Video Feature: Home-Rental Apps as Alternatives to Airbnb

Abstract: To some people, Airbnb is an innovative service that is shaking up the hotel industry by offering interesting alternative places to stay. To others, Airbnb is viewed as a tax-dodging scourge that lets tenants violate their leases’ subletting rules in return for a quick buck. This week, both sides squared off in an election in San Francisco, where voters on Tuesday rejected a proposal that would have limited its services. In some other areas, Airbnb is restricted or barred from doing business. But if the service is unavailable for the city you’re vacationing in, there are some great alternative apps. I recently used the HomeAway app to plan a trip to Paris in December. HomeAway, which said on Wednesday that it would be acquired by online travel company Expedia for about $3.9 billion, is similar to Airbnb, with hosts offering houses and apartments for short-term vacation rentals. The app is focused on properties from homeowners, which means it circumvents some of the subletting issues that have troubled Airbnb. HomeAway’s offers are also diverse, with more than one million properties in more than 130 countries. The app lets you search by location, plus dates. You can refine the results with a few taps to show only places priced at a certain level per night or week, or those that have a certain number of rooms or facilities like a pool. When you find a promising property in the search results, a quick tap reveals photos and detailed information, including maps, a text-based description, a list of reviews and so on. To reassure renters, there is information about the property owner, with data about what languages they speak, contact numbers and a note about how long they have been an active member of the site. When you find the perfect property, you can easily book and pay through the app, and you can even chat with the property owner to sort out the details. HomeAway’s app is visually clean and it’s a breeze to use, though the way you filter the search results to find suitable properties can feel awkward. The app is free on iOS and Android. HouseTrip is another Airbnb alternative, with around 300,000 properties. Though the app’s search results are heavy on European locations, it also has properties in the United States and elsewhere. HouseTrip’s listings include a photo and basic information like rating, price and bed space so you can scan and spot promising properties at a glance. Filtering and sorting through the search results is a little simpler in HouseTrip than in HomeAway. Finding a property starts with a location-based search. Once you have decided where you want to go, you don’t have to enter definite dates, making the app great for spontaneous vacations. HouseTrip’s app is visually attractive with a minimalist interface. I like how you can see previous guest ratings for features like cleanliness, ease of check-ins and other features. Property hosts have to use a separate app to manage their rentals, and this is free on both iOS and Android . Oddly, if you’re a renter, there’s only an iOS app . If searches on these apps don’t turn up any properties you want to rent, check out the Roomorama app, free on iOS . It works in a similar way, with an image-centric design, an easy-to-navigate interface and properties worldwide. The app also has a handy “near me” feature that lists properties close to your current location. Roomorama has as many features as its peers, including booking, paying and chatting with hosts through the app, but it offers fewer properties. The app hasn’t been updated by its makers in a year, which may mean it’s prone to bugs. If you book through Roomorama, contact the property hosts to check that the listing is current. Lastly, if you’re staying in London, Los Angeles, New York or Paris and you want to splurge on a rental, check out Onefinestay . Properties found through this app cost more, but they are luxurious and in great locations. The app won’t let you book vacations, but it seamlessly passes you to the website where you can find and pay for rentals. The app also acts as a digital concierge, informing you about everything you need to know for your stay, such as how to operate appliances and what to do and see in the area around the property. Onefinestay is impressive, but remember: Though the app is free on iOS , the rents can easily be more than $1,000 a night. Always check insurance, payment and cancellation policies when you use these apps. The way each app works and the way you pay varies, so make sure you know the terms of your deal before zipping across the globe. Quick Call The team behind the popular photo-editing app VSCO has a new treat: DSCO , an app that’s all about creating and sharing animated GIFs. The app has VSCO’s characteristic minimalist gesture-based interface and a number of filter options to improve the look of your GIFs, and it is easy to use. Expect a few teething pains since it’s so new, but so far it looks promising. Free and on iOS only .

Travel,Tourism
Mobile Apps
Airbnb
Rent
HomeAway
Roomorama
VSCO


5 Fort Hood Soldiers Dead and 4 Missing in Texas Floods

Abstract: Five soldiers were killed and four were missing after a truck overturned Thursday during a routine training mission at the Fort Hood military post in Texas, the Army said. Three other soldiers were rescued from water near the vehicle and were listed in stable condition. They were taken to a medical center on the post, according to a statement. Chris Haug, a spokesman for Fort Hood, said that floodwaters from recent rains were believed to have overturned the truck, a Light Medium Tactical Vehicle, while the soldiers were using a low water crossing, but that the episode would be investigated. Mr. Haug said the soldiers were on a mission that “they do every day,” and driving on “a normal dirt road” that was not known to be a problem. The area has been inundated with heavy rain over the past week. Around the time of the accident, concerns about flooding had caused emergency personnel to close a paved road that runs parallel to the dirt road the soldiers were traveling on. “All the low water crossings are potentially dangerous when we’ve had this much rain,” said Tyler Broadway, another Fort Hood spokesman. The accident, which took place about 12 miles north of the base’s main area, was reported shortly after 11 a.m. on Thursday. Search parties were sent immediately. Rescue teams were searching for the missing soldiers by air, land and water, the statement said. The bodies of the dead soldiers were recovered downstream from where the truck overturned. Their names will not be released until their families are notified. The National Weather Service issued a flash flood watch for all of northern and central Texas on Thursday afternoon, with rainstorms expected to continue through Friday afternoon. May brought a record-breaking amount of rain to the state, resulting in the deaths of at least six other people . Gov. Greg Abbott issued a statement, saying, “Texas stands ready to provide any assistance to Fort Hood as they deal with this tragedy.” This is not the first fatal episode in recent months during a training exercise at Fort Hood. In November, a Black Hawk helicopter crashed during an exercise at the post, killing four crew members.

