New law provides Realtors an edge
A new state law backed by Realtors that critics say stifles cut-rate competition already has prompted a discount brokerage, California-based HomeYeah!, to shutter its operations here.
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A new state law backed by Realtors that critics say stifles cut-rate competition already has prompted a discount brokerage, California-based HomeYeah!, to shutter its operations here.
The view from John Pelizzari’s 14th-floor office in downtown’s Capital Center is a good one. The recently hired president and CEO of Cincinnati-based Fifth Third Bancorp’s central Indiana operations can see the rooftops of many of downtown’s landmarks. And he likes it that way. He’s used to the view from the top. From 2001 to 2005, Pelizzari, 50, captained the ship for Fifth Third’s northern Michigan affiliate, which enjoyed a whopping 28-percent market share, more than 10 percentage points higher…
Fifty years ago, economist Charles Tiebout expressed a vision of how freeing local governments to pursue their own unique strategies for setting taxes and providing services could produce an efficient outcome much like the private marketplace. He called it “voting with your feet.” The idea was simple-by moving, people could sort themselves out and live in communities that came closest to providing the tax and expenditure combinations they valued most. Reality is quite a bit more complicated. When people move…
The “hot spots” that drive wirelessfidelity access-better known as WiFi-might be in for a cool-down. WiFi enables Internet users to log on without a wire connection, as long as they are in a hot-spot area. The sites have become so common that the number worldwide surpassed the 100,000 mark earlier this year, according to JiWire, a Web-based hotspot information provider. Thousands of businesses, universities and municipalities have invested in the technology. But wireless phone companies are challenging the technology with…
What little some people see of active railroads these days is when they catch a glimpse of Indiana Rail Road Co.’s Ferrari-red engines pulling hopper cars from downstate coal mines up to Indianapolis Power & Light’s Harding Street generating station, south of town. “People feel like railroads are a dying industry,” said Thomas Hoback, founder and CEO of Indiana Rail Road, the 20-yearold freight concern based in Indianapolis. Looks can be as deceiving as the speed of a locomotive approaching…
What a great Independence Day weekend. Like many businesses, IBJ Corp. took both Monday and Tuesday off for a midsummer break. The four-day weekend squeezed our deadlines a bit, but we happily paid the price. After a strong first half of the year, we deserved the break, and I don’t think we missed much by not being here. On Wednesday morning, it was as if all the July 4 fireworks blew the humidity out of the atmosphere. We woke up…
Lauth Property Group soon will break ground on Brownsburg Station, a massive retail complex that will be one of the largest in the Indianapolis area. The Brownsburg property, which will be roughly 500,000 square feet and sit on almost 70 acres, will take advantage of the west side’s rapidly growing suburbs. The project received preliminary approval from the town of Brownsburg in late June and needs only to clear a few minor hurdles before building can begin. Tenants could move…
Although I consider myself a reasonably intelligent individual, there are some things I don’t understand, like why there’s Braille at drive-through ATMs, why some bookmarks cost $1 (it would be easier to use the dollar), and why we have most sex-offender laws. There are numerous sex-offender laws going into effect July 1 in Indiana. Some make sense, like lifetime probation for sexually violent persons that can be revoked should an offender commit another offense. There are some, like Marion County’s…
National Wine and Spirits Inc., Indianapolis’ eighthlargest private company, in early June sued accounting giant Ernst & Young, charging “fraud and deception.” But don’t expect to peek into the court file to get the juicy details. Marion Superior Court Judge S.K. Reid on June 20 granted National Wine’s motion to seal the complaint. Court filings suggest the liquor distributor filed the motion at the behest of E&Y-which argued that because the dispute arose out of arbitration, and that process is…
In development circles, the color green is often associated with money. But it has a different connotation for Indianapolis-based Williams Creek Consulting-an environmental one. Launched in 2002, the firm aims to help developers minimize disruptions to the natural features of a construction site, co-founder Neil Myers said. It specializes in strategies to manage stormwater runoff. “We improve a project by integrating the building into the natural environment,” Myers said. That means doing more than digging a series of retention ponds…
