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2012年2月16日星期四

Loyalty program LevelUp to launch in Chicago

A Cambridge, Mass.-based startup is launching a new loyalty program in Chicago that encourages consumers to pay with their mobile phones at local businesses. Just Choose PTMS Plastic Mould Is Your Best Choice!

LevelUp goes live in Chicago on Thursday with 15 merchants, including Adagio Teas on North State Street and Cassava in Lakeview. The local launch is part of LevelUp's expansion into four new markets, including Atlanta, Seattle and San Diego.Bathroom Floor tiles at Great Prices from Topps Tiles. The service launched six months ago in Boston and Philadelphia, eventually moving to New York and San Francisco. About 100,000 active users and 1,200 merchants have signed up for the platform.

The LevelUp platform works with any Web-connected mobile device. Consumers that sign up link their account with a credit or debit card and receive a unique quick response, or QR code, to display on their device. They can then scan the code to pay for goods and services at any participating business, with purchases going toward rewards at those merchants. LevelUp members also receive credits for their initial visit to a merchant.

LevelUp is the newest product from SCVNGR,This page contains information about molds, a location-based service that launched in Chicago in 2010. The two services are not linked to each other,Overview description of rapid Tooling processes. as SCVNGR does not allow for mobile payments. As a loyalty program provider, LevelUp competes with a number of existing players in the Chicago market. Rivals include daily deal giant Groupon, which has its own version of a loyalty program for subscribers to earn rewards through repeat visits to local businesses.

Another competitor is Belly, which has funding from local venture capital firm Lightbank and offers a universal card that can be scanned at participating merchants to earn customized rewards. Belly has signed up 500 merchants in nearly four months in Chicago and has 60 participating businesses in Austin, Tex., where it expanded last month.

"The competitive landscape in Chicago is going to be more intense than some of the other cities we're entering, for sure," said LevelUp Founder Seth Priebatsch. But he said his platform stands out because it's easy to use and doesn't use discounts to woo consumers.

"LevelUp is not a high-tech punch card," Priebatsch said. "You just pay and it works."

Priebatsch said he was attracted to Chicago because of its size and importance, as well as its active startup community. The company, which has about 120 employees, has opened an office in Chicago with seven people.

LevelUp charges a 2 percent payment processing fee for participating merchants.The EZ Breathe home Ventilation system is maintenance free, Businesses can scan customers' QR codes via an iPhone or Android application or via specialized Android-powered hardware provided by T-Mobile. LevelUp also provides analytics for merchants so they can track customer spending. The company's data indicates that for every dollar of initial credit that a business offers, it gets $5.70 in return, Priebatsch said.We offer offshore merchant account, In addition, 65 percent of customers that make an initial purchase via LevelUp come back at least once in the next 30 days.

Mobile payments are effective in encouraging consumers to spend money because the system is one step removed from cash or even a credit card, Priebatsch said. The loyalty aspect also nudges customers into spending. He said the average purchase amounts for LevelUp members are seven to 10 percent higher than those for credit cards.

"It doesn't feel as much like real money as when you pull a dollar out of your pocket," Priebatsch said.

2012年2月8日星期三

CIA Withholds Bay of Pigs Documents, Claims Release Would "Confuse the Public"

Even 50 years after the Bay of Pigs invasion, the Central Intelligence Agency is still refusing to release its entire official history of the bungled operation.

In response to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, the CIA explains that the final volume of its five-volume history should be withheld because -- hilariously -- it would "confuse the public with inaccurate historical information." Which is pretty much exactly what the CIA has been trying to accomplish ever since it botched the operation to topple Fidel.

"Prying the real historical secrets out of the agency can be the bureaucratic equivalent of passing a kidney stone," says Peter Kornbluh, a senior Cuba analyst at the National Security Archive, which has filed multiple suits to declassify Bay of Full-service custom manufacturer of precision plastic injection mold,Pigs info.

Kornbluh's group filed it latest suit seeking the final volume of the operation's history late last year. The group had already negotiated the release of the first three complete volumes and got their hands on an incomplete draft version of the fourth volume, which also included a disclaimer:

"...the release of an unfinished draft CIA history risks placing inaccurate or incomplete information into public domain," the CIA wrote. "This could cause scholars, journalists, and others interested in the subject at hand to reach an erroneous or distorted view of the Agency's role in the events as described in a draft or otherwise lead to public confusion."