US Military
Fort Hood
Car Crash
Flood
Brazos River TX
Fatalities,casualties


Bahrain Turmoil Poses Fresh Test for White House

Abstract: MANAMA, Bahrain — A brutal government crackdown on pro-democracy protesters here on Thursday not only killed at least five people but, once again, placed the Obama administration in the uncomfortable position of dealing with a strategic Arab ally locked in a showdown with its people. As the army patrolled with tanks and heavily armed soldiers, the once-peaceful protesters were transformed into a mob of angry mourners chanting slogans like “death to Khalifa,” the king, while the opposition withdrew from the Parliament and demanded that the government step down. At the main hospital following the violence, thousands gathered screaming, crying and collapsing in grief. For the Obama administration, it was the Egypt scenario in miniature in this tiny Persian Gulf state, a struggle to avert broader instability and protect its interests — Bahrain is the base of the Navy’s Fifth Fleet — while voicing support for the democratic aspiration of the protesters. The United States said it strongly opposed the use of violence. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton called Bahrain’s foreign minister on Thursday morning to convey “our deep concern about the actions of the security forces,” she said. President Obama did not publicly address the crackdown, but his press secretary, Jay Carney, said that the White House was urging Bahrain to use restraint in responding to “peaceful protests.” In some ways, the administration’s calculations are even more complicated here, given Bahrain’s proximity to Saudi Arabia, another Sunni kingdom of vital importance to Washington. Unlike in Egypt, where the struggle was between democracy and dictatorship, Bahrain is suffering a flare-up in old divisions between its ruling Sunni Muslim minority and restive Shiites, who constitute 70 percent of the local population of 500,000. This has broader regional implications, experts and officials said, since Saudi Arabia has a significant Shiite minority in its eastern, oil-producing districts and the Shiite government in Iran would like to extend its influence over this nearby island kingdom. Shiite political figures in Bahrain deny that their goal is to institute an Islamic theocracy like that in Tehran. For those who were in the traffic circle known as Pearl Square when the police opened fire without warning on thousands who were sleeping there, it was a day of shock and disbelief. Many of the hundreds taken to the hospital were wounded by shotgun blasts, doctors said, their bodies speckled with pellets or bruised by rubber bullets or police clubs. In the morning, there were three bodies already stretched out on metal tables in the morgue at Salmaniya Medical Complex: Ali Mansour Ahmed Khudair, 53, dead, with 91 pellets pulled from his chest and side; Isa Abd Hassan, 55, dead, his head split in half; Mahmoud Makki Abutaki, 22, dead, 200 pellets of birdshot pulled from his chest and arms. Doctors said that at least two others had died and that several patients were in critical condition with serious wounds. Muhammad al-Maskati, of the Bahrain Youth Society for Human Rights, said he had received at least 20 calls from frantic parents searching for young children. A surgeon, who asked not to be identified for fear of reprisals, said that for hours on Thursday the Health Ministry prevented ambulances even from going to the scene to aid victims. The doctor said that in the early morning, when the assault was still under way, police officers beat a paramedic and a doctor and refused to allow medical staff to attend to the wounded. News agencies in Bahrain reported that the health minister, Faisal al-Hamar, resigned after doctors staged a demonstration to protest his order barring ambulances from going to the square. In the bloodstained morgue, Ahmed Abutaki, 29, held his younger brother’s cold hand, tearfully recalling the last time they spoke Wednesday night. “He said, ‘This is my chance, to have a say, so that maybe our country will do something for us,’ ” he recalled of his brother’s decision to camp out in the circle. “My country did do something; it killed him.” There was collective anxiety as Friday approached and people waited to see whether the opposition would challenge the government’s edict to stay off the streets — and if it did, whether the government would follow through on its threat to use “every strict measure and deterrent necessary to preserve security and general order.” Both sides said they would not back down. “You will find members of Al Wefaq willing to be killed, as our people have been killed,” said Khalil Ebrahim al-Marzooq, one of 18 opposition party members to announce Thursday that they had resigned their seats. “We will stand behind the people until the complete fulfillment of our demands.” Arab leaders have been badly shaken in recent days, with entrenched leaders in Egypt and Tunisia ousted by popular uprisings and with demonstrations flaring around the region. And now as the public’s sense of empowerment has spread, the call to change has reached into this kingdom. That has raised anxiety in Saudi Arabia, which is connected to Bahrain by a bridge, and Kuwait, as well, and officials from the Gulf Cooperation Council met here to discuss how to handle the crisis. After the meeting, the council issued a statement supporting Bahrain’s handling of the protests. It also suggested that outsiders might have fomented them, in a clear effort to suggest Iranian interference. “The council stressed that it will not allow any external interference in the kingdom’s affairs,” said the statement, carried on Bahrain’s state news agency, “emphasizing that breaching security is a violation of the stability of all the council’s member countries.” “The Saudis are worried about any Shia surge,” said Christopher R. Hill, who retired last year as United States ambassador to Iraq, where he navigated tensions between Sunnis and Shiites. “To see the Shia challenging the royal family will be of great concern to them.” Still, Mr. Hill said there was little evidence that Arab Shiites in Bahrain would trade their king for Iranian rulers. Bahrain’s king, Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa, and his family have long been American allies in efforts to fight terrorism and push back the regional influence of Iran. In diplomatic cables made public by WikiLeaks, he urged American officials to take military action to disable Iran’s nuclear program . While Bahrain has arrested lawyers and human rights activists over the last two years, it had taken modest steps to open up the society in the eight years before that, according to Human Rights Watch. King Hamad allowed municipal and legislative elections last fall, for which he was praised by Mrs. Clinton during a visit to Bahrain in December. In the streets, however, people were not focused on geopolitics or American perceptions of progress. They were voicing demands for democracy, rule of law and social justice. When the protests started Monday, the demands were for a constitutional monarchy, but in the anger of the day the chants evolved into calls for tearing down the whole system. “Death to Khalifa! Death to Khalifa!” chanted a frantic crowd massed in the driveway of the hospital. “Bring down the government!” cried out the thousands of men and women. The fearful and hostile mood was set the night before, when the police opened fire. Doctors, victims and witnesses gave a detailed account of how the police assault unfolded, revealing details of a calculated, coordinated attack that closed in from all sides, offering no way out. “They had encircled us and they kept shooting tear gas and live rounds,” said Ali Muhammad Abdel Nabi, 25, as he rested in a hospital bed after having been hit by shotgun pellets on both his legs and his shoulder. “The circle got closer and closer.” Doctors at the hospital said that 226 demonstrators had been recorded as being treated in the hospital and that many more were given aid on the run. At the scene, the doctors said protesters were handcuffed with thick plastic binders, laid on the ground and stomped on by the police. Outside the hospital, the police stayed away, as the fuming crowd of mourners remained on the medical campus. But not far away, in the symbolic center of the city, beneath the towering statue of a pearl on a setting, soldiers patrolled, armored vehicles blocked all arteries, and a circle of barbed wire was laid around the square. Within 24 hours, the site of the first tolerated expression of public dissent had been transformed into a memorial to fear and death. “We are a people of mourners now, we have nothing,” said Taghreed Hussein, 35, as she and her friends crowded the hospital.

Bahrain
Demonstrations Protests and Riots
Politics and Government
Defense and Military Forces
Arab World Unrest (2010- )
United States International Relations
Obama Barack


With Security at Risk, a Push to Patch the Web

Abstract: Since a secret emergency meeting of computer security experts at Microsoft’s headquarters in March, Dan Kaminsky has been urging companies around the world to fix a potentially dangerous flaw in the basic plumbing of the Internet. While Internet service providers are racing to fix the problem, which makes it possible for criminals to divert users to fake Web sites where personal and financial information can be stolen, Mr. Kaminsky worries that they have not moved quickly enough. By his estimate, roughly 41 percent of the Internet is still vulnerable. Now Mr. Kaminsky, a technical consultant who first discovered the problem, has been ramping up the pressure on companies and organizations to make the necessary software changes before criminal hackers take advantage of the flaw. Next week, he will take another step by publicly laying out the details of the flaw at a security conference in Las Vegas. That should force computer network administrators to fix millions of affected systems. But his explanation of the flaw will also make it easier for criminals to exploit it, and steal passwords and other personal information. Mr. Kaminsky walks a fine line between protecting millions of computer users and eroding consumer confidence in Internet banking and shopping. But he is among those experts who think that full disclosure of security threats can push network administrators to take action. “We need to have disaster planning, and we need to worry,” he said. The flaw that Mr. Kaminsky discovered is in the Domain Name System, a kind of automated phone book that converts human-friendly addresses like google.com into machine-friendly numeric counterparts. The potential consequences of the flaw are significant. It could allow a criminal to redirect Web traffic secretly, so that a person typing a bank’s actual Web address would be sent to an impostor site set up to steal the user’s name and password. The user might have no clue about the misdirection, and unconfirmed reports in the Web community indicate that attempted attacks are already under way. The problem is analogous to the risk of phoning directory assistance at, for example, AT&T, asking for the number for Bank of America and being given an illicit number at which an operator masquerading as a bank employee asks for your account number and password. The online flaw and the rush to repair it are an urgent reminder that the Internet remains a sometimes anarchic jumble of jurisdictions. No single person or group can step in to protect the online transactions of millions of users. Internet security rests on the shoulders of people like Mr. Kaminsky, a director at IOActive, a computer security firm, who had to persuade other experts that the problem was real. “This drives home the risk people face, and the consumer should get the message,” said Ken Silva, chief technology officer of VeriSign, which administers Internet addresses ending in .com and .net. “Don’t just take for granted all the things that machines are doing for you.” When Mr. Kaminsky, 29, announced the flaw on July 8, he said he would wait a month to release details about it, in the hope that he could spur managers of computer systems around the world to fix them with a software patch before attackers could figure out how to exploit it. Last week, however, accurate details of the flaw were briefly published online by a computer security firm, apparently by accident. Now security experts are holding their breath to see whether the patching of as many as nine million affected computers around the world will happen fast enough. “People are taking this pretty seriously and patching their servers,” Mr. Silva said. Major Internet service providers in the United States this week indicated that in most cases, the software patch, which makes the flaw much more difficult to exploit, was already in place or soon would be. Comcast and Verizon, two of the largest providers, said they had fixed the problem for their customers. AT&T said it was in the process of doing so. But the problem is a global one, and the length of time required to fix it could leave many Web users vulnerable for weeks or months. And there are millions of places around the world where people might find themselves vulnerable to potential attacks, ranging from their workplaces to an airport lounge or an Internet cafe. Individuals and small companies with some technical skills can protect themselves by changing the network preferences of their computer settings so that they use the domain name servers of a Web service called OpenDNS ( www.opendns.com ). Some computer systems are immune to the flaw. About 15 percent of domain name servers in the United States and 40 percent in Europe, including those at major Internet providers like America Online and Deutsche Telekom, use software from a Dutch company called PowerDNS, which is not vulnerable. Still, much of the Internet remains vulnerable. “I’m watching people patch, and I realize this is not an easy thing to do,” Mr. Kaminsky said in an interview. The flaw, which Mr. Kaminsky stumbled across in February, had been overlooked for more than two decades. The eureka moment came when he was idly contemplating a different security threat. He suddenly realized that it would be possible to guess crucial information about the protocol that domain name servers use to convert the numerical Web addresses. Mr. Kaminsky worried about his discovery for several days and then contacted Paul Vixie, a software engineer who runs the Internet Systems Consortium and is responsible for maintaining a widely used version of software for domain name servers, known as BIND. Almost immediately, software engineers who looked at the vulnerability realized that Mr. Kaminsky had found a significant weakness. In March, Microsoft held the secret meeting at its headquarters in Redmond, Wash. Sixteen representatives from security organizations and companies, including Cisco, talked about ways to combat the potential threat. But after several delays while vendors fixed their software, Mr. Kaminsky went public. For Mr. Kaminsky, the discovery and his subsequent warning to the Internet community were the culmination of an almost decade-long career as a security specialist. He was spotting bugs in software for Cisco and contributing to a book on computer security while still in college. “I play this game to protect people,” he said. He thinks that it is necessary to publish information about security threats to motivate system operators to protect themselves. Otherwise, “You don’t get to tell the river you need more time until it floods,” he said. He said that he had initially hoped to give the Internet community a head start of a full month to fix the problem, but his plan was foiled when technical details were briefly posted online last week. “I would have liked more time, but we got 13 days and I’m proud of that,” he said. The new flaw has sharpened the debate over how to come up with a long-term solution to the broader problem of the lack of security in the Domain Name System, which was invented in 1983 and was not created with uses like online banking in mind. While Mr. Kaminsky is being hailed as a latter-day Paul Revere, Internet experts like Bruce Schneier, a member of the insular community that guards online security, said flaws like this were a routine occurrence and no reason to stay off the Internet. “If there is a flaw in your car, it will get fixed eventually,” said Mr. Schneier, the chief security technology officer for British Telecom. “Most people keep driving.”

