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BEHIND THE NEWS: Settlements bring anticlimactic close to SEC fraud case

When the Securities and Exchange Commission in 2003 announced fraud charges against three former executives of once-high-flying Analytical Surveys Inc., it filed court papers laced with explosive allegations. Anyone who read the 18-page civil lawsuit filed in federal court in Indianapolis might have figured a trial drenched with drama was in the offing. So much for the climax. Newly filed court papers show the SEC has quietly reached a $260,000 settlement with Sidney Corder, who was CEO of the computerized-map…

Used cars piling up: Record sales of new vehicles put damper on auction prices

Especially these days, used cars have gotten all the respect of Rodney Dangerfield. Like the late comic, they’ve been dissed-in this case by the incessant marketing of automakers’ “employee discounts” that drove new-car sales to record volumes in July. But with automakers expected to end those discounts in early September, local dealers and auction firms are bracing for used cars to be the next big wave of sales. Dealer lots are crammed with trade-ins, so many aren’t buying additional used…

RETURN ON TECHNOLOGY: If tired of browsing for news, why not try an aggregator?

The bane of the Information Age is information. At least when my father went to work in the factory he ably kept running for many years, he knew the aisles would still be in the same places, the machinery still exhibiting the same behaviors, and that the number of unknowns in his life would be manageable. I’m better situated in life than he was, but I pay for it with uncertainty. The content of my job isn’t machinery, but information,…

BULLS & BEARS: Something not going well? Blame surging in oil prices

The spike in the price of oil has many people singing the blues, and using it as an excuse for nearly every imaginable problem. Oil has been a scapegoat for the weak stock market, poor sales at Wal-Mart, tough times at Bob Evans restaurants, and a bad summer at the movie box office. Conventional wisdom is, gas costs so much that the average family can’t afford to buy gas AND shop, eat out, or go to a movie. Nobody likes…

NOTIONS: An empty nest fills with memories

Last Sunday morning, I awoke before dawn. Dreading what was to come, I lingered in bed, watching the gray light of a cloudy morning illuminate the houses across the way. Around 7:30, I worked up the energy to get out of bed. I took a shower, popped my morning meds, and headed downstairs. As is their teen-age wont, both my boys were still asleep. So I retrieved The Star and The New York Times from the driveway and glanced through…

EYE ON THE PIE: Prison reform is off state’s radar

What do the following cities have in common? Auburn, C r aw f o r d s v i l l e , Greenfield, Griffith, Huntington, Logansport, New Castle, Seymour and Shelbyville. Each has a smaller population than the number of people in Indiana prisons. The Indiana Department of Correction reports we have more than 19,600 adults in our prisons at an annual cost in excess of $21,500 per prisoner per year, for a total of $420 million. According to…

Questions follow Standard into new arena: Company boosts health services with several purchases

Standard Management Corp. followed the sale of one of its staple insurance businesses with a flurry of purchases this summer aimed at shifting its focus to health care services. Despite all the change, some constants remain for the struggling Indianapolis holding company: seven-figure quarterly losses and questions about its new direction. Standard completed the sale of Standard Life Insurance Company of Indiana to Louisville-based Capital Assurance Corp. in June for $79 million, then wasted little time spending some of the…

Stoeppelwerth & Associates: ‘Staking’ their claim on growth Local engineering firm finds abundant opportunities

While most 8-year-old boys were playing with toy trucks, Dave Stoeppelwerth was riding in big ones helping land surveyors at his father’s civil engineering firm. Stoeppelwerth, now 51 and CEO of Stoeppelwerth & Associates, grew up learning the business. In fact, Stoeppelwerth had done enough surveying during grade school and high school that at age 16 he became a crew chief working under his father, Dick, who started the north-side company in 1962. He joined the company full time after…

Museum deflects pork perceptions: Policy wonks decry grant of $12.5M in transportation funds

“Why are taxpayers in California and Texas and Massachusetts paying for a museum in Indianapolis?” David Boaz, executive vice president of the Washington-based Cato Institute, wrote on the think tank’s Web site in May as the bill was coalescing. The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis landed the grant under the $286 billion transportation bill signed by President Bush this month. The grant was included in the bill courtesy of Rep. Julia Carson, D-Indianapolis. “Congress constantly uses the Department of Transportation’s budget…

Law could generate earnings for Cummins: States face deadline in completing standards for connecting generators to grid

Cummins Inc. and other makers of electric generators stand to gain under a provision an Indiana lawmaker plugged into the federal energy bill signed this month. The amendment by 4th District Republican congressman Steve Buyer forces state utility commissions to adopt standards within two years that will pave the way for businesses that generate their own electricity to sell excess power to the electric grid. That’s good news for firms that generate their own power and for Cummins, which makes…

