In August, a subcontractor working for a contractor who was supposed to perform renovations instead gutted the interior and sold the fixtures for scrap.

VENICE - A historic apartment building on the island of Venice that seemed destined for the wrecking ball is instead headed on a course toward renovation and revival.

When completed, the building should look like it did in 1926, said Ernest Ritz, owner of Ritz Construction Corp. in Sarasota whom the owner hired to perform the extensive makeover.

The Rose Hill East Apartments, 504 Armada Road South, is one of several residential buildings in a historic district within walking distance of downtown. The renowned town planner John Nolen specifically designated the area for apartments that could be rented by the city's working population a crucial component of his vision to make Venice a diverse, walkable town.

We still need these apartments for the workforce here, James Hagler, the city's historical resources director, said.

In August, Glen Jones father of the property owner, Tracy de Chevron Villette appeared before the city's Architectural Review Board to seek a demolition permit for the building.

Without permission, a subcontractor working for a contractor who was supposed to perform renovations, instead gutted the interior and sold the fixtures for scrap.

When he sought the demolition permit, Jones presumed the Mediterranean Revival structure had no historical significance.

Expressing doubts, the review board immediately summoned Hagler.

Hagler explained that Rose Hill East, which The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers hired M.G. Worrell of Tampa to build, is of historical significance because of the John Nolen connection.

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Historic Venice apartment building to be restored

The long-awaited Penfield is officially open.

St. Paul leaders gathered Thursday morning for a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the downtown apartment building at Robert and Tenth streets.

Envisioned nearly a decade ago as a luxury condo high-rise that would change the St. Paul skyline, the Penfield project was scaled back over the years to fit market trends.

What got built was a $62 million, block-long building that stands six stories tall and features 254 apartments. The project also includes a parking garage and a Lunds grocery that will open May 15. Construction took about two years.

"The Penfield is another example of downtown's development momentum," Saint Paul Mayor Chris Coleman said at Thursday opening. He noted a number of nearby projects in the works, from the Lowertown Ballpark to the Central Corridor that will begin running in June.

"We have a lot to look forward to celebrating this year," he said.

The Penfield has gone through various designs since its inception.

Plans in 2005 called for a $117 million, 40-story glass-and-steel tower of condominiums and townhomes. Other proposals since had included a hotel and a shortened tower at 30 stories. A development partnership, Alatus and Sherman Rutzick & Associates, backed out when the housing market collapsed during the recession.

The city stepped in and served as the developer itself, having recently developed the five-story Lofts at Farmers Market, a 56-unit luxury rental building in Lowertown that opened in 2012.

The city approved a tax-increment financing district for the building, which will recycle $15 million -- 25 years of property taxes generated by the site -- back into project development. It will be owned by the Saint Paul Housing and Redevelopment Authority and managed and marketed by Village Green Residential Properties.

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St. Paul celebrates Penfield opening; Lunds' first day is May 15

AUSTRALIA'S building industry has slumped back into contraction following a fall in new orders.

The Australian Industry Group's Performance of Construction index dropped 2.6 points to 48.2 in January, indicating the building sector is contracting.

A reading below 50 points shows the sector is contracting; above indicates expansion.

It dints hope that the industry was on a rebound after strong growth in house building propelled the broader construction sector into its third consecutive month of expansion in December following several years of decline.

Driving the fall was a decline in new orders (down 6.6 points to 47.7), a steeper fall in employment (45.1) and a continued reduction in deliveries from suppliers (49.0), Ai Group says.

Ai Group public policy director Peter Burn said the reading casts doubt over possibilities of a recovery in the construction sector.

"Its performance in the next few months will be critical in determining whether there is a consolidation of the gains of late last year or a resumption of the weakness that has characterised the residential and commercial construction slump in the past couple of years," he said.

House building was the strongest sub-sector, at 57.5, but its rate of expansion had moderated in line with slower growth in new orders in January.

Engineering construction recovered from the drop reported in December, while apartment building contracted

sharply and commercial construction slipped from the slight expansion recorded in December.

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Aussie building industry slumps

Business Property

A decline in new orders, steep fall in employment and drop in delivers from suppliers led to the slow down in the building industry. Photo: Tamara Voninski

The Australian Industry Group's Performance of Construction index dropped 2.6 points to 48.2 in January, indicating the building sector is contracting.

A reading below 50 points shows the sector is contracting; above indicates expansion.

It dints hope that the industry was on a rebound after strong growth in house building propelled the broader construction sector into its third consecutive month of expansion in December following several years of decline.

Driving the fall was a decline in new orders (down 6.6 points to 47.7), a steeper fall in employment (45.1) and a continued reduction in deliveries from suppliers (49.0), Ai Group says.

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Ai Group public policy director Peter Burn said the reading casts doubt over possibilities of a recovery in the construction sector.

"Its performance in the next few months will be critical in determining whether there is a consolidation of the gains of late last year or a resumption of the weakness that has characterised the residential and commercial construction slump in the past couple of years," he said.