Computer security
Dan Kaminsky
Domain name
Phishing


Could This Be the End of Paul Simon’s Rhymin’?

Abstract: VIENNA, Va. — Paul Simon says he is ready to give up making and playing music, 61 years after he started as a 13-year-old. “You’re coming towards the end,” he said in an interview this week, discussing the mysterious epiphanies that delivered some of his greatest songs, the toxic qualities of fame, and his yearning to explore questions of spirituality and neuroscience. “Showbiz doesn’t hold any interest for me,” Mr. Simon said. “None.” Here is why you might consider believing him. At 74, he often needs 15 hours of sleep at a stretch. The other day, performing in Philadelphia, he looked out from the stage and was surprised to see four mountains on the horizon. When he put on his glasses, he realized the mountains were actually big white tents. His voice has held up far longer than he had any right to expect but needs frequent days of rest. While most stars of his generation, unsurprisingly, are playing greatest hits concerts, if anything, Mr. Simon’s new album is competing with those of Drake and Beyoncé on pop music charts, and with Radiohead and Deerhoof for college radio airtime. So Mr. Simon could leave the public stage with one last hit record and final memories of high-energy performances by his touring band, a collection of masterful musicians rooted in Latin America, Africa and the United States who are taking frisky, joyful turns with the Simon canon and his newest songs. His North American tour comes to an end on Thursday and Friday in Forest Hills, Queens, where he grew up, went to school and met a boy named Art Garfunkel. For his audience, at least, finishing the American chapter of his career in Queens, where he began, would be punctuation ripe with history and emotion. Mr. Simon insists that the place holds no sentimental power over him, but he did note that it was the last venue where he played with Mr. Garfunkel, from whom he is estranged, as he has sporadically been since they became adults. “It’s an act of courage to let go,” Mr. Simon said. “I am going to see what happens if I let go. Then I’m going to see, who am I? Or am I just this person that was defined by what I did? And if that’s gone, if you have to make up yourself, who are you?” Maybe, he said, such inquiries are a waste. Yet nothing — not a moment — about a day with Paul Simon suggests a man ready to withdraw from the pursuits that have absorbed his life. Ahead of a concert on Monday evening at the Filene Center at Wolf Trap here, he kept his band on stage for two hours in the swampy afternoon heat, checking the sound and fine-tuning songs. Image Mr. Simon preparing for performances at the Filene Center at Wolf Trap on Monday. Credit T.J. Kirkpatrick for The New York Times “The claves, Joel?” Mr. Simon called to Joel Guzman. “Don’t need them there.” Horns and woodwinds needed to be less timid in “Spirit Voices,” he instructed. He told Jamey Haddad, a percussionist, to lay off the tambourines during a noirish piano section of “One Man’s Ceiling,” a rarely performed song about city life that Mr. Simon’s 23-year-old son, Adrian, had asked his father to have ready for the New York shows. “You’re right,” Mr. Haddad, an old touring partner, said. “Right again,” Mr. Simon replied. “It happens.” On stage were scores of homemade percussion instruments, a kind of woodwind hacked from PVC plumbing pipe, accordions, electric mandolin, tricked-up washboard, guitars and bass and keyboard and French horns and trumpets. No one had a precise census of the instruments, but the soundboard receives 110 channels for microphone feeds, each capturing musical hues from separate sources. This routine has been followed for virtually all the 36 dates so far on the band’s tour: performance, grinding refinement, performance. Mr. Simon cautions that this fastidiousness is no rebuttal to his declaration that he’s ready to let it all go. “That doesn’t mean I don’t want my band to sound great,” he said. His new album, “Stranger to Stranger,” was released this spring into a shower of laudatory reviews. The performances by his touring group surge with moments of “delight and revelry,” as Mark Stewart , a guitarist (and cellist and player of the PVC pipe) described it. The album and a single, “Wristband,” have been among the top songs played on college radio. He has a detailed genesis for each tune, lyrically and musically. “I was having dinner with Paul Muldoon, the poet, and I said, I had this title I don’t know whether I want to keep it, ‘Wristband,’” Mr. Simon said. “He said, ‘It’s a good title. You could go a lot of places with that title, you should keep it.’” Sometime later, he got stuck while working on a lyric that involved a musician who steps into an alley behind a club and finds himself locked out, unable to regain entry without a wristband. He wasn’t sure what would happen in the song. “From out of nowhere, I said, wristband, it’s just a metaphor for, ‘You can’t get in. You don’t have what’s required,’” Mr. Simon said. “And that’s what’s going on. That battle is being fought right now, the haves and have-nots. “ Image Some of the many, many instruments his touring band uses are improvised. Credit T.J. Kirkpatrick for The New York Times His successes in popular music cover six decades, giving him rare late-inning creative triumph. In 1957, when he was 15, he and Mr. Garfunkel, playing as Tom and Jerry, had a minor hit with “Hey, Schoolgirl.” In 2016, “Stranger to Stranger” reached No. 1 on Billboard’s lists for both best-selling rock and Americana/Folk albums. It could put him in the running yet again for a Grammy among musicians 40 years his junior. (He has already won three Grammys for Album of the Year.) He labors at music and lyrics, he said, unwilling to accept what would have been satisfactory to him a few years earlier, feeling stalled. Then the songs will move ahead in leaps. “I was 21, maybe 22, when I wrote ‘The Sound of Silence,’ which seems to me like quite a big jump from where I was before that,” he said. “And why or where, I have no idea. I thought the same thing when I wrote ‘Bridge Over Troubled Water’ —whoa, that song is better than what I’ve been doing. Different chords and something special about it. The same feeling with ‘Graceland,’ and ‘Still Crazy After All These Years.’” The successes mystify him, he said: “All of a sudden you’re there, and you’re surprised. This happened to me at times where some line comes out, where I’m the audience and it’s real, and I have to stop, because I’m crying. I didn’t know I was going to say that, didn’t know that I felt that, didn’t know that was really true. I have to stop and catch my breath.” He paused, then added, “It doesn’t happen too often.” With that gift came popularity, a bewildering force in anyone’s life, he said. “I’ve seen fame turn into absolute poison when I was a kid in the ’60s,” he said. “It killed Presley. It killed Lennon. It killed Michael Jackson. I’ve never known anyone to have gotten an enormous amount of fame who wasn’t, at a minimum, confused by it and had a very hard time making decisions.” He has a European tour scheduled for the fall, when he will turn 75. Then his vague plans are to drift and travel for a year, he said, perhaps with his wife, the musician and composer Edie Brickell, if her work permits. For now, he has started rehearsing songs for the last moments at Forest Hills, including an Elvis tune, “That’s Alright (Mama).” And if that turns out to be a finale, that’s all right by him. “I don’t have any fear of it,” he said.