The Indianapolis Colts in early July will unleash its most aggressive marketing campaign ever-even though demand for tickets, club seats and corporate suites at its RCA Dome home exceeds supply. The push is all about the future. Billboards around the state will proclaim that those who want to see games in Lucas Oil Stadium when it opens in 2008 “better not wait until the dust settles,” said Tom Zupancic, Colts senior vice president of sales and marketing. Some radio, television…
The lesson Amy Kurzekwa taught the folks at the downtown Gregory & Appel Insurance agency reaches far beyond what they learned about premiums and deductibles. Since 1992, she has taken the bus to her job there as a clerical assistant, performing such tasks as sorting and delivering the office mail and filling the copy machines. While most anyone can do that, Kurzekwa, 37, is irreplaceable to her co-workers. Her role in opening their eyes to the fact that people with…
PROFILE RYAN MCCORMICK Laughter proves best medicine for cancer survivor When local companies need hazardous materials removed, Ryan McCormick hopes they call Active Environmental Ser vices, an environmental services company based in College Park. McCormick, a part-time comic, has been the sales and marketing manager for the Indianapolis-based company about three months. But two years ago, McCormick faced his own personal hazard when he was diagnosed with non-Hodgkins lymphoma, a form of cancer that attacks the body’s lymphatic system. He…
GREENSBURG-Companies from Cincinnati to Indianapolis hoping to drive home business from Honda Motor Co.’s 2,000-employee plant might want to watch for an economic pothole hiding up the road. Giant auto plants plopped onto the prairie, while buying hundreds of millions of dollars in goods and services from companies in the state, also tend to swallow workers from established employers. That likely will force some Indiana employers to jack up wages and benefits to retain and attract workers pining to wear…
God, she’s cute: Your little Paula or Patti or Pammy. Sitting there on the swing set, rocking back and forth, back and forth, her brunette locks blowing in the breeze. You watch her on the merry-go-round, spinning faster and faster. Watch her on the jungle gym, climbing higher and higher. Watch her and her little friend Annie or Jenny or Missy walking toward the trail into the woods. And you know you aren’t the only one watching. You know he’s…
A small Indiana firm is looking to become a big player in the emerging radio-frequency-identification market. Carmel-based BlueBean LLC is one of a small but growing number of firms nationally that provide consulting services to companies trying to set up systems using radio frequency identification-commonly called RFID-tags and readers. BlueBean in April acquired Mishawakabased www.rfidsupplychain.com, which sells RFID hardware and software online. The acquisition also provided BlueBean rights to a bevy of other domain names, including www.rfidhealthcare.com, www.rfidpharma.comand www.rfidfood.com. The…
The walls of Turae Dabney’s office at the Indianapolis Black Chamber of Commerce are covered in easel paper scribbled with enough notes to make an anal-retentive person dizzy. Though garbled to visitors, the pages hold the key to her vision for the organization she assumed leadership of as executive director earlier this year. “I do better if I visualize it,” she said. “It looks like a mess, but I know exactly what everything means.” The message she is sending to…
Indianapolis Public Schools is sitting on a 12-acre parcel of prime downtown land it probably could sell for big bucks. But its pursuit of a land swap instead has tempered interest in the site and raised questions about whether such a complicated deal is the way to go. Just three developers responded to IPS’ request for bids on its land east of Massachusetts and College avenues, despite the unsolicited inquiries that drove the school district to explore its options in…
For my midyear column, I’ve decided to run Warren Buffett’s discussion of Benjamin Graham’s classic allegory on the stock market called “Mr. Market.” Note that Buffett wrote the words below soon after the 1987 market crash. “Whenever Charlie [Munger] and I buy common stocks … we approach the transaction as if we were buying into a private business. We look at the economic prospects of the business, the people in charge of running it, and the price we must pay….
The Summer Celebration schedule appears in our Diversity in Business Focus. PAGES 15A-19A The title of Indiana Black Expo Inc.’s 2005 annual report couldn’t be more fitting: “Con tinuing the Legacy.” It’s an apt description for both the organization’s recent history and its goals for the future. As Black Expo prepares to kick off its second Summer Celebration without its longtime leader, Rev. Charles Williams, CEO Joyce Q. Rogers is abuzz with ideas to make the nation’s largest black heritage…