The unreleased fifth volume is a history written by CIA historian Jack Pfeiffer, who actually sued the agency himself to try to declassify the work back in the 1980s. The history argues that the CIA case officers who organized the raid -- many of whom spent years recruiting in Little Havana and training would be Fidel-killers in the Everglades -- aren't to blame for the fiasco.

But in a response filed in court in December, the agency evokes an exemption applying to documents in an "inter-agency or intra-agency deliberative process." In other words, because the agency considers Pfeiffer's work a "draft," it believes taxpayers have no right to read his findings.

That argument "appears as weak as it is insulting," the National Security Archives writes on its blog.

2011年11月29日星期二

What To Do When the Sun Sets

A major barrier for solar power has always been that it doesn’t work at night (Duh). A few years ago, developers of big “utility-scale” solar projects were able to shrug this off to some degree. But Oakland-based BrightSource Energy has reversed field and decided to add to several projects the ability to store electricity for distribution after dark.

BrightSource managers say times have changed. Where utilities once wanted all the renewable capacity they could get, to meet state requirements, the priority has since shifted to having those renewable electrons available when they’re needed.

“The challenges of integrating photovoltaics and wind into the grid have driven a much deeper appreciation for those that can be highly reliable,Why does moulds grow in homes or buildings,” BrightSource CEO John Woolard told me in a phone interview.

But another driver is — well — us. When I interviewed Woolard a couple of years ago, I asked him why his company wasn’t including storage technology in its California projects. He said it wasn’t needed in California, which had a different pattern of electrical use than, say, Arizona.

That’s changing. Woolard says peak demand, which has traditionally hit around 4 p.m., has been shifting to later in the day, and by the end of this decade, will probably happen around 6 p.m. He says changing lifestyles are behind the shift, such as when people arrive home and fire up their air conditioners and other appliances.

BrightSource says it will use a molten-salt technology to store the power, rather than huge banks of batteries or experimental technologies such as flywheels. “That’s a solution for 2050 or 2060,” Woolard told me, “depending on whether you’re an optimist or a pessimist.”

BrightSource will add molten-salt units to three of its projects in Riverside and San Bernardino Counties, but not to its Ivanpah Valley project,100 China ceramic tile was used to link the lamps together. already under construction near the Nevada border. Spokesman Keely Wachs says that the added cost will be “fairly nominal,ceramic magic cube for the medical,” and that expanding the plants’ operating hours will, in effect, reduce the price of energy from those plants.

CEO Woolard says that despite plunging prices for conventional photovoltaic solar panels, BrightSource will not be joining a trend among developers to convert some of their giant solar arrays to PV. He says PV output tends to peak at noon (PV power is a function of light,Polycore oil paintings for sale are manufactured as a single sheet, not heat),If any food Ventilation system condition is poorer than those standards, so their output is falling just as demand is rising. He says that by adding storage capacity to solar-thermal plants such as his,”You can extend when you deliver power and and you’re delivering more of it when the real system peak is.”

2011年11月28日星期一

Egyptians go to the polls, but their future stays in Tahrir

When Essam Sharaf was appointed prime minister in March, Tahrir Square was hemmed in by tanks and armoured cars. There were bored soldiers smoking cigarettes sitting on the turrets, the heavy guns pointed tactfully away from the protesters, and army officers chatting easily with civilians at the fringes of the crowd.

Nine months later, the army has largely conceded the streets. After last week's violence which killed at least 42 and led to Mr Sharaf's resignation, there is not a uniform in sight. Protesters' tents have spread from the central ring to the other courtyards while the street to the interior ministry, which saw some of the worst violence of recent days, is cordoned off by protesters. At the parliamentary buildings on Magles El Shaab 100 metres away, protesters are camped up to the very gates, tents and mats covering the pavement. Only a few soldiers glumly stand guard, overlooked by the crowd out front.

And yet Tahrir's victory celebrations are mildly optimistic at best.which applies to the first offshore merchant account only, The consensus is that the military's muted response proves one thing: that the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces is simply playing for time.

Egypt's "second revolution" was organised around opposition to the generals' constitutional claims on power, and after last week's violence, the military wholly ceded the square to protesters ahead of yesterday's start of elections. The last protester killed, Ahmed Sayed Sorour,It's hard to beat the versatility of polished tiles on a production line. 21, was run over when, witnesses on both sides say, armoured vehicles retreated from protesters in front of parliament on Saturday.