Music
Pop Rock Music
Stranger to Stranger
Paul Simon


Too Much Winter, and Not Nearly Enough Propane

Abstract: EASTABOGA, Ala. — In the midst of one of the great natural gas drilling booms in the nation’s history, millions of Americans are struggling with a problem that is chilling their bones. There is not enough propane, a byproduct of natural gas production and crude oil refining, to heat their homes and keep their farms running. Even while production of the fuel is up 15 percent over a year ago, inventories are now nearly 50 percent lower than last winter, and many Southerners and Midwesterners who depend on the fuel are angry and confused. In North and South Dakota, the shortage has become so acute that the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe has opened shelters to serve its population, most of whom rely on propane. Several states have moved to help ease delivery problems, and a number of attorneys general have called for investigations into price gouging. “It’s not a good subject right now,” said John Flanagan, a retired truck driver who uses propane to heat his home in Iowa, where the federal government said the price of a gallon had increased by nearly $2 since November. “Everybody you talk to, they’re just devastated. They’re disgusted by the whole situation.” Hundreds of miles to the southeast, at the Del-Ray Ranch here in Calhoun County, Ala., the concerns were just as intense in the state’s $15 billion a year chicken business. Ray Bean began his week with the realization that the propane supply that helps him and his wife raise more than 500,000 chickens a year had dwindled to nothing. “You know that within four or five hours, if that temperature starts to fall, those birds are going to pile up against the walls to try to maintain body heat,” said Mr. Bean, whose farm received an emergency delivery of fuel, but only for 20 percent of normal capacity. “You know what’s going to happen.” Image Credit Jeff Haynes/Reuters Energy experts are also struggling for answers about why the system of supply truckers and pipelines to deliver propane broke down so badly for the rural homeowners who depend on it for portable electrical generation and home heating. The experts point out that propane production has been soaring in recent years, leading to some record monthly surpluses. Demand had been steady until this winter, opening the way to profitable exports for energy companies. But like diesel, gasoline and other fuels, propane is not customarily stored in great amounts at local levels, so confined shortages are always possible. “You don’t design church for Easter Sunday,” said Clifton Linton, a natural gas liquids specialist at the Oil Price Information Service. “Well, guess what happened this year? In the Midwest, it was a double Easter Sunday.” Still, he added, the problem is one of logistics rather than production. The higher price for propane, according to the experts, is the consequence of three principal factors, including frigid weather over the past two months that has led to a surge of demand. In addition, five times as much propane was used to dry corn in recent months because of a bumper crop of wet corn last year, the result of heavy rains at the end of the growing season. Meanwhile, American propane exports exceeded 400,000 barrels a day for the first time in October, according to a recent report by the consultants RBN Energy, helped along by booming domestic production and the completion of several port dock expansions. Propane exports have been steadily rising from about 150,000 barrels a day in January 2012. Although prices have moderated slightly in recent days, the Energy Department reported this week that residential propane was selling for an average of $3.89 a gallon nationwide, up from $2.31 at the same time last year. Image Mark Burger delivered propane last month to a farm near Clinton, Wis. Credit Scott Olson/Getty Images State officials, increasingly alarmed as costs have climbed, have been spurred to action. In addition to the mainstay warnings by attorneys general against price gouging in times of crisis, at least 20 states have declared emergencies or suspended certain transportation regulations, including limits on how long propane delivery drivers can remain on the road. Some states are opting for — or are at least weighing — more aggressive tactics. Indiana lawmakers are considering a plan that would allow consumers to avoid sales taxes on bulk propane purchases when prices rise above $2.50 a gallon, while a legislative committee in Missouri voted this week to support a resolution seeking a federal investigation into the price increases. “We want to take every action possible to protect Missourians from what many fear is blatant price gouging,” the speaker of the state’s House of Representatives, Timothy Jones, said last week. “We know our local suppliers are not at fault, but we want the United States Justice Department to get involved and get to the root of this problem as quickly as possible.” The Illinois authorities were among the state-level officials who offered some households additional credits for energy costs. In Minnesota, where there are about 250,000 propane-heated homes, officials started an emergency hotline to dole out advice and aid. “It’s an all-hands-on-deck approach,” said Commerce Commissioner Michael J. Rothman, who brought cookies one day this week to thank workers. “We continue to get a large volume of calls from people who are in desperate situations, turning to the hotline for help and assistance. We’re doing everything we can.” Still, operators have occasionally become the target of frustration as average prices peaked at $4.61 a gallon in Minnesota. Image Mr. Ward’s hog farm. A shortage is attributed to a cold winter, more exports and wet crops that farmers used propane to dry. Credit Daniel Acker for The New York Times “People are so upset about this that they’re not listening all the way through,” a hotline worker in St. Paul said after putting a caller on hold. Part of the reason is fear. The energy and transportation industries have struggled to respond to the crisis. Last month, during the worst of the cold, pipeline companies seeking to stretch their supplies restricted the amount of propane that private distributors could buy to no more than their contracted amounts. But there are also signs that the industry’s answer could soon become more forceful. Oneok Inc., the pipeline giant, told federal regulators last week that it could reverse the flow of a propane pipeline to bolster supplies at a Kansas storage hub with supplies from Oklahoma. The company, however, did not say when it might act. An Oneok spokesman, Brad Borror, suggested that the company would reverse the pipeline if extra supplies were needed in regions suffering from bone-chilling weather. “This filing is an example of us trying to get as much propane as we can in the regions where it is desperately needed,” Mr. Borror said. “It would give us a little bit more flexibility and remove some constraints.” Even as prices recede, the consequences of recent weeks could linger, and some propane customers said they were looking for possible alternatives. In northeast Nebraska, Andrew Freudenburg said he had already chosen an alternative fuel for his home in Stanton County. He prefers to chop and burn wood. “It’s a lot of wood and a lot of work,” said Mr. Freudenburg, 29. But his rationale is simple: “The wood is cheaper.”

Propane
Agriculture
Price
Regulation and Deregulation
Energy Department
Heater
Natural gas
Shortages


