January's big chill led to widespread death of corals in many near shore and mid-channel reefs from Biscayne Bay to Summerland Key, but most of the popular offshore diving and fishing reefs in the Florida Keys were spared.
“TEACH near the BEACH!'' read the education jobs posting in the Feb. 28 edition of The New York Times.<p/> The ad was for the Broward school district, which is recruiting teachers this week — in New York City.
Chad Pennington will stay with the Dolphins as a backup for one year as he continues to rehab his shoulder.
The brownish-gray coyote bared its teeth and snarled as Ralph Pfister arrived to open the steel trap that held it by the leg. A young male, it had succumbed to the irresistible bait combination of dead skunk and rival canine poop placed on the side of a dirt road running through the expansive Adams Ranch.
Homes and apartment buildings here have collapsed. Looters have destroyed a dozen businesses.<p/> A major bridge is down to one lane, and a state shipbuilding company has shut down. A major private employer, a steel mill, has stopped operations to repair its damaged furnace.
The FBI has turned up the heat on Narcy Novack, the widow of slain Fort Lauderdale millionaire Ben Novack Jr., seizing assets from his estate under federal forfeiture laws.
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By Matthew Bigg
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (Reuters) — Government planners and international experts are racing to produce a blueprint this week to reconstruct Haiti’s economy after the earthquake that killed up to 300,000 people and devastated its infrastructure.
A team of 150 Haitian government officials and 90 international experts is to submit the plan to the government by Friday, said Doekle Wielinga, a World Bank disaster recovery specialist in charge of the effort.
The document will then be assessed at a meeting of international technical experts in the Dominican Republic on March 16 before a donor conference in New York on March 31.
“What we are working on is what the requirements will be in terms of recovery and reconstruction,” Wielinga told Reuters.
“This is the first PDNA (post-disaster needs assessment) where we have almost the entire international community participating physically,” Wielinga said, adding that Haitian communities outside the country were also being consulted.
An outstanding question remains the scope of recovery and whether to attempt to restore the economic status quo that existed prior to the January 12 quake, or go further.
Haiti is the poorest country in the Western hemisphere. Its society is divided among a tiny elite, many of whom dwell in sumptuous villas on hills overlooking the capital, a small middle class and a majority who earn just a few dollars a day.
At the same time, the fractured relationship between the government and people could undermine long-term recovery.
Wielinga stressed that a single recovery plan produced by international actors and the Haitian government would likely produce more coherence, but he acknowledged the difficulties of restoring a country beset by long-term structural weaknesses.
“Doing this thing in a joint or coherent manner, the ordinary Haitian will see a uniformly managed reconstruction process and therefore get more bang for your buck,” he said.
Haitians in a series of interviews on Saturday said they had little confidence in the government and criticized its efforts since the earthquake.
The country saw modest stabilization under President Rene Preval, who was elected in 2006. But the views expressed by poor and middle-class Haitians reflected a cynicism bred from decades of political upheaval.
“We have never had the impression that the government was on the side of the people. Never ever,” said Florence Romain, a civil engineer. “Haitians got used to it. They ended up counting on God.”
“I have the impression that we are in a boat without a captain,” said Gaelle Ambroise, who runs a pet food store in Petionville. “We get no help from the government, though we still have to pay taxes.”
At a camp in Petionville for around 25,000 people displaced by the quake, several noted that it was international aid groups, rather than the government, who provided assistance.
“The government does nothing for us. It is the international community and that’s what everyone says,” said Wesner Lafond, an accountant who is living in a tent.
The plan will address eight areas of reconstruction including education, housing, telecommunications, transport and energy. One aspect will deal with boosting the effectiveness of government and macro economic recovery.
Another will look at how to improve the agricultural sector to provide an alternative livelihood for the thousands who have fled the capital, which was overcrowded prior to the earthquake.
At the same time, there would be a special focus on preparing for the storms and hurricanes that regularly batter the country — as well as for the possibility of another big quake.