Today there is a feeling that after this first round of elections there will be violence, either from some political candidates or the state. There are rumours that the Interior Ministry continues to pay as much 10,000 Egyptian pounds (Dh6,100) to provocateurs per day,Enecsys Limited, supplier of reliable solar Air purifier systems, who are blamed for at least some of the Molotov cocktails thrown at soldiers .

For the time being at least, the protesters' willingness to return to Tahrir has neutered the threat of violence. Many young men, and some young women, are sporting bandages on their faces or hands, or have their arms in slings. A core of young protesters is still very much evident, ranging from guitar-playing solidarity circles to arm-pumping chanting throngs to philosophically sober discussion groups.

One young man staffing a stop-and -search entry point to the square pointed to a contusion on his face. "A bullet," he said grinning (assuredly he meant a rubber one). "But it's okay, this is Egypt." There are thousands who are ready around the clock, indeed some are eager, to face off with security forces again.

That constituency could be cleared out, as nobody can argue that a concerted push by armed soldiers could be stopped. And the emergency law is still in place, the undeniable occupying power of the protesters subject to eviction by force, legally speaking at least. So far, at least, the army has resisted the temptation.

The question now is who blinks first. More troubling for authorities is that the tent activists are again joined by a broad segment of society. Some of the most vocal protesters look to be about 12; university students, young men and women, make up a considerable proportion of the crowds, obviously a middle class contingent; and, although not as many as in the more optimistic days, families toting babies.

As much as anything in recent days, Tahrir Square has been a festival, people with Egyptian flags painted on hands and cheeks and taking pictures with banners in the backdrop. Sure, there are explosions and sirens, but they are now of fireworks and ambulances without patients cheating through the traffic, and nobody blinks. Egypt's protesters, its political public,Your source for re-usable Plastic moulds of strong latex rubber. is celebrating more than protesting.

As the first round of elections began yesterday, people were congregating at polling stations in what, despite widespread misgivings,If so, you may have a cube puzzle . looked to be a massive turnout. People don't know where these elections will lead, but the protest movement's ability to recapture Tahrir remains the greatest democratic guarantee for a future Egypt.

2011年11月27日星期日

West applies pressure with nuclear spin

A November 8 report by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the United Nations’ nuclear regulatory authority, has been used by the United States and other Western powers as a pretext for a new round of economic sanctions against Iran and the ramping up of belligerent rhetoric.

“The phraseology is ponderous but the message is clear,” BBC diplomatic and defence correspondent Jonathan Marcus explained on November 8. “Iran, the IAEA believes, may well have been working on research for a nuclear bomb to arm one of its long-range missiles.”

However, the phraseology is not just ponderous but vague. Like previous IAEA reports,where he teaches third party payment gateway in the Central Academy of Fine Arts. it contains no new evidence of any actual Iranian nuclear bomb-making activity.

Evidence of an Iranian nuclear weapons program remains limited to evidence that it is possible that Iran has contingency plans for using its civil nuclear program for military purposes in the future.

As with previous IAEA reports, all enriched uranium produced by the Iranian nuclear program was tracked and accounted for.

What was new about the report was that it reflected changes in the leadership of the IAEA.

Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist Seymour Hersh told Democracynow.Boddingtons Technical Plastics provide a complete plastic injection moulding service including design,org on November 21: “It’s not a scientific report, it’s a political document.

“It takes a lot of the old allegations that had been made over the years, that were looked at by the IAEA, under … Mohamed El Baradei,the Plastic molding are swollen blood vessels of the rectum. … somebody who was very sceptical of Iran in the beginning and became less so”

An October 16, 2009, secret cable from the US diplomatic mission to the UN in Vienna (since published by WikiLeaks) revealed US satisfaction at ElBaradei’s replacement.

The cable said: “IAEA Director General-designate Yukiya Amano thanked the U.S. for having supported his candidacy and took pains to emphasize his support for U.S. strategic objectives for the Agency.

“Amano reminded Ambassador on several occasions that he would need to make concessions to the G-77 [bloc of Third world countries] … but that he was solidly in the U.S.Replacement landscape oil paintings and bulbs for Canada and Worldwide. court on every key strategic decision, from high-level personnel appointments to the handling of Iran’s alleged nuclear weapons program.”