Loss to Louisville Puts Seton Hall on the Bubble

Abstract: It would have been somewhat poetic for Seton Hall Coach Kevin Willard to virtually secure his first N.C.A.A. tournament appearance Wednesday night by beating the man who gave him his start. But after a 61-55 loss to Louisville in the second round of the Big East tournament at Madison Square Garden, Seton Hall will spend the next few days sweating. Willard’s mentor, Cardinals Coach Rick Pitino, was not going to cede a win that easily. The seventh-seeded Cardinals proved again why they are among the nation’s toughest defensive teams. Louisville — ranked fifth in the nation in field-goal defense (37.9) and seventh in steals per game (9.2) — held the Pirates to 32.7 percent shooting. Guard Peyton Siva had six steals, and center Gorgui Dieng had six blocks. “I told them it’s got to be about defense,” Pitino said. “Defense helps you advance.” Louisville will play second-seeded Marquette at 7 p.m. Thursday. In the first half, the lead changed hands eight times, but Louisville (23-9) got some separation with a 16-4 run to start the second half. Against Seton Hall’s 2-3 zone, the Cardinals’ guards found success getting into the lane and flipping in teardrop shots. “As long as we continue to play defense and continue to get steals,” Siva said, “then that’s when we’re at our best.” Willard, who is 0-3 against Pitino, said: “We had some really good looks early in the game that I think if we had knocked down, we could have loosened up a bit. And we didn’t knock them down, and we had to kind of battle from that point on.” The loss keeps the N.C.A.A. tournament an uncertain destination for Seton Hall (20-12). Before the game, Jerry Palm, a CBSSports.com bracket analyst, said of the Pirates: “They’re in trouble if they lose tonight. It’s going to depend on what some other teams do.” Willard worked for 10 years as a Pitino assistant, first with the Boston Celtics and then Louisville until 2007. Under Pitino, threats of dismissal were frequent. Manhattan Coach Steve Masiello, who worked as a Louisville assistant with Willard for two seasons, joked that he spent many nights in Willard’s office browsing through help-wanted ads in anticipation of an imminent firing. “Kevin got it the worst,” Masiello said in a telephone interview. “He had the most pressure on him. But it made him a great basketball coach. I think the reason for his success today is because of what he went through with Coach at Louisville.” The warnings were just Pitino’s means of motivating — hardening Willard, like others from his coaching tree, into someone of N.C.A.A. tournament caliber, whenever that time arrives. In the night’s second game, sixth-seeded South Florida held off Villanova, 56-47 . The 14th-seeded Wildcats scored only 17 points in the first half and shot 30 percent over all. The Bulls, who were led by Anthony Collins’s 17 points, will face Notre Dame on Thursday night. TEMPLE TO ARRIVE For the past six months, conference expansion has turned the Big East into a rush-hour highway, with programs entering and exiting quickly and maddeningly. On Wednesday, the Big East announced that it would add Temple, which it hopes will put a temporary end to the league’s seemingly relentless turnover. Temple will play football in the conference next season and in all other sports beginning in 2013. “This is a landmark day for Temple,” said the Owls’ football coach, Steve Addazio. Counting all the additions and subtractions, the Big East will be a 13-team league in football and an 18-team league in basketball. Perhaps most important for the Big East is where it has landed in the big picture in football. For months, the conference heard doomsday speculation that it would be left behind in the Bowl Championship Series after the departure of Pittsburgh, Syracuse and West Virginia. With the new format for a college football playoff unlikely to have a so-called automatic qualification element, the Big East appears in reasonable position for the future. “We feel very confident with what we’ve assembled that it will be very hard to exclude us from whatever system is in place,” said Nick Carparelli Jr., the Big East’s associate commissioner for football. Commissioner John Marinatto said that the Big East planned to “pause on the expansion front” and that he hoped to sit down with Syracuse and Pittsburgh officials in the near future about negotiating to let them out of the Big East after next season. PETE THAMEL

Basketball (College)
University of Louisville
Seton Hall University
Big East Conference
University of South Florida
Villanova University


U.N. Report Details Casualties in Eastern Ukraine

Abstract: GENEVA — Hundreds of people have been killed and thousands have fled their homes amid rising violence, insecurity and crime in areas of eastern Ukraine that are under the control of pro-Russia armed groups, the United Nations said on Wednesday. A total of 356 people are known to have been killed since mid-April, Gianni Magazzeni, a senior United Nations human rights official, told reporters in Geneva as he presented the latest in a series of monthly reports by the United Nations’ team of 34 monitors in Ukraine. Fighting between the Ukrainian Army and armed groups in the eastern regions of Donetsk and Luhansk has increased in regularity and intensity as the government in Kiev seeks to assert its authority, and has led to a growing number of civilian casualties, the United Nations reported, noting that separatist groups have acknowledged that their ranks include fighters from Chechnya, a Russian republic, and elsewhere in the Caucasus. The dead included 257 civilians and 86 Ukrainian military personnel, including the 49 who were killed last week when separatists shot down a military transport plane with a shoulder-launched missile as it approached Luhansk airport, Mr. Magazzeni said. The report did not offer additional details about the remaining 13 deaths. “We are talking of a reign of fear, if not of terror” in the territory around Donetsk and Luhansk controlled by armed separatists and now in a state of lawlessness, Mr. Magazzeni said, citing cases of people shot at checkpoints for no reason and members of armed groups who were summarily shot because they no longer wanted to fight. “The escalation in criminal activity resulting in human rights abuses is no longer limited to targeting journalists, elected representatives, local politicians, civil servants and civil society activists,” the report stated. “Abductions, detentions, acts of ill treatment and torture and killings by armed groups are now affecting the broader population of the two eastern regions.” The United Nations refugee agency has reported that more than 34,000 Ukrainians have been displaced. Most were from Crimea, where people who speak Ukrainian or do not want to change their nationality to Russian face discrimination and intimidation, Mr. Magazzeni said. The monitors reported: “They are mostly concerned about security: people report staying in cellars to keep away from the fighting, facing harassment at checkpoints and fearing the increasingly common abductions, threats and extortion.”

Refugees,Internally Displaced People
UN
Russia
Ukraine


Bedoya Added to United States Team

Abstract: Midfielder Alejandro Bedoya has been added to the United States roster for the Gold Cup, replacing the injured Benny Feilhaber (right ankle). Bedoya has been training with the team since May 30, and played in the 4-0 loss to Spain on Saturday. The Americans face Canada on Tuesday night in their Gold Cup opener.

Gold Cup (Soccer)
Soccer
Feilhaber Benny
Bedoya Alejandro


Lin Is Traded to Lakers

Abstract: Point guard Jeremy Lin joined the Los Angeles Lakers on Sunday in a trade with the Houston Rockets, who also gave up first- and second-round draft picks in 2015 for the rights to the European center Sergei Lishchuk. Lin, 25, will make about $15 million this season in the last year of a deal that counts $8 million against the salary cap. He averaged 12.5 points and 4.1 assists a game for the Rockets last season but lost his starting job because Coach Kevin McHale preferred Patrick Beverley. ■ The free-agent forward Luol Deng agreed to a two-year, $20 million deal with the Miami Heat, one of his agents said. The deal, expected to be signed this week, includes a player option for the 2015-16 season. ■ Chandler Parsons will go to the Dallas Mavericks after the Houston Rockets decided not to match his three-year offer sheet worth more than $45 million. Parsons said on Twitter that he had heard from the Rockets.

Basketball
Lakers
Jeremy Lin
Houston Rockets


Finding the Source and Inspiration

Abstract: Evan Shively was a chef at Postrio, the San Francisco restaurant owned by Wolfgang Puck, when it opened in 1989. The restaurant has since closed, and Mr. Shively now runs Arborica, a salvaged wood mill in Marshall that supplies architects and designers with reclaimed walnut, redwood and cypress with which to fashion floors, tables and doors. He lives next to the mill with his partner, the artist Madeleine Fitzpatrick. Mr. Shively visits the Occidental Arts and Ecology Center in Sonoma County regularly because, he said, its mission to preserve and restore native biodiversity mirrors his desire to be a steward of the land. (His words have been edited and condensed.) TRACEY TAYLOR HUMBLE BEGINNINGS The center is not an inherently exalted spot. It’s a random Californian hillside not unlike many others, a hardscrabble adobe that, year after year, has been added to and enriched, letting it manifest itself over time. Somebody chose to make it extraordinary, which is what makes it inspiring. ORIGINS OF THE SPECIES I was a puppy prep cook — just starting out at Oliveto in Oakland — when I discovered this place. I wanted to find the source of some beautiful herbal greens that came into the restaurant. RHYTHMS OF NATURE I think of myself as under pressure because the logs roll in, and if something is not done with them, they’re lost. But, here, the commitment to the effort is so sustained. They have a seed-saving garden that has to be grown out every five years. I look at all the plants and vegetables here and appreciate the fact that it’s a place that values diversity. When I visit, I see varieties of fava beans and garlic I’ve never seen before. And the flowers are woven in for the aesthetics. HIDDEN MUSE I started coming here many years ago and only discovered later that Madeleine, my companion and muse, lived here in the late ’80s. We didn’t meet — she must have been hiding in the medlars. BRANCHING OUT When I’m here, I think about our ambition as a species. I find the place moving, and it redoubles my efforts.

