Baltimore Business Journal articles from February 1998

Baltimore Business Journal archives from February 1998

Harbor Inn owners stiff city. (Harbor Inn Pier 5 behind in rent and loan payments)
February 27, 1998... The owners of Harbor Inn Pier 5 are months behind on their rent and loan payments to Baltimore City, giving the high-profile Inner Harbor hotel an uncertain future. The newly renovated waterfront hotel, owned by real estate developer Otis...

Lawyers bet on venture relationship. (law firm Rifkin, Livingston, Levitan and Silver; venture capital firm Wyndhurst Capital Group)
February 27, 1998... One of Baltimore's most noted lobbying and government law firms has forged a link with a venture capital company. Rifkin, Livingston, Levitan & Silver has hired two finance attorneys who are also owners of a local venture capital firm. Lewis...

Sinai breaks out with gush of ER advertising. (Sinai Hospital; emergency room)
February 27, 1998... Yon are only minutes away from another Sinai Hospital advertisement. After opening a new emergency room two months ago. Sinai started one of the most talked about marketing efforts in recent years among Baltimore-area hospitals. The blizzard...

USA Stats expanding fantasy league lineup. (sports statistics services for rotisserie baseball league)
February 27, 1998... Sports statistics have been Bill Meyer's life since 1988, when the attorney started a "rotisserie" league business in his garage. That business, USA Stats in Towson, is now the largest service of its kind in the country. He expects the...

Owings Mills firm has a hot tip. (online financial news provided by Aether Technologies International LLC and Reuters America Inc.)
February 27, 1998... A Baltimore County wireless-technology company has teamed up with Reuters America Inc. on a cutting-edge financial news and information service. Owings Mills-based Aether Technologies International LLC and Reuters this week launched...

Polishing the chrome out. (cleaning of cancer-causing chrome from Baltimore's harbor)
February 27, 1998... Maryland environmental officials are betting on a new technology to clean cancer-causing chrome out of Baltimore's polluted harbor. The Maryland Environmental Service, a quasi-public agency that finances pollution cleanup programs, has...

Tall order. (Baltimore Convention Center needs trained service workers)
February 27, 1998... The Baltimore area faces likely shortage of trained service workers When the Baltimore Convention Center expansion was completed nearly two years ago, there were only 20 trained food-service employees to handle events in a facility that had...

Restaurant may yet live after fund-raising drive. (Women's Industrial Exchange)
February 27, 1998... The mission of the Women's Industrial Exchange remains the same as it was 115 years ago - to help women become financially independent. The question is whether the Exchange itself will remain financially equipped to do this. If the...

GTS Duratek Inc. (proxy report excerpts)(Company Profile)
February 27, 1998... A weekly analysis of Baltimore-area public companies Corporate Profile GTS Duratek Inc., based in Columbia, has patented a method of converting hazardous and low-level nuclear wastes into a harmless glass product. The technique, known as...

Mate eludes Hopkins in merger race. (failed mergers talks between Helix Health and Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions leads to merger between Helix Health and Medlantic Healthcare Group)
February 20, 1998... When its chief executive officer abruptly left three months ago, Helix Health halted merger talks with the Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions. That decision would lead to a groundbreaking agreement between Helix and Medlantic Healthcare...

Fader's family ownership gets snuffed out. (A. Fader and Son Inc.)
February 20, 1998... Ira B. "Bill" Fader Jr. never pushed his children to get involved with the family cigar business. But as time passed, the president of A. Fader & Son Inc. knew he had to secure the future of the company his grandfather started in 1891. So...

City woos NASA incubator. (Baltimore, MD; NASA-run business incubator)
February 20, 1998... Baltimore business leaders are mounting an effort to bring a NASA-run incubator for young technology companies to Canton. The Maryland Economic Development Corp. (Medco), a state-created company that works to bring new business to Maryland,...

Managing before lawyering: managing partners cope with changing industry. (law firm Semmes, Bowen and Semmes)
February 20, 1998... When Cleveland D. Miller became a lawyer in 1963, he thought he'd never use the accounting class he took in college. But the managing partner of Semmes, Bowen & Semmes, one of Baltimore's largest law firms, finds that bean-counting takes up a...

Avoiding a disaster: right insurance can save the day.
February 20, 1998... When Lois and Alan Elkin bought a building in Cockeysville in 1986 to house their business, Advance Business Systems, they were happy it was on a hill and not in a flood plain. They were surprised, when eight years later, they opened the...

Obstructed view. (initiative limiting the expansion of suburban development in Carroll County, Maryland)
February 20, 1998... Is 'Smart Growth' a good idea? Developers who've dealt with similar rules in Carroll say 'no' With the governor's initiative to stop suburban sprawl going into effect later this year, lawmakers are confidently predicting a halt to unchecked...

Landers lands on feet in 180-degree career turn. (Joseph Landers, executive vice-president of the Greater Baltimore Board of Realtors)
February 20, 1998... Joseph "Jody" Landers was perusing the "Help Wanted" section of the local newspaper last fall, a routine check to stay up to date on the job market. Landers, then director of fiscal services for the Baltimore City Council, spotted a position...

