Stigma zoning: a new study aims to quantify the cumulative negative effect on home values caused by undesirable neighborhood features such as landfills and airports.(What Hurts Housing Values?)(Brief Article)

ACCORDING TO RESEARCHER STEPHEN F. THODE, the impact of locally undesirable land uses, or LULUs, is poorly understood. Liability for depressed housing values, he says, often lean too heavily on a single bad factor, when many sites should share the blame.

Thode, director of the Murray H. Goodman Center for Real Estate Studies at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pa., suggests an alternative system of "clustering" industrial features into something called a "stigma zone" to assess their impact on local housing.

"I really start with what you can see, smell, or hear." says Thode. "In measuring how much impact something has, you have to look first at what is the …

Kroger CEO's pay falls 19 percent

CINCINNATI (AP) — Pay for Kroger Co.'s CEO fell again as the grocery chain's sales and profit growth fell below tough targets in a choppy economy.

An Associated Press analysis of a regulatory filing Friday shows that David Dillon, chairman and CEO of the nation's largest traditional grocer, received compensation for 2010 valued at $5.4 million. That's down 19 percent from 2009, and the third straight year in which Dillon's largely performance-based pay fell.

The 60-year-old CEO's compensation has dropped about 40 percent in that time, from $9.09 million in 2007.

Kroger outperformed most competitors last year, with revenue up 7.1 percent to a Kroger-record $82.2 billion. …

Investigates Fatal Tosco Fire.

The U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board (CSB) will conduct a full investigation of a February 23 fire at Tosco's Avon Refinery near San Francisco, which killed four workers and critically injured another. A fireball engulfed the workers when …

The good, the bad and the maybe.(Life-Scene)

Byline: MARK MCGUIRE STAFF WRITER

The broadcast networks have finished the "upfronts" the New York City coming-out party for new fall shows and schedules, and the understated funeral for dramas and comedies past and proposed that don't make the cut.

Of course, the dearly departed ("Jack & Bobby") and the better-off-dead ("Listen Up") get scant if any attention at this gathering to schmooze and impress advertisers. The focus is on, as Green Day sings, the television dreams of tomorrow.

That's the way it works. Ask a TV exec about mistakes (What are you talking about? I don't remember any show named "Father of the Pride") , and you'll likely get talk about looking ahead, and a strong fall slate filled with shows that are organic and will pop and blah-de-blah-blah-blah.

Blah.

So we are left to say goodbye, and amen, to "Joan of Arcadia" and "Judging Amy." Farewell "8 Simple Rules" (John Ritter …

Heavyweight US SUV has female charm; Hummer sales in Spain on track to beat expectations.(sports utility vehicle)

Byline: Paulo Soares de Oliveira

The heavyweight sport-utility Hummer has female appeal in Spain.

Women there are so attracted by the [euro]80,000 vehicle that "seven women have convinced their husbands to buy our H2 model, even though their husbands never intended to buy one," says Hummer Spain Managing Director Carlos Espinosa de los Monteros.

Since the three-ton Hummer appeared at the Madrid auto show in May, sales have surged, says Espinosa.

More Hummers

The General Motors-built H2 model and the [euro]200,000 H1, built by US contract coachbuilder AM General, went on sale in Spain at the start of the year.

Hummer Spain …

Woman rats out son to avoid prison

After she was arrested on forgery charges, Paulyn Miller offeredto help police nab a suburban man she said had taken part in anunsolved 2001 murder.

The 57-year-old Bellwood woman, DuPage County prosecutors said,even agreed to secretly record conversations to help obtain evidenceagainst the man -- her own son.

Following those 2005 conversations, authorities charged her son,Terrence Miller, with murdering a 25-year-old Woodridge man during abungled robbery.

A DuPage County jury hearing the murder case against TerrenceMiller listened intently Thursday to recordings of two conversationshe had with his mother about the April 3, 2001, fatal shooting ofEzra …

POST OFFICE IS HONORING 3 LOCAL OLYMPIANS.(CAPITAL REGION)

Byline: TIM REYNOLDS Staff writer

The three Saratoga Springs natives who competed in the 1998 Olympic Winter Games in Nagano, Japan, will be honored today by the Saratoga Springs Post Office.

Long-track speedskater Moira D'Andrea and short-track team members Erin Porter and David Tamburrino are slated to receive three giant congratulatory cards signed by well-wishers from the community during the noon ceremony at the Post Office on Broadway.

``Anytime you have an Olympic competitor from a mid-sized city such as ours, it's a wonderful, wonderful honor,'' said Saratoga Springs J. Mayor Michael O'Connell. ``It's quite a distinction not to have just …