Sonoma County (Calif)
Shively Evan
Occidental Arts and Ecology Center


Hungarian News Media Fight Laws of Silence

Abstract: BUDAPEST — On a recent day, in a boisterous studio here, the Klubradio host Gyorgy Bolgar warmed up his audience with a barrage of defiant complaints against the government. Mr. Bolgar, a gentlemanly Rush Limbaugh of the left, opined that the rightist party of Prime Minister Viktor Orban was undermining the national currency, imposing a nonsensical “weather forecast” tax on broadcasters, and muzzling the news media. Listeners accused the government of being power hungry and vengeful. “Orban is very clever, but very evil,” a listener said. “We’re dealing with arrogance on such a scale here that Mount Everest is a molehill in comparison.” Such mudslinging would seem a healthy sign of a free and vibrant news media in this former Communist country, except that Klubradio has found itself at the center of what its director, Andras Arato, calls a government-backed war to weaken and silence the station. The clash has become emblematic of what critics call a bald attempt by the Orban government to tighten its grip on the news media, the judiciary, the central bank and education, and the inability of the European Union, which Hungary joined in 2004, to restrain a government not cleaving to the bloc’s democratic standards. For two years, Hungary’s news media council, which hands out radio frequencies and is stacked with Mr. Orban’s supporters, refused to renew Klubradio’s long-term frequency, despite three court rulings in the station’s favor. Instead, it initially awarded Klubradio’s frequency to an unknown broadcaster that then mysteriously disappeared. The regulator consistently came up with seemingly spurious arguments to avoid granting the license, Mr. Arato said, including deeming Klubradio’s application invalid because the blank back pages were not signed. The broadcaster operated for two years on two-month licenses, bleeding cash because the uncertainty scared away advertisers. Advertising revenue plummeted to $10,000 a month from $200,000 in 2008, and today the station is barely scraping by. Late last week — after the fourth court ruling, a grass-roots campaign by thousands of listeners and mounting international pressure — the council finally backed down and awarded Klubradio the long-term frequency. “The government doesn’t like to hear any criticism,” Mr. Arato said. “So it tried to starve us to death.” Among the biggest concerns to Mr. Orban’s critics is a restrictive news media law, which has come under criticism from the European Commission, the Council of Europe and press watchdog groups for giving the governing party excessive control over the regulation of news media outlets. The government has responded by revising the law, including a provision that would have given police officials the power to demand the name of a journalist’s source. Journalists remain wary, but opinion is also divided as to how seriously anyone can muzzle the news media in the age of Twitter and Facebook. “Under Communism, there was one state channel, and the government could stop it,” said Akos Balogh, editor in chief of Mandiner, a liberal Web site. “But now if you try and block anything, it will just come out some other way. So the reaction to the media laws is as exaggerated as the law itself.” Image Andras Arato, CEO of Klubradio, which is facing attempts to weaken and silence the station. Credit Akos Stiller for the International Herald Tribune Mr. Orban, a charismatic father of five whose bold call for the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Hungary in 1989 made him a regional hero, is now being recast as an authoritarian intent on eroding the checks and balances of democratic government. Since coming to power in 2010 with a two-thirds majority, he has adroitly tapped into widespread discontent with a post-1989 order that many Hungarians feel has failed to deliver on its promises. Last week, Mr. Orban’s party, Fidesz, defied warnings from the European Union and the U.S. State Department and pushed through an amendment to a new Fidesz-drafted constitution that, among other things, discards the rulings of the constitutional court made before 2012. That move followed Mr. Orban’s appointment in early March of a close ally to head the central bank, his former economics minister, Gyorgy Matolcsy; the decision raised concerns that the bank would become open to political interference. Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany last week warned that the government should not “abuse” its parliamentary majority, and the European Commission, the executive body of the European Union, has announced an inquiry into the latest constitutional changes. The Hungarian government, for its part, insists that it has a strong mandate and has accused the Union of interfering in Budapest’s domestic affairs. Peter Hack, professor of constitutional law at the Budapest university ELTE, argued that with its current constitutional setup, Hungary would never have been admitted to the Union. “But now that it’s in, it thinks it can do what it wants.” Despite the news media law revisions, analysts say too much regulatory power remains concentrated in the news media council, all of whose members were appointed by the Fidesz-dominated Parliament for nine-year terms. Andras Koltay, a lawyer and member of the council, argued that the nine-year appointments guaranteed the independence of the council in the longer term. He said that he was not a member of any political party and that the council had come under no government pressure in the Klubradio case. Moreover, he said, all of the council’s decisions had been based on strict adherence to the letter of the law. Ferenc Kumin, a government spokesman, added that the council had not once used its regulatory power to impose fines or to silence opposition voices. He noted that nearly 75 percent of the Hungarian news media was foreign-owned, so the notion of the government’s controlling the news media was ill conceived. Klubradio, he added, had engaged in a disingenuous campaign to present itself as a martyr for press freedom. But critics remain unconvinced; Peter Molnar, who teaches free speech at Central European University in Budapest, said Klubradio showed that the council was an “arbitrary” regulator in thrall to the government. Mr. Molnar further charged that the government and powerful state-owned companies, which spend an estimated €16.4 million, or $21.3 million, annually on advertising, disproportionately favor pro-government media outlets. Andras Kosa, a journalist with the online edition of HVG, a center-left weekly magazine that often criticizes the Orban government, said self-censorship had become rife in the publicly financed news media, in particular on state television, which he said showed “idealized pictures of cabinet ministers opening new factories and solving problems” that, he said, were reminiscent of Communist times. But he emphasized that this was more than offset by vast and varied privately owned media and countless Web sites and blogs, where opposition voices are loud and fierce. He noted that HVG last year reported that former President Pal Schmitt, a former Olympic gold medalist and member of Fidesz, had plagiarized his doctoral thesis, resulting in his resignation, and felt no pressure or censorship from the government. “You can be as critical as you want,” he said. Anna Salyi contributed reporting.

Hungary
News media,journalism
Viktor Orban
Censorship


Water Department Chief Steps Down in Los Angeles

Abstract: LOS ANGELES — The head of the city’s water department, who lately has faced criticism over a series of major water main breaks and has had to defend conservation programs and planned rate increases, resigned Friday to take a job with the Clinton Climate Initiative. H. David Nahai, who had been general manager and chief executive of the Water and Power Department since 2007 and a commissioner for two years before that, said in a letter announcing his move that his new job would allow him to focus on “the central challenge of our time, global warming .” The Clinton Climate Initiative, where he will be a senior adviser, is an effort by former President Bill Clinton’s foundation to study and find solutions to climate change. Los Angeles residents and the water department’s engineers have been baffled in the past month by a series of major water pipe failures across the city, buckling and flooding streets on several occasions and in one instance partly swallowing a fire truck. The department is investigating the cause. Officials said privately that Mr. Nahai’s stepping down had nothing to do with the breaks. Through a spokesman, Mr. Nahai declined to be interviewed. Heading the Water and Power Department of a sprawling city in a semidesert is never an easy job, and Mr. Nahai, a former real estate lawyer and Iranian émigré who was educated at some of Britain’s most prestigious schools, often defended the department in his scholarly, British-inflected English. Just Wednesday Mr. Nahai sought to reassure the City Council that the department was on top of the water main breaks. He has also sought to deflect criticism over proposed water and electric rate increases and a drought-induced mandatory conservation program that limits lawn sprinkling to just two days, among other steps. Water consumption has dropped to record levels, and environmental leaders have praised Mr. Nahai’s stewardship of the department. In his letter, he listed numerous achievements, including an increased use of renewable energy and fewer power failures.