House building was the strongest sub-sector, at 57.5, but its rate of expansion had moderated in line with slower growth in new orders in January.

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Aussie construction slows

Australia's building industry has slumped back into contraction following a fall in new orders.

The Australian Industry Group's Performance of Construction index dropped 2.6 points to 48.2 in January, indicating the building sector is contracting.

A reading below 50 points shows the sector is contracting; above indicates expansion.

It dints hope that the industry was on a rebound after strong growth in house building propelled the broader construction sector into its third consecutive month of expansion in December following several years of decline.

Driving the fall was a decline in new orders (down 6.6 points to 47.7), a steeper fall in employment (45.1) and a continued reduction in deliveries from suppliers (49.0), Ai Group says.

Ai Group public policy director Peter Burn said the reading casts doubt over possibilities of a recovery in the construction sector.

'Its performance in the next few months will be critical in determining whether there is a consolidation of the gains of late last year or a resumption of the weakness that has characterised the residential and commercial construction slump in the past couple of years,' he said.

House building was the strongest sub-sector, at 57.5, but its rate of expansion had moderated in line with slower growth in new orders in January.

Engineering construction recovered from the drop reported in December, while apartment building contracted sharply and commercial construction slipped from the slight expansion recorded in December.

Housing Industry Association senior economist Shane Garrett said new dwelling construction was needed to prop up the economy as mining slows.

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Aust building industry slumps

Syracuse, N.Y. Hotelier Norm Swanson is planning to build a five-story, 100-unit apartment building next to his Hotel Skyler on University Hill.

Skyler Commons will be built on what is currently a parking lot at 908 Harrison St., just east of the 58-room Hotel Skyler.

Swanson said he expects to begin construction in July. The apartments, which all will be one-bedroom units, will be available for lease early in the spring of 2015, he said.

The building will be clad in fiber cement panels with the main facades featuring projecting bays in vertical bands. The main entrance will feature a black metal roof matching the roof over the courtyard area attached to the Hotel Skyler next door.

Swanson expects many of the building's tenants to be Syracuse University students and people who work on University Hill. Monthly rents will be about $1,100, including all utilities and wireless Internet service, he said.

The property will have 55 parking spaces, including 30 in a basement garage. Swanson has applied to the city for zoning variances related to required parking, maximum height, density, and front and side yard setbacks.

Swanson opened the Hotel Skyler in 2011 in a building that was built in 1921 as Temple Adath Yeshurun and later served as the home of Salt City Theatre. It is the only hotel in Syracuse that meets the U.S. Green Building Council's Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design platinum standards.

The hotel, which is named after his grandson, is Swanson's third in Syracuse. The other two are the Genesee Grande and the Parkview Hotel, both on East Genesee Street.

Contact Rick Moriarty at rmoriarty@syracuse.com or (315) 470-3148. Follow him on Twitter @RickMoriartyCNY and on Facebook at rick.moriarty.92.

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100-unit apartment building planned next to Syracuse's Hotel Skyler

The promise of a snowstorm and more cold was good news for Dave Ruhland and the wavy-haired Iceman he made by freezing about 50 water balloons around 3,000 ice cubes in a stacked rainbow of yellow, orange and green.

The burst of sherbet color on the front lawn of his apartment building on a drab but busy stretch of Sheridan Drive in the Town of Tonawanda has had people slowing down as they pass and sometimes even pulling over to pose for pictures beside it.

I try to brighten up the gloomy day as best I can, Ruhland said.

While Ruhland makes his living in construction, painting and rehabbing apartments, for the last few winters, he has made a hobby of building icemen at 2719 Sheridan. His pastime part art sculpture, part ice construction experiment has changed his take on winter.

While lots of people are sick of the cold and snow, hes eager for todays promised snowstorm and another crack at icy art.

I was probably the only one who was like, Please stay colder longer, he admitted Tuesday as he surveyed his work on the snowy lawn. The adrenaline gets going ... Before you know it, it doesnt even bother you.

Ruhland had not yet started to mend his Iceman 4, which was partially worn out by the weekends warm weather. After the 40-degree temperatures, only one side of his ice skin was intact.

Half of its ice-cube skeleton was exposed in appetizing layers of yellow, orangey-red and greenish-blue, like a tall snow cone of many flavors.

Its a pretty cool view, he said. Thats part of the fun, seeing how he melts.

It had taken a week and a half of painstaking work for him to build this 7-foot-tall man.

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Iceman sculpture balloons into hobby

Residents 'could run Bradford's Gatehaus building'

6:30am Tuesday 4th February 2014 in News By Rob Lowson, T&A Reporter

Leaseholders in a rotting Bradford apartment block say they will bid to take over the running of the building if problems with the existing managers cannot be resolved.

Members of the Gatehaus Owners Association (GOA), who own or lease flats in the 22 million Little Germany development, are considering a right to manage proposal to take over responsibility from the propertys managing agents, Braemar Estates, whose directors paid a visit to the Leeds Road apartments yesterday.

