Belco's plan worries retailers

Necklaces, earrings and brooches sparkled in the afternoon sun as Joan Lewis pondered leaving behind the storefront she has tended for nine years in downtown Harrisburg.

"I've looked at a couple places," Lewis said. "But after building up your clientele, you want to stay where you are."

Lewis must move because her shop, Glitz & Glitter Fashion Accessories, is in one of several buildings slated for demolitio

n by Belco Community Credit Union. The credit union wants to expand its headquarters in the 400 block of North Second Street.

Credit union officials said they need the space to accommodate future growth. Their plan, however, has created a dilemma for …

Marcus cites SA's 'deep and liquid markets'.

"Over that it is a debt trap."

After the US Standard & Poor's downgrade - described by Congressional Democrats as "the Tea Party downgrade" after the right-wing Republican group which blames the US debt problem on overspending rather than too low tax revenues - US markets opened for trading yesterday with the Dow down more than 200 points.

The rand broke below R7/US$ as US markets opened, and Garrow expected the rand to weaken in the short term.

Marcus and Gordhan noted that SA had "deep and liquid financial markets which continue to function even during the difficult time of global financial turmoil". All rating agencies rated SA at an investment …

ENCYCLOPEDIA: A DINOSAUR ON THE BOOKSHELF OR AN IMPORTANT LEARNING TOOL.(Perspective)(Bibliography)

Byline: Richard Matturro

Twenty years ago conscientious parents interested in their children's education used to agonize over whether to buy a set of encyclopedias for their home. The decision was difficult because encyclopedias represented an investment of several hundred dollars, and in those days, several hundred dollars was still a lot of money.

That dilemma, though, has largely been superseded today by the question of whether to buy the children a home computer, an investment that can run into several thousand dollars. And yet, the encyclopedias still exit, like the new World Book, published nearly every year since 1917. And surprisingly enough the cost for most of them is still in the hundreds. The 22-volume World Book retails for $499 in its least expensive binding.

But is the encyclopedia still necessary in this new age of information? If you can call up on your computer screen the current market value of your stocks, the status of a legislative bill going through committee, the outcome of a local election half a continent away, why would you need an encyclopedia?

Besides, isn't an encyclopedia by its very nature "old news," outdated before it even gets into print? The World Book, for instance, in its 1986 edition, makes no mention of the biggest news story of 1986, the Challenger explosion. This is not an oversight, but an inevitable result …