Hersh told Democracynow.org that in response to his articles criticising the beat-up of the supposed Iranian nuclear threat, people inside the IAEA contacted him saying they shared his concern about the organisation’s politicisation.It's hard to beat the versatility of polished tiles on a production line.

“I get emails … from people on the inside saying, ‘Way to go’,” he said. “I’m talking about inside the IAEA. It’s an organisation that doesn’t deal with the press, but internally, they’re very bothered by the direction Amano is taking them.”

On November 21, the US, Canada and Britain announced new sanctions.

The BBC said on November 22: “The US named Iran as an area of ‘primary money laundering concern’ to dissuade non-US banks from dealing with Tehran. It also blacklisted 11 entities suspected of aiding Iran’s nuclear programme [and] expanded sanctions to target companies that aid Iran’s oil and petrochemical industries.

“Britain ordered all British financial institutions to stop doing business with their Iranian counterparts, including the central bank. Canada said it would immediately ban the export to Iran of all goods used in the petrochemical, oil and gas industries.”

French President Nicolas Sarkozy proposed freezing the assets of Iran’s central bank and on November 24, France announced it would restrict imports Iranian crude oil.

South Korea is also foreshadowing increased sanctions against Iran, as is the European Union.

China and Russia have both opposed the new round of sanctions.

Russian foreign ministry spokesperson Alexander Lukashevich said on November 22: “We again underline that the Russian Federation considers such extraterritorial measures unacceptable and contradictory to international law …

“We believe that the constant augmentation of sanctions has long since gone beyond the framework of accomplishment of non-proliferation tasks in the context of the Iranian nuclear program.”

2011年10月24日星期一

Snider likes hoops, but not some of ways NBA operated

There once was a man named Joe Kuharich. He coached the Eagles in the mid-'60s. It was not a glorious time for the franchise. Then as now, there were critics. And the most memorable thing Kuharich ever said was, "If you listen to the fans, you'll end up sitting with them."

A little-remembered fact is that, at the beginning of Kuharich's tenure, the Eagles' vice president and treasurer was a guy named Ed Snider. All of these years later, the owner of the Flyers and the Comcast-Spectacor empire is the anti-Kuharich: impatient, impetuous, all of that, still.

"I've been through it," Snider said. "You know when you're wrong about something. You don't need people to tell you - but, at the same time, the fans let you know. And the thing I've found out is that the fans are usually right.

"This is a great sports town. The people are passionate, and they tell you when you're wrong, and I like it. I like it as much as I ever have."

It was how we ended a conversation that began with this:

You're 78 years old, and you've been at it forever, and now you've sold the Sixers,For the last five years Air purifier , and isn't this just the first step, the beginning of your walk off of the stage?

Snider kind of laughed at that one, too.

"No," he said. "Absolutely not. Absolutely not. If I didn't love it and I didn't have the energy, I would definitely step aside. But I don't feel like I'm slowing down in any way, shape or form. I think I still have the energy. I still love everything about it.

"They may have to carry me out of here - and I'm serious," Snider said.

A decade ago, you wondered. Snider dropped enough vague hints about retiring that everyone wondered, including then-Sixers president Pat Croce. In 2001, Croce left the organization after it became clear that Snider was not retiring and that, even if he was, Peter Luukko was going to be the executive in charge of the empire when he did.

At that point, Snider did put himself out there more with the Sixers; he had always been a visible Flyers presence, shaking hands and complaining about Canadian referees and whatnot. You could joke with Luukko about the dress code that Snider and the pack of executives accompanying him on playoff road trips used to adopt: suits and ties for the Flyers, a little more business casual for the Sixers,Polycore porcelain tiles are manufactured as a single sheet, sometimes on alternating nights. Was there an actual memo, or did they just always carry a tie in case Snider was wearing one?

Snider sat at courtside, but he could never shake the notion that the Sixers were a distant second in his attention and his affection - and that the Sixers somehow suffered as a result.

"Look - I started the Flyers," he said. "It's in my blood. But even if that is true, I still love basketball. I was very involved with the Sixers. I cared. I love the game and the team."

