wrongs. Although I continue to faithfully translate her words, I begin to contemplate how I can challenge her with the truth.
Just then, her 9-year-old son returns home. A dirty, undernourished boy shyly enters the hut barefoot and meekly interrupts his mother. He hands over about 15 pesos which he collected — during school hours — selling Chiclets at a downtown street corner. The mother places all but one peso in her pocket. This one coin she places on a box in the middle of the room that serves as a makeshift table. After a while, I ask her what she plans to buy with the peso she set aside.
Oh that, she responds, Thats for the poor.
In that moment I learned more about God than I had from all of the theology books I had ever read. When those who have so little do their faith by providing for those who have even less; those of us privileged by class should be profoundly humbled. It is the privileged who see the oppressed and do nothing that are the ones that do not know God. I may have had the educational training to tease apart the inconsistencies in this womans beliefs, but she knew far more about God than I did. This is not a romanticization of the poor, for surely there is nothing romantic about poverty. Rather, it is a theological truth that I learned directly from this poor womans actions.
When we all get to Heaven, we will discover how wrong we all were. No group has a monopoly on truth. So in a sense, orthodoxy — correct belief — is not that important (I say as a working theologian!). What should take precedence is orthopraxis — correct action. Calling oneself a Catholic, Protestant, Jew, Hindu, Buddhist, Muslim, curandera/o or santero/a is less important than living ones faith, and each of our traditions instructs us to care for the poor and marginalized members of our societies. This reminds me of the New Testament passage found in the book of James: You say you believe in one God — big deal; even the demons believe and tremble with fear. You idiots, dont you know that faith without praxis is dead!? (2:19-20, my translation)
This column is an excerpt from My Neighbors Faith: Stories of Interreligious Encounter, Growth, and Transformation.
