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EYE ON THE PIE: The trouble with inexpensive housing

From 2000 to 2004, the U.S. Census Bureau tells us, there were 148,500 housing units added in Indiana. That’s a 5.8-percent rate of growth (16th in the country), exceeding the national rate of 5.3 percent. During the same period, Indiana added 134,600 people, a 2.2-percent increase (33rd in the country) and just more than half the 4.1-percent national rate. For every person we added, we built 1.1 housing units, the 10th-highest rate in the nation. What’s going on? To get…

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Hotel art adds more than ambiance: Local gallery offers work from Picasso to Perrin for sale at Conrad Indianapolis

An international crowd in for the Formula One race milled through a sold-out Conrad Indianapolis downtown on a recent weekend. As they jutted off to their spa appointments and dinner reservations, some may have spared a glance at artwork that sprinkles the walls of the first and mezzanine floor-an interesting mix of modern art from the likes of Pablo Picasso to Indianapolis artist Lois Main Templeton. The collection of 18 pieces was selected under an agreement between the hotel and…

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Australian-born luxury ‘healing’ spa opens in Conrad: Spa Chakra touts healthy benefits of its treatments

A world-renowned, high-end luxury spa that originated in Australia and partners with a Parisian skin-care and fragrance company has chosen Indianapolis for its second U.S. facility. Spa Chakra, which uses Guerlain SA products exclusively, opened in the new Conrad Indianapolis Hotel in May. There are 16 Spa Chakra locations worldwide, but only one other in the United States-in Portland, Ore. Locations are expected to open in Bal Harbour, Fla., later this year and in Washington, D.C., in 2007. The spa,…

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VIEWPOINT: Consumers should take charge of health

In an environment where we’re all being asked to pay a larger share of our own health care costs, it’s interesting to see how little time we spend thinking about major decisions that have an impact on our health. Like selecting a primary care physician or any medical specialist, for example. According to a recent Managed Care Weekly Digest survey, 67 percent of U.S. adults ages 18-64 said they spent eight hours or more researching an automobile purchase, yet only…

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Westview soldiers on amid health care explosion: Hospital fares well against larger, newer competition

A touch-screen directory, a grove of potted trees and a muffin-bearing kiosk greet visitors entering the six-story atrium at the new Clarian North Medical Center in Carmel. A much milder scene awaits people walking into Westview Hospital a few miles away, on the west side of Indianapolis. There, a lonely player piano spills soft tunes into a one-story lobby filled with clusters of chairs and pamphlets on volunteering. “Quiet! Healing in Progress” reads a nearby sign. Indiana’s lone osteopathic hospital…

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Williams Creek Consulting Inc.: Consultants engineer ‘green’ solutions After years of taking any work it could find, company specializes in stormwater issues

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…

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PROFILE: RYAN MCCORMICK: Laughter proves best medicine for cancer survivor

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…

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Patient safety center steers clear of the blame game: New approach modeled after aviation industry

Indiana hospitals are drawing inspiration from the aviation industry for their latest push to reduce medical errors. The Indiana Patient Safety Center, which opened July 1, will foster a blamefree approach to reporting errors, much like the environment promoted by the Federal Aviation Administration. The result will be a culture that encourages system analysis to fix flaws that lead to an error, rather than one that merely heaps blame on the person who committed it, said Bob Morr, vice president…

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INVESTING: Time to ditch widely touted-but wrong-investing rules

We love a good conspiracy in America. The FBI just spent millions of dollars looking for Jimmy Hoffa again, and again came up empty. We’ll be talking about who killed JFK until our grandkids are gone. Today, I am going to start a new one, and when you read this you are going to want your finance professor’s head on a platter. There is a conspiracy to keep you from making money. I can’t pinpoint the exact beginning of the…

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Indianapolis marketing firm plays ‘game’ to win: Fun environment helps CIK Enterprises earn reputation as a ‘best’ place to work, inspires employees to give their all

Business is often compared to a game. There are winners and losers, MVPs and benchwarmers, touchdowns and penalties. Only the strong survive. The leaders at Indianapolis-based CIK Enterprises LLC take the competition seriously. But they don’t see why it can’t be fun, too. CIK’s 30,000-square-foot Georgetown Road office, known as “the stadium,” features green, blue and orange walls, some of which are rounded. Huge puzzle pieces listing company goals decorate the spacious atrium. A life-size Monopoly board displays monumental moments…

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Employee privacy a sensitive legal issue:

For all businesses, especially small companies, the best way to approach potential legal issues is proactively: spending time crafting policies and procedures today can save significant headaches-and attorney fees-down the road. This is especially true for the thorny issue of privacy in the workplace. While the right to privacy isn’t enumerated specifically in the Constitution, it remains a closely guarded prerogative for most Americans. Harris polls consistently show that more than 85 percent of respondents are concerned about the erosion…