The plan would look at what can be done in an initial period of six to 18 months, then within the next three years and finally over a 10-year period, and the aim was to fund the first period at the donor conference, he said.
NEW YORK, USA — Fearing a major fallout in the relationship between their home country and the United States of America (USA), Jamaican nationals here are demanding a quick resolution to the impasse over the extradition request for reputed Tivoli Gardens don, Christopher “Dudus” Cooke.
Fears of a potential major fall out have heightened among Jamaicans in the Diaspora since last Monday’s report by the US State Department which criticised Jamaica’s handling of the request and the subsequent response by Prime Minister Bruce Golding, who openly defended Coke’s rights in Parliament.
Interviews conducted by the Observer here revealed a real sense of frustration and deep desire for a resolution of the matter.
“It’s been going on for too long. They should settle it before it is too late,” said Leon Saunderson, a bus driver.
Saunderson is fearful that the United States might impose some level of sanctions against Jamaica as a way to force an end to the matter.
Dionne McKoy, a Massachusetts-based healthcare provider argued that: “it will be better for all if this thing is settled soon.”
McKoy said that she was fearful that there could be “more serious consequences,” for her homeland, should Jamaican authorities fail to resolve the extradition request soon.
Describing the present impasse as holding serious concerns for the future of US, Jamaica relations, Patrick Beckford, who heads the Diaspora board for the North East United States, said that he worries that his country of birth could be designated a rouge state.
“Should this happen we could lose valuable economic and other support,” he said noting that his office had been receiving numerous telephone calls, many of themy from Jamaicans in law enforcement here, expressing concern about the matter.
He argued that the Jamaican Government should allow the Courts there to determine or interpret what the Prime Minister refers to as the illegal means used by United States authorities to obtain the information it used in its extradition request.
But not everyone here views the current impasse, as holding dire consequences for the future.
Florida-based attorney Marlon Hill said that he does not think “Jamaica will be punished severely by the US, over the extradition issue.”
Hill concedes, however, that “a quick resolution of the matter would be in the best interest of both countries.”
He said that he was more concerned about the criticism contained in the State Department’s report about failed efforts on the part of the Jamaican Legislature, to complete several pieces of Crime Bill legislation which have been stalled in Jamaica’s Parliament.
The Jamaican Attorney urged resolution on those bills as a matter of priority.
Still Basil Grant, a warehouse clerk, like most of his countrymen here, is worried about a serious strain in relationships between the US and his native land.
“A solution must be found soon,” he said.
ST. JOHN’S, Antigua, CMC –Congressman Mike Coffman of Colorado has introduced a resolution in the US House of Representatives seeking to pressure Antigua and Barbuda over the alleged multi-billion dollar Ponzi scheme involving disgraced Texan financier, Sir Allen Stanford.
The four-page resolution which was introduced on Friday has been referred to the US House of Representatives Financial Services Committee and is now awaiting a vote.
It calls on US Executive Directors to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank to ensure that any loan provided to Antigua and Barbuda should have conditions attached.
Coffman wants the Baldwin Spencer administration to release to the US receiver all of Sir Allen properties that were compulsorily acquired and that the country makes several monetary contributions for the benefit of investors who lost money in the alleged scheme that US regulators said amounted to US$ 7 billion.
Specifically, it asks that the government be pressed to give the US receivership estate being managed by Ralph Janvey the same amount of money provided to Antigua and Barbuda by Sir Allen or any Stanford-affiliated entity.
A similar Senate Resolution sponsored by eight US Senators in December 2009 is now pending a vote by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
The Baldwin Spencer government has in the past criticised the moves to blacklist the country over the affair and has described as “unbelievable†a class action lawsuit filed in the United States by a group of disgruntled investors against the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank (ECCB) and the government.
The so-called Stanford Victims Coalition, which filed the action in a New York court claims its 28,000 members fell prey to Sir Allen, who is alleged to have conducted the scheme through his Antigua-based Stanford International Bank.
Sir Allen, who is awaiting trial in the United States, has consistently denied the allegations.
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