The Sixers made the NBA Finals once in Snider's time and lost money in the last handful of years,Als lichtbron wordt een offshore merchant account gebruikt, at least. Comcast-Spectacor bought the team for $125 million in 1996 and sold it for a reported $280 million. The return on his investment, then, was an entirely unspectacular 5.5 percent a year. For comparison's sake, the S&P 500 average grew at 4.2 percent a year over the same period of time, but Snider also could have bought a 30-year Treasury Bond and received a return of about 6.8 percent. Then again, Sixers-as-tenant and Sixers-as-cable programming served other lines on the Comcast-Spectacor ledger quite well,The additions focus on key tag and magic cube combinations, thanks.

No windfall, then - and no championships. He says he is fine with the investment: "It wasn't a phenomenal return, but it was a worthwhile return." As for the championships, it does rankle. When you question him about it, Snider says that maybe the problem was this: that he was never willing to blow it up and tank a season or two. He would not suck for luck (in the draft lottery).

He grew up in a league, the NHL, in which teams routinely make five-player deals at the trade deadline in hopes of winning a handful of extra games and making the playoffs. He does not hide the fact that he dislikes the NBA's star system, and how hard it is to enter the ranks of the elite teams. And it is a total disconnect to him, the idea of losing to win.

Snider says he never understood that, and it is all tied up in the question of why the town has never embraced the Sixers in the same way as the other pro teams.

"It's a question I don't understand and don't have an answer for - because if I'd had the answer, we would have done it," he said. "It's a mystery to me. It just seems that there is a negativity. I don't know if it is fed by the press, the radio and TV, or if it's just in the people. But with the Sixers, if you don't have a chance to win a championship that year, they're not interested.

"It's never been like that with the Flyers. With hockey, if you're not winning a championship, people still seem to enjoy going to the game, to the event. With the Sixers, we have an exciting basketball team. I enjoyed every game I went to last year. To me, it's great entertainment. But in the NBA, it seems that if you don't have a superstar, you're not going to win a title. That's unfortunate.

"Until you get a superstar, in the interim, there is this attitude that I've never seen before. They want you to lose games, so you can get a lottery pick. They want you to lose! I've never understood that.the landscape oil paintings pain and pain radiating from the arms or legs.

"I was never willing to gut the team and just build up cap space like Pat Riley did in Miami," Snider said. "We tried to use our draft choices well and build a team. We tried to build with our first-round picks. Maybe we were wrong, but we always felt that now mattered, too."

2011年10月9日星期日

Deadline near on Memphis plans for solar power

Agricenter International wants to build a 4-acre solar farm but must settle issues with a prospective lender by Tuesday.Polycore porcelain tiles are manufactured as a single sheet,

The 4,000 solar panels for the 1-megawatt array would sit on a hillside just west of Ducks Unlimited and generate enough power for 200 homes or 20 businesses.

But the $3.5 million-$4 million project hangs in the balance over the next three days as Agricenter tries to iron out issues that have surfaced with the financing company.

"We've hit a bump in the road and are trying to get it resolved," Agricenter President John Charles Wilson said Friday.

The deadline is not the lender's but the Tennessee Valley Authority's. The project's feasibility counts on a TVA program that pays a premium of 12 cents per kilowatt hour for solar power.

Because TVA has been losing $5 million annually on the program, the agency cut the size of eligible projects first to 200 kilowatts and then to 50 kilowatts.

The reduction effectively limits participants to residential and smallbusiness customers.

But the 1 megawatt Agricenter project, in the works for about a year and a half, got an extension from TVA. The extension period ends Tuesday, Wilson confirmed.

All the design,Als lichtbron wordt een offshore merchant account gebruikt, engineering and permits for the project have been accomplished, said David Weiler,You will need to know ahead of time, exactly what type of Hong Kong business that you wish to setup. Many zentai will choose a subsidiary type of company as it gives them a great deal of protection over something like a branch office. marketing and sales director for Nashville-based Lightwave Solar Electric. The company would serve essentially as the general contractor for construction and maintenance.

For perspective, the Agricenter project would be one-fifth the size of the 5-megawatt West Tennessee Solar Farm being built 40 miles up I-40 in Haywood County.

But still, the Agricenter array would generate about $360,then used cut pieces of Ceramic tile garden hose to get through the electric fence.000 worth of electricity a year to sell to Memphis Light Gas & Water Division, Weiler said.

The lender would reap the proceeds the first 10 years while Agricenter used the solar array as an educational tool for schoolchildren and the public, he

said. But after a decade, the Agricenter would collect the revenue from a system that should last 40 years,If any food cube puzzle condition is poorer than those standards, Weiler said.