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NOTIONS: Gore’s film has lessons we should heed

Last Friday night, my friend Cheri and I decided to go out to dinner and a movie. The film we chose wasn’t playing near our downtown home. So we had to get in the car and drive 14 miles northwest to Traders Point. As we sat outside at Abuelo’s eating and talking, we watched hundreds of cars, trucks and SUVs pass by on 86th Street. This led to a conversation about the environment and the need for mass transit in…

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Ex-Chamber chief buys Daleville testing firm: Deal gives LaMothe one-third ownership, CEO post

Now, he’s an owner himself. This month, he teamed with two prominent executives to buy Dalevillebased Sherry Laboratories, a 180-employee company that does product testing for firms in such fields as aerospace and automotive. “I’ve been interested in Sherry for about 10 years,” LaMothe said. “I had approached them two or three different times … . I was intrigued with the company because I believed it was needed and necessary and adds value to society.” LaMothe will serve as chairman…

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Site gets people involved: Institute uses Web to link volunteers with opportunities

When Roger Williams began approaching local not-for-profits early this year about his idea to post their volunteer opportunities for teen-agers on his Web site, many were skeptical. “What’s this guy trying to sell me?” they wondered. But six months after launching www.helpindyonline.com, part of his larger Emergent Leadership Institute, Williams has more than 80 charities promoting nearly 300 positions on his site for high school and college students interested in volunteering. The 36-year-old Carmel native and former youth pastor founded…

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Regional partnerships called key to making it: Purdue urges state manufacturers to join supply chain

Growing global competition is bringing local manufacturers together. And the definition of local is changing from around the corner to within 500 miles. Officials from Purdue University have conducted a series of manufacturing summits encouraging Indiana plants to tear down their separatist walls and become an integrated part of regional supply chains. “Supplier-based manufacturing is based on long-term relationships in a 500-mile radius, so we need to think about Indiana manufacturing regionally,” said John Sullivan, director of Purdue’s Center for…

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RETURN ON TECHNOLOGY: How much freedom is enough? Or too much?

Jams Surowiecki (en.wikipedia.org/ wiki/The_Wisdom_ of_Crowds) would like you to look deeply into your business soul and choose between chaos and high walls. For that matter, so would I. It’s a decision worth thinking about. The right choice could remake your enterprise. The wrong one could, too. Surowiecki is just one of several thinkers pondering whether organizations do better with top-down plans, processes and hierarchies, or with loose controls and chaotic creativity. His book, “The Wisdom of Crowds,” maintains that large…

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“No habla ingles”: Immigrants who want to advance find many programs to help them learn English

No habla inglesImmigrants who want to advance find many programs to help them learn English Osvaldo Escobedo was hungry to learn English. It was bad enough when he couldn’t advance at the Nissan Motor Co. plant in Aguascalientes, in central Mexico, because he couldn’t converse in the business language of English. Later, when he came to the United States, he couldn’t eat much more than what he could pronounce. “When I go to restaurant, I ask [for] ‘coffee and doughnuts….

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PROFILE DAVE BROWN: Passion for history, people drives manager’s hobby

Instead, Brown transforms himself from a 21st century theater director for the IMAX 3D Theater at White River State Park into a 19th century Civil War soldier as a re-enactor with Indianapolis-based Mid States Living History Association Inc. Brown’s interest in the past began as a child. He was fascinated with older people in his small town of Hagerstown, Ind. “I would sit at the old soda fountain in the drugstore and talk to old folks about their lives and…

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School founder traveled challenging road: Before starting Montessori Academy, Cain overcame loss of parents, dyslexia to earn engineering degree, MBA

Vivian Cain founded the Montessori Academy of Indianapolis five years ago, but for most of her life, she’s been a walking billboard for people striving to overcome obstacles. Cain, 36, operates the private school on the northwest side of Indianapolis. The academy, which Cain started with $40,000 of her personal savings, has grown to 100 students and could expand to include a second location. “When we first started, I opened and closed, and cleaned and cooked,” said Cain, who serves…

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Hazmat conference to stress preparation: Topics include corporate readiness, Katrina lessons

Organizers of the Indiana Hazardous Materials & Environmental Safety Conference are hoping Hurricane Katrina’s demonstration of mass destruction will be a wake-up call for businesses and communities ill prepared for disaster. Corporate participation in the 18-year-old conference has waned a bit in recent years as hazardous and safety planning became more standardized. Some companies have become too detached after outsourcing their emergency preparation to consultants, said Stephen Nash, chairman of the Indiana Forum for Environmental Safety, which sponsors the June…

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