Los Angeles (Calif)
Water
Suspensions Dismissals and Resignations
Clinton Climate Initiative


Uber and Lyft End Rides in Austin to Protest Fingerprint Background Checks

Abstract: Uber and Lyft were not bluffing. On Monday, the two leaders of the booming ride-hailing industry halted service in Austin, Tex., after losing a legislative fight over how they screen their drivers. The decision to leave an energetic city known for its young, well-educated population offered a stark illustration of how strenuously the companies oppose new rules that would require them to perform fingerprint background checks on drivers. Ending the service also meant that about 10,000 drivers would be out of work, Taylor Patterson, an Uber spokeswoman, said. “Folks are devastated,” she said. “People are saying, ‘I don’t know how I’m going to pay my rent.’” The legislative fight playing out in Austin, the Texas capital, has been watched closely by municipalities across the country as they ponder how to handle public-safety issues posed by the so-called sharing economy. Austin’s City Council voted in 2015 to require that the companies subject their drivers to fingerprint background checks, which could turn up criminal records. The regulation was fiercely opposed by the industry as unnecessary and less effective than its own system. Uber and Lyft, both based in California, responded by underwriting a nearly $9 million campaign against the ordinance that culminated with an up-or-down vote by Austin residents on Saturday. Nearly 56 percent voted to preserve the measure, which also includes requirements for identifying vehicles and data reporting. Both companies described the result as bitterly disappointing on Monday. “Unfortunately, the rules passed by the City Council don’t allow true ride-sharing to operate,” Lyft said in a statement. “Instead, they make it harder for part-time drivers, the heart of Lyft’s peer-to-peer model, to get on the road and harder for passengers to get a ride.” Lawmakers and some law enforcement professionals have argued that fingerprint checks, which are required of Austin’s taxi drivers, are the best way to establish a person’s identity and weed out those with criminal records. Uber has said that its own checks, performed by the third-party provider Checkr, include scrutiny of court records and other biographical information and are more effective than the fingerprint checks, which it said rely on incomplete federal databases. Industry experts have noted that the fingerprint rules, which go fully into effect next February, could pose a potentially time-intensive and costly new burden on the companies and their drivers. Yet Uber still operates in two cities that require fingerprint checks: Houston and New York. Ms. Patterson, the spokeswoman, said the company was in New York for good, but that it was pressing its case in Houston and could potentially pull up stakes there. Lyft left Houston in 2014 . Last week in Miami-Dade County, after a battle of more than two years, transportation officials legalized ride-sharing services with no requirement that drivers be subjected to fingerprint background checks. David Butts, a political consultant in Austin who helped lead a campaign to preserve the new ordinance, accused Uber and Lyft of putting corporate strategy above public safety. “But we’re a progressive city,” Mr. Butts said. “We happen to believe that government has a role to play. And the idea that we’re just going to give them a blank check and say, ‘Self-regulate and we’ll take your word for it’ was not acceptable to the majority of voters in this city.” In addition to Uber and Lyft, at least three ride-hailing companies are operating in Austin, a center of technology that hosts the South by Southwest festival and is home to the University of Texas’ flagship campus. City officials said other companies were making inquiries on Monday after the announcements by Uber and Lyft. Get Me, a new ride-sharing company in Austin, said it had been asked repeatedly how it would respond if its larger rivals left. “The open and honest answer is, as it’s always been, we’re not going anywhere,” the company said in a statement on Facebook . Councilwoman Ann Kitchen, who led the effort to tighten the regulation of ride-hailing companies, said in an interview on Monday that the city was open to continuing talks with Uber and Lyft. “Of course, we have always said to Uber and Lyft that they are welcome here and we didn’t ask them to leave,” she said. “But we have got to respect the will of the voters.”

Uber
Lyft
Car Service
Austin
Fingerprinting
Legislation


Wal-Mart Profit Rises, but Same-Store Sales Fall

Abstract: The tepid economic recovery does not seem to be extending to many of Wal-Mart ’s customers in the United States, lower-income consumers who are not yet spending. The nation’s largest retailer reported Tuesday that sales in its American stores open at least a year, a crucial measure of retail health, had declined for the sixth consecutive quarter. Net income at Wal-Mart Stores rose 9.3 percent, to $3.44 billion, or 95 cents a share, in the third quarter, which ended in October, because of international growth and cost-cutting. Revenue rose 2.6 percent, to $101.95 billion. The earnings were in line with analysts’ estimates; revenue came in slightly below what analysts had expected. In the United States, where revenue dropped 1.3 percent in Wal-Mart stores open at least a year, a measure known as same-store sales, executives said that they were continuing with changes like increasing the number of items for sale, adding more $1-and-under products and underselling competitors. Still, visits to Wal-Mart’s American stores declined from a year ago, as did the average price paid at checkout, Wal-Mart executives said. “They’re focused on necessities and being practical with how they spend their money,” Charles M. Holley Jr., executive vice president for finance, said of customers in a call with reporters. “We still see what we call the paycheck cycle, where you see the spikes in comps the day or two after a payroll check,” or after shoppers receive government payments, he said. “It’s every bit as pronounced as we’ve seen it.” This summer, Wal-Mart made management changes at its United States division, putting Bill Simon in charge and replacing the head of merchandising. Mr. Simon has been increasing the inventory Wal-Mart carries, adding back merchandise that had been removed to present a less cluttered look. “Last year we probably played our cards a little bit too close to the vest on inventory, and may have missed out on some sales — we’re trying to avoid that here in the fourth quarter,” Wal-Mart’s chief financial officer, Thomas M. Schoewe, said Tuesday. As a result, inventory was up 6.5 percent in the third quarter in Wal-Mart’s American stores, compared with the period a year ago. Mr. Schoewe said Wal-Mart was being more aggressive about having enough goods in stock for holiday shoppers. And Mr. Schoewe and Mr. Holley said that while the stores would have low prices, particularly on basics and practical gifts, they did not expect reduced profit margins in the fourth quarter. Wal-Mart executives have said that they expect positive same-store sales in the fourth quarter, though in the earnings report, the company said the range could be from a decline of 1 percent to an increase of 2 percent. Mr. Schoewe said in the call with reporters that the focus should be on the midpoint of that range, growth of 0.5 percent. While Wal-Mart cited economic pressures for the slow United States results, Craig Johnson, president of the consulting firm Customer Growth Partners, argued that competitors like the Aldi discount chain, dollar stores like Dollar General, Family Dollar and Dollar Tree, and Wal-Mart’s own Sam’s Club division all grew in the third quarter. “Blaming the economy doesn’t work,” Mr. Johnson said in an e-mail. “Wal-Mart U.S. has clearly been knocked back on its heels by the competition.” In a bright spot in its American operations, the company showed growth in same-store sales of food , where Wal-Mart has added back more items than in any other category, Mr. Simon said. He cited marshmallows and pie filling as examples. International stores continue to be a sales driver for Wal-Mart, with sales rising 9.3 percent, to $26.92 billion. Wal-Mart Mexico and Brazil had particularly strong performances. Shares of Wal-Mart closed up 31 cents, or 0.57 percent, at $54.26, as investors were apparently encouraged by the company’s fourth-quarter guidance. Home Depot also reported earnings on Tuesday, beating analysts’ expectations on profit by 3 cents. The retailer, citing cost-cutting, said its earnings rose 21 percent , to $834 million, or 51 cents a share, from $689 million, or 41 cents a share. Analysts had expected profit of 48 cents a share. Total revenue was $16.6 billion, up 1.4 percent. Its same-store sales in the United States rose by 1.5 percent. But as with Wal-Mart in the United States, Home Depot said its average ticket — the average amount paid at checkout — was down, and consumers weren’t buying many expensive items. Purchases under $50, which make up about 20 percent of the company’s American business, rose 2.7 percent from the same period last year. But purchases of $900 and up, also about 20 percent of the business, fell 3.4 percent. “That, in many cases, is our pro customer,” the chief financial officer, Carol B. Tomé, said in an interview. “That’s all demand-driven, and if demand is soft,” the bigger sales will decline. “Clearly, the basic repair business is good, and it has been good — those are the tickets that are $50,” she said. Over all, store traffic, measured by the number of transactions, rose 2.5 percent, but the average amount per transaction decreased by 0.8 percent. Home Depot raised its earnings guidance for the full year to $1.94 a share, from $1.90. But with the housing market still shaky, “we still think this presents a picture of continued pressure in our market,” Francis S. Blake, the chairman and chief executive, said in a call with analysts. Shares of Home Depot rose 32 cents, or 1 percent, to $31.71. “While investors will be pleased with the solid operating performance, it is difficult to see much improvement in the home improvement sector,” a Sanford C. Bernstein & Company analyst, Colin McGranahan, wrote in a note to clients. At the luxury end of the consumer sector, Saks posted a big increase in profit , as overall sales rose and it depended less on slashing prices. Its third-quarter net income was $36.3 million, or 20 cents a share, and included a $26.7 million gain related to the reversal of certain estimated income tax reserves deemed no longer necessary. Excluding this gain, Saks would have recorded net income of $9.7 million, or 6 cents a share, compared with $6.3 million or 4 cents a share, Sales rose 4.3 percent, to $658.8 million. Its same-store sales rose 5.7 percent, with women’s categories, including dresses, shoes, apparel and fashion jewelry, performing well.