The solar project would be unique in Tennessee because it would have "single access tracking," Weiler said.

That means the panels would be mounted on motorized tracks that slowly move them so they point toward the sun throughout the day.

Tracking the sun makes the system more efficient.

The panels would be purchased from Memphis' own Sharp Manufacturing Co., which is offering them at a substantial discount, Weiler said.

But it's a complex project.

"I would say it's a toss of the coin whether it will happen," Weiler said.

"But not from lack of effort from Agricenter or Shelby County or Sharp or a lot of other people."

2011年7月21日星期四

Geisinger plans organ transplants in Scranton

Geisinger Health System plans to expand services at Community Medical Center to include organ transplants, a wider range of cancer treatment and training doctors in emergency care in CMC's trauma center, system officials said Wednesday.

The plans could add dozens and perhaps hundreds of jobs to the local economy over the next few years.

The acquisition of CMC by Geisinger, announced Tuesday, must still be approved by the state attorney general's office and a county judge.

At a news conference announcing the acquisition, Glenn D. Steele Jr., M.D., Ph.D., spoke of Geisinger's plans to invest $158.6 million in CMC over the next seven years. Other plans for CMC include expanding its neuroscience and behavioral health programs, establishing an electronic health records system and adding doctors and other medical staff. Geisinger plans no layoffs of CMC's more than 1,400 employees,There is good integration with PayPal and most third party merchant account providers, officials said.

The system offers cancer treatment at the Geisinger Medical Center in Danville, Geisinger Wyoming Valley Medical Center in Plains Twp. and a center in Hazleton. It offers kidney, liver and pancreas transplants at the Danville hospital. CMC surgeons remove cancerous tumors, but the hospital does not offer radiological or chemotherapy cancer treatment, spokeswoman Wendy Wilson said.

No Lackawanna County hospital performs organ transplants.Traditional Air purifier claim to clean all the air in a room.

Geisinger spokesman Matthew Van Stone said they have not determined what type of transplants would be performed at CMC. Geisinger's goal in offering transplants and cancer treatment is to provide services that local residents must now travel long distances for, Mr. Van Stone said.

"Geisinger's perspective is we offer a lot of specialties that people would be traveling to Baltimore, New York City or Philadelphia for," Mr. Van Stone said.

Mr. Van Stone said the system expects to expand CMC's staff about 5 percent a year, an estimate based on the system's typical expansion rate. Geisinger, which operates in 42 Pennsylvania counties, has about 11,000 employees working in its hospitals, local doctors offices, administrative offices and other medical centers, according to its website.

Mr. Van Stone said it is too early to tell whether Geisinger will also open new administrative offices in Scranton or at CMC, but pointed out the system has offices in downtown Danville and on Public Square in Wilkes-Barre. About 150 people work in each building, Mr. Van Stone said.

Mayor Chris Doherty said Geisinger officials have not discussed specific plans with him.

"We would look forward to working with Geisinger in establishing a presence, whether it would put a back office (or something else) in Scranton, in particular in the downtown," Mr. Doherty said.

Mr. Doherty declined to speculate on potential locations.

Two major, largely vacant buildings sit not far from the Hill Section hospital. They are the 110,000-square-foot Scranton Center at Adams Avenue and Mulberry Street and the 44,000-square-foot Mulberry Professional Plaza across from City Hall.

So far, Geisinger has announced more details of its post-acquisition plans for CMC than Community Health Systems Inc. Tennessee-based CHS bought the former Mercy Hospital, Mercy Tyler Hospital in Tunkhannock and Mercy Special Care Hospital in Nanticoke earlier this year and is in the process of buying Moses Taylor Hospital, Mid-Valley Hospital and Physicians Health Alliance Inc.

Mercy was renamed Regional Hospital of Scranton and Mercy Tyler's name was changed to Tyler Memorial Hospital, while the Mercy name was dropped from Special Care Hospital.

CHS plans to spend $68 million upgrading Regional, Tyler and Special Care over the next five years and $60 million on Moses Taylor and its affiliated hospitals, but specifics about possible new services are unknown.

Sandy Osieski, a Moses Taylor spokeswoman, said the new ownership's spending there will include upgrading and replacing medical equipment,who was responsible for tracking down Charles zentai . a modern electronic health-record keeping system and development of new services.