Real estate investment trusts buck slump predictions: REITs outperforming major stock market indexes so far this year; Simon, Duke and Kite doing well locally

For the second quarter, the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts Composite Index posted a return of 13.52 percent, boosting its year-to-date return to 4.9 percent. For the quarter, that’s more than three times any of the other equity indicators, the highest of which, the Russell 2000, posted a 4.32-percent return. The Russell 2000 also has the second-highest year-todate returns at 5 percent. Real estate investment trusts are due for a downturn, according to many stock analysts, but they’ve…

EYE ON THE PIE: Let’s turn our children into assets

Could we reduce some of the major costs in our society if we had fewer children and more immigration from abroad? Think about it. Children, particularly those 15 to 19 years of age, are a major disruptive and expensive aspect of our nation. They establish behaviors that lead to lifelong misery for themselves and expenses for the rest of us. Teens get into all sorts of costly trouble. They lead police on dangerous chases because they will not obey the…

Deal giving edge to unions muddies midfield contracts: Non-union contractors question whether bidding on project is worth the trouble

A construction agreement that requires union wages, work rules-and union workers-at the midfield terminal project has big and small businesses alike concerned they’ll be shut out of all but the tiniest contracts on the $300 million building. Unless Janet South’s painting firm Deco Group agrees to accept those terms, she’d only qualify for projects of $75,000 or less-the threshold at which the agreement kicks in. That limitation, contained in the project labor agreement attached to the midfield terminal, contrasts with…

Rental Finders business ready to sell franchises: Service acts as middleman for tenants, landlords

Linking landlords with tenants from an office buffered by a coin laundry and a pet shop may seem like an unusual career choice for someone who once aspired to be a lawyer or doctor. But for Vasilios Maniatis, the decision to become a broker in the residential rental business has led to a concept he thinks has the potential to become a national franchise. The 38-year-old Chicago native arrived from Salt Lake City, where he opened his first Rental Finders…

NOTIONS: The faulty presumption of perpetual accessibility

I was in pain. I lost lots of blood. My blood sugar skyrocketed (I’m diabetic). In the wee hours that Friday morning, nurses pumped me full of morphine, injected me with insulin and watched my vital signs while doctors pressed and squeezed, pushed and prodded, and talked it all over in hushed tones. An hour before surgery, an anesthesiologist visited. He asked lots of questions about allergies and dental work. Then he warned me of potential doom-perhaps even death on…

INVESTING: Thank Apple for putting music industry back on feet

As a tool of creative destruction, the Internet did a job on the music industry. For a few years, the largest consumers of music were obtaining the product for free, and stocks in the sector suffered as a result. Today, the industry is getting back on track, and investors are making money again. Music executives worldwide should be lavishing Steve Jobs of Apple with bottles of champagne and cigars. After courts shut Napster down, other illegal download services popped up…

Centre Properties, state nearing agreement: Retail center at 96th and Allisonville closer to reality after years of legal wrangling

Indianapolis-based Centre Properties LLC is beginning to move dirt on 96th Street just west of Allisonville Road, a sign that a battle over developing part of a 220-acre site may be nearing an end. In late March, Centre dropped a lawsuit it had filed in mid-2004 against the Indiana Department of Natural Resources over the agency’s reversal of a permit granted to Centre. That permit would have allowed Centre to fill in 15 acres of White River floodway to build…

Special Report: Buying blind: Lack of oversight leaves state in dark on real estate deals The state of Indiana knows how much it’s spending to lease property statewide -nearly $40 million a year. But it doesn’t know if that’s too much.

The state of Indiana knows how much it’s spending to lease property statewide -nearly $40 million a year. But it doesn’t know if that’s too much. State contracts for third-party real estate services give government officials few safeguards to ensure they’re paying a fair price for office, laboratory and storage space outside of state-owned buildings, those in the industry say. And state administrators have no control over seven-figure commissions paid to two Indianapolis real estate brokers in the past decade,…

Space crunch prompts Indiana to seek help with real estate leasing duties:

Between the Statehouse, the Indiana Government Center and the State Library building, the state of Indiana owns 1.1 million square feet of real estate in downtown Indianapolis. Still, that’s not enough room to house all state government’s agencies and functions-which is why Indiana spends nearly $17 million each year to lease space elsewhere in Marion County. Some agencies, including the departments of education and health, house nearly all their office workers in privately owned buildings near the Statehouse. Other departments…