Bowles Fluidics Corp. (proxy report excerpts)(Company Profile)
February 20, 1998... Corporate Profile Bowles Fluidics Corp. is the leading designer, manufacturer and supplier of windshield and rear window-washer nozzles for passenger cars and light trucks in North America. Totalfiscal year 1997 sales of $18.8 million...

Lawsuits forecast Lasky's troubles; a trail of unpaid bills, busted relationships. (Michael Lasky of Inphomation Communications Inc.)
February 13, 1998... Infomercial mogul Michael Lasky this week blamed the downfall of his company, Inphomation Communications Inc., on billing problems with phone-service giants MCI Telecommunications and AT&T Corp. But a review of bankruptcy and court records...

Bankrupt restaurateurs give up on chain. (Jeffrey Pressman and Henry Pertman of J.P. Henry's)
February 13, 1998... One month after J.P. Henry's three-chain restaurant closed its doors, two of its owners have filed for personal bankruptcy. Henry Pertman and Jeffrey Pressman, part-owners of the casual-dining restaurants, each filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy...

Business in the zone: job creation priority for Empower director. (Empower Baltimore Management Corp.; Diane Bell)
February 13, 1998... Diane Bell isn't about to give herself a pat on the back just yet. Truth is, the president and chief executive of Empower Baltimore Management Corp. - the nonprofit company created nearly three years ago to administer the $350 million...

Key figure in state case to serve time for fraud. (Howard Schapiro, founder and president of Chesapeake Industries Inc. and Lesslabel LLC)
February 13, 1998... A local businessman instrumental in an extortion case against a former state trade official received a reduced sentence Feb. 6 in a separate bank-fraud case. Howard Schapiro, founder and president of Chesapeake Industries Inc. and Lesslabel...

Pension consultant faces string of lawsuits. (Alvin Y. Shapiro of Shapiro Pension Consultant Inc.)
February 13, 1998... An Owings Mills man accused last month of mismanaging a Lutherville credit union's pension funds has been plagued by a string of similar lawsuits dating back five years. Since 1993, five lawsuits have been filed by clients of Alvin Y....

Bank execs profited from '97 bull market.
February 13, 1998... Carl Stearn, chairman and chief executive officer of Provident Bankshares Corp., picked a great year to set aside money for retirement. Taking advantage of Provident's surging stock, Stearn sold the bulk of his holdings in the Baltimore-based...

State aims to cap rising health costs for small firms. (Maryland)
February 13, 1998... The state agency charged with overseeing health-reform efforts for small businesses is recommending some new ways to cork rising health care costs which have begun to plague these firms. "If we do nothing, we'd be flirting with disaster,"...

Environmental Elements Corp. (Proxy Report Excerpts)(Company Profile)
February 13, 1998... Corporate Profile Environmental Elements, which supplies systems and services to the power-generation industry, achieved improved results in fiscal 1997 despite the continued lack of activity in its traditional markets. The overall domestic...

Piper mulling city exit. (Piper and Marbury L.L.P. to move to a new office)
February 6, 1998... A political snafu within the state bureaucracy has left law firm Piper & Marbury toying with the idea of moving out of downtown. Piper, the city's largest law firm, is hoping to move into a proposed office tower on land owned by the Baltimore...

Industry buzz: Doner's going. (W.B. Doner and Co. may closedown operations in Baltimore, Maryland)
February 6, 1998... W.B. Doner & Co. officials insist there are no plans to shutter its Baltimore office. But the Baltimore advertising community, which has long coveted Doner's success, isn't buying it. Many of Doner's competitors believe last week's...

Airfares, even at BWI, are ascending rapidly. (Baltimore/Washington International Airport)
February 6, 1998... Business airfares took off at Baltimore/Washington International Airport over the past year, but studies show BWI is still a bargain for corporate travelers. The American Express business airfare index shows the average one-way corporate...

Older and wiser: growing tech firms turn to seasoned professionals to run the ship. (Baltimore, Maryland; CEOs)
February 6, 1998... Jim Chen has spent five years growing his Germantown-based V-One Corp. into one of the top half-dozen computer network security firms in the world. When he decided to give up the burden of overseeing the company's day-today operations, his...

UM's tech extension service aims to help firms grow. (University of Maryland's Technology Extension Service)
February 6, 1998... When John Songster read about Pevco Systems International Inc. in the local newspaper two years ago, he knew he had to introduce himself. At the time, Pevco, a White Marsh-based manufacturer of computerized pneumatic-tube systems for...

Sinclair Broadcast Group Inc. (Proxy Report Excerpts)(Company Profile)
February 6, 1998... Corporate Profile Sinclair Broadcasting is a second-generation, family-owned business that owns and/or provides programming services to 28 television stations in 20 separate markets and 33 radio stations in eight separate markets nationwide....