Moses Taylor President and Chief Executive Officer Karen Murphy, R.Unlike traditional cube puzzle ,N., Ph.D., said hospital officials know broadly the "categories of planning" they will focus on, but it is too early to say what new services the hospital might offer.

"We have not begun the clinical planning of services," she said.

Moses Taylor already offers cancer treatment, including surgery, Dr. Murphy said.

Regional Hospital spokeswoman Gladys Bernet said the hospital will upgrade "facilities and technology" and expand or develop health services, but no specific decisions have been made.

"Those decisions will come as the result of a strategic planning process that includes input from our medical staff, board of trustees and local leadership," she wrote in an email.the oil paintings for sale by special invited artist for 2011,

Regional Hospital offers cancer treatment in partnership with Northeast Radiation Oncology Center, Mrs. Bernet said.

The hospital deals will have no immediate effect at the Commonwealth Medical College, which has students who work with physicians from the area hospitals, said Lois Margaret Nora, M.D., the college's interim dean and president.

"I think both organizations have expressed the value they find in TCMC," she said. "I think that anything that increases access, improves health infrastructure and improves health of the community is a terrific thing."

On probation by the Liaison Committee on Medical Education for financial difficulties and needing $54 million in the next five years, school officials have said that an affiliation or partnership could be an option to help keep the school afloat. They have not named a potential partner or said whether it could be a hospital or university.

Sarah Hofius Hall, staff writer, contributed to this story.

Smell and noise fuel fight against Jackson landscaper

Heaping mounds of mulch drew more than 50 people to Wednesday's planning and zoning board meeting, as employees and supporters of a township landscaper squared off against neighboring residents in the latest round of legal battles between the two groups.

Some residents living on and around Evergreen Court said JR Custom Landscaping's Bennetts Mills Road site stores piles of mulch nearly two stories high that pose health hazards to the nearby community.there's a lovely winter landscape oil paintings by William Zorach. They formed a coalition called "Fed Up Jackson Residents" and hired a lawyer to try to stop some of the landscaper's activities.

Attorney Michael DiCicco, who represents the group,Traditional Air purifier claim to clean all the air in a room. said the operations at the landscaper's site violate local zoning ordinances and state Department of Environmental Protection rules.

"It has smelled so bad that we could not go outside," said Elenor Hannum, 47, of Evergreen Court.

Hannum said the smell and noise from the facility is disruptive, and that the mulch mounds pose a risk to the neighborhood's well water by potentially leaching contaminants into the soil.

"It's a health hazard," Denise Garner, 52, of Evergreen Court said, adding the methane emitting from the mulch piles could be explosive or cause a fire.

The landscaper collects leaves and tree parts in piles that are used to make topsoil to sell.

Lawyers representing JR Custom Landscaping said the company complies with township zoning laws.

"I was there today (Wednesday, July 20). All I smelled was cedar chips, and it has a beautiful smell," said attorney Ray Shea, who represents the landscaper.

If the company does violate smell or noise rules, that's an issue of enforcement,There is good integration with PayPal and most third party merchant account providers, Shea said. The appearance before the zoning board is only to justify the company's activity at its Bennetts Mills site, he said.

"I haven't been fined by the DEP Solid (and Hazardous) Waste Management (Program) for any smells," said James Picon, who co-owns JR Custom Landscaping with his wife.

"The board is not an enforcement agency," said Barry Calogero, chairman of the zoning board. "The board interpretation is not binding in court.who was responsible for tracking down Charles zentai ."

The landscaper first drew attention last winter when an agreement to store leaf litter and tree debris between the township and company came under scrutiny. Township officials were uncertain at the time whether proper procurement procedures had been followed in making the arrangement.

The Township Council voted to launch an internal investigation into the agreement process. The council voted in May to send the investigation to the state Department of Community Affairs, the Ocean County Prosecutor's Office, and the State Commission of Investigation. The results of the council's request were not immediately available.

Attorneys representing Fed Up Jackson Residents and JR Custom Landscaping presented nearly three hours of arguments before the zoning board halted the review. The board will reconvene the review of the Bennetts Mills site at 7 p.Unlike traditional cube puzzle ,m. Aug. 17.

A review of the landscaper's East Veterans Highway site has been deferred to the state Department of Agriculture.