As exclusively reported in yesterdays Telegraph & Argus, GOA members had contacted Braemar Estates to say they were not satisfied with the way the Gatehaus was being managed, highlighting health and safety issues and a general state of disrepair within the building.

This claim was disputed by the firm, which said the building had inherent construction problems and a chronic service charge deficit.

But Jamil Ashraf, a spokesman for the GOA, said: It is their responsibility to chase any outstanding service charges, but we dont believe that to be case for our members. We have asked for this information so we can chase up any of our members who are in arrears and help the process along.

After nearly two years of frustration, it is difficult to offer support when you dont see anything being done and see the building deteriorate even further. These problems need to be resolved, and this work needs to be done.

Mr Ashraf said GOA members were looking at the right-to-manage process and become responsible for making management decisions.

In response, Braemar Estates managing director Neil Roberts, said: We believe that they may well face the same challenges of prioritising repairs, arranging contracts and securing sufficient funding from all leaseholders.

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Residents 'could run Bradford's Gatehaus building'

CARLSBAD A fee proposed for developers who want to build apartment complexes in Carlsbad is being called excessive, punitive and something that wont accomplish the citys goal of making housing more affordable for the working class.

Carlsbad officials say the fee, which would be higher than what most other cities in the region charge, is necessary to help subsidize enough low-income apartments to meet a sharply growing need for such housing.

The fee would increase the cost of building a typical apartment complex by somewhere around 10 percent, depending on the price of land adding hundreds of thousands of dollars, or even millions, to the total price tag.

Revenue from the fee would go into a fund the city uses to subsidize construction of low-income apartments, which allows the builders of those complexes to charge lower rents to qualified tenants.

The fee, which the City Council is expected to consider in March or April, is based on the same reasoning as the commercial development linkage fee that has become controversial in the San Diego mayoral race.

The idea behind San Diegos linkage fee is that commercial projects create low-paying jobs, which increases the need for affordable housing. The idea behind Carlsbads new housing fee is that market-rate apartment complexes bring new customers to town who buy goods and services, creating low-paying jobs and more need for low-income housing.

A consultant hired by Carlsbad presented the citys Housing Commission an 86-page report in January demonstrating the connection between apartment-building construction and an increased need for subsidized, low-income housing. Partly based on that report, the Housing Commission voted 3-2 on Jan. 9 in favor of recommending the new fee to the City Council.

The reasoning the consultant used is disputed by the Building Industry Association, which lobbies for developers and contractors, and the San Diego Apartment Association, which lobbies for landlords and housing developers.

I think the connection theyre making is overblown, said Molly Kirkland, public affairs director for the apartment association. All the people who work at the new businesses wont be living in Carlsbad.

Kirkland also said the proposed fee, which would be $20 per square foot of construction, would be passed along to people living in market-rate apartments in the form of higher rent.

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Builders howling over proposed fee

Developer Rocco Termini wants to create more housing along Elmwood Avenue in North Buffalo and dub the neighborhood the Pierce Arrow Village, after the nearby former auto plant.

Termini, known for reviving the Lafayette Hotel and AM&As warehouse building in downtown Buffalo, is completing his second project in North Buffalo and is eyeing a third in the same neighborhood.

Termini, through his Signature Development Buffalo LLC, plans to convert the nearly empty former American Radiator office building at 1807 Elmwood Ave. into a mixture of 38 market-rate apartments and some commercial space.

The developer has the two-story building under contract and expects to close on it sometime in June.

Construction would begin immediately, with completion anticipated by January 2015. Termini still needs to obtain approval from the Buffalo Planning Board, and also plans to seek sales and mortgage-recording tax breaks from the Erie County Industrial Development Agency, under its adaptive re-use program. The project comes before the citys Zoning Board of Appeals on Feb. 12.

The $9 million project, to be called the ARCO Lofts, follows Terminis newly opened Houk Lofts around the corner on Grote Street and the pending Foundry Lofts across Elmwood Avenue.

What were doing is trying to create critical mass there, with a third building in the neighborhood, Termini said.

Termini completed the $6.72 million conversion of the two-story former Houk Wire Wheel building at 316 Grote St. into 22 apartments, a hair salon and a tattoo parlor called Ink Inc. The 28,160-square-foot building is now open and fully leased as Houk Lofts.

The 85,000-square-foot former FWS Furniture store and warehouse at 1738 Elmwood Ave. is being redeveloped into the Foundry Lofts, with 46 market-rate apartments and 25,886 square feet of commercial space that is already pre-leased. That $23 million project will be completed and open by May.

The 48,000-square-foot American Radiator building is currently owned by Mod-Pac Corp., a formerly publicly traded commercial print and paperboard maker that was taken private by owners Kevin and Daniel Keane in September. The companys facilities are located in the former American Radiator manufacturing plant, which made all the radiators you see in all the old houses in Buffalo, Termini said.

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Termini proposes 3rd loft project for North Buffalo