Shopping and Retail
Wal-Mart Stores Inc
Home Depot Inc
Saks Fifth Avenue


Port Authority Plans a Web Site to Help Offset Pollution

Abstract: The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey will announce plans on Monday to become the first tolling agency in the country to set up a Web site where drivers and airline passengers can buy credits to offset the carbon emissions created by the trips they take. The money from the so-called carbon-offset credits is typically used to plant new trees, build windmills, install solar panels and other measures that may mitigate the effects of emissions from greenhouse gases. The credits are bought at places like the Chicago Climate Exchange, which barters with companies that produced credits by reducing their emissions and companies seeking to reduce the impact of their emissions. The Port Authority does not plan to make money off the Web site initially. Instead, it will seek bids from companies that want to build and operate the service on its behalf. TerraPass, LiveNeutral and DrivingGreen.com are among the many providers that already sell the credits to consumers and companies. The Port Authority, which will announce the details of its service once a provider is chosen, hopes to follow the lead of airlines like Delta and Continental that have in recent years been helping their customers compensate for the pollution produced by the planes they fly on. While the Web site is for people who use the Port Authority’s bridges, tunnels and airports, the agency itself has taken steps to reduce the amount of greenhouse gases created at its facilities. In recent months, the Port Authority has pledged to buy carbon offsets to reduce the impact of the greenhouse gases it produces. It plans to convert Stewart International Airport into the nation’s first carbon-negative airport and has built a geothermal-powered building at John F. Kennedy International Airport. Over time, the Port Authority hopes to attract enough customers to its carbon-offset Web site to combine that money with the agency’s own credits and invest them together into local renewable energy and environmental cleanup projects, said Anthony R. Coscia, the agency’s chairman. The Port Authority could eventually add carbon offsets into the prices it charges at its facilities, he said. “Since we are right at the center of the largest city in the U.S. and operating a transportation network in that city, if we became a facilitator, we could make a difference,” Mr. Coscia said. “We want to create a way so that our money and our patrons’ money becomes a deep enough pool of capital to invest in things.” Critics of carbon offsets contend that drivers buy the credits to justify continuing to use their cars. They add that since some of the money from offsets is spent overseas, some people feel it has little direct impact on their lives. But transportation experts say that carbon-offset programs like the one the Port Authority is planning are better than spending little or nothing to reduce greenhouse gases. They add that tolling agencies now have more interaction with their customers, which gives the agencies more opportunities to work with them on an array of projects including carbon offsets. “With E-ZPass and electronic toll collection, a lot of tolling agencies feel a lot closer to their customers, and they try to make the driving public feel like the authority is concerned about their customers,” said Michael Kolb, a consultant at Traffic Technologies Inc.


Byliner, an Online Publisher of Long-Form Writing, Seeks Partners

Abstract: Byliner , a company that publishes long, literary journalism and fiction online and as e-books, told its contributors Tuesday that it has been struggling and is seeking partners to ensure its future. The company started in 2011 with some fanfare. It was among the first of a series of ventures to back deeper stories as a medium that might flourish, rather than suffer, in the fast-moving ecosystem of web journalism. It signed up known writers and attracted more attention when one of them, Jon Krakauer, the author of “Into The Wild,” wrote at length about flaws he had uncovered in the nonfiction work of Greg Mortenson, who wrote the best seller “Three Cups of Tea,” a book popular for its inspirational lessons on Afghanistan and Pakistan. Fiction writers whose works have been published on Byliner include Elmore Leonard, Carl Hiaasen and Jodi Picoult. “As for our own story,” the company wrote in an email to contributors, “it’s undergoing some changes. We’ve struggled to reach the level of growth we’d been hoping for the business, and thus we’ve begun conversations with possible partners about the future of Byliner.” The company declined to immediately provide more information. In 2012, Byliner and The New York Times began a collaboration on a line of short e-books. The Times has used Byliner to publish original e-books by David Leonhardt, Amy Harmon and Adam Liptak, among others. Other companies similar to Byliner are still publishing. The Atavist, which is also a technology platform, was backed shortly after its start by investors including Eric E. Schmidt of Google and the Silicon Valley investor Marc Andreessen. In addition to publishing long works of journalism, The Atavist licenses its software. Another writing platform, Medium, started by Evan Williams, a founder of Twitter, allows anyone to write on any topic.


Britain Remains a Dissenter as Europeans Try to Set Capital Reserves for Banks

Abstract: BRUSSELS — A meeting of European Union finance ministers turned a little unruly late Wednesday when George Osborne, Britain’s chancellor of the Exchequer, accused his counterparts of making him look like an “idiot” because he pushed for approval of stricter banking laws. When the meeting finally broke up, Britain stood mostly alone among 27 European Union member states after refusing to give its blessing to a deal on capital requirements for banks to fortify them against a future crisis. “Only one, maybe two, delegations disagreed in the end,” Margrethe Vestager, the economic minister of Denmark, told a news conference early on Thursday morning after 16 hours of talks. Ms. Vestager, whose country currently leads the rotating presidency of the organization, said she hoped the deal would be approved by all countries at a followup meeting of finance ministers on May 15. “We are very, very close” to completing the law, she said. Even if Britain still objected, the law could pass into force by a majority vote of other states and after approval by the European Parliament. Earlier in the day, Mr. Osborne challenged his fellow European finance ministers to carry out the international accord, known as Basel III, raising the minimum amount of capital that banks are required to hold. But after 10 hours of talks, a testy Mr. Osborne said that a deal on the table was inadequate because it failed to take into account his concerns and would subject Europe, and him, to ridicule at a time when the region was struggling to emerge from its debt crisis . “We’re not implementing the Basel agreement, as anyone who takes a look at this text will be able to tell you — every bank analyst, every financial journalist, every other finance ministry in the world would say that,” said Mr. Osborne, referring to Basel III, the accord to raise the minimum amount of capital that banks are required to hold. “I am not prepared to go out there and say something that would make me look like an idiot five minutes later,” Mr. Osborne said. Miroslav Kalousek, the Czech finance minister, shot back, “George, looking like an idiot is one of the basic qualifications for a minister.” That drew peals of laughter from assembled ministers at the late-night gathering in Brussels, but Mr. Osborne was infuriated by the jab. “I represent the largest banking industry around this table by far,” Mr. Osborne said solemnly. “You’ve got to allow me to sit down and go through the issues, and you have not done that for 10 hours,” he said. Mr. Osborne insisted that he was seeking rules that would be acceptable to regulators and authorities around the world including Jean-Claude Trichet, the former president of the European Central Bank, and his successor, Mario Draghi. “I will not be painted as somehow being anti-European or demanding something especially for London,” Mr. Osborne said. Other ministers attending the meeting raised strong concerns about the proposed text, including Jacek Rostowski, the Polish finance minister. Osborne said he supported efforts to reach a deal in negotiations that stretched well into Thursday morning. Wolfgang Schäuble, the German finance minister, also expressed some concern, but had said a deal still was within sight. But France’s finance minister, François Baroin, left the meeting before the dust-up to watch the French presidential debate on television. Reluctantly, Ms. Vestager agreed to continue the talks. The ministers had been seeking agreement on requirements for banks to hold capital reserves that would function as a cushion against future losses. The idea is to help avoid financial crises like the one brought on by the collapse of the American investment bank Lehman Brothers in 2008. The European Union faces a deadline of January 2013 to start phasing in rules agreed on by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision raising the minimum reserve to 7 percent of a bank’s assets. Backed by Sweden, Britain held firm to its demand that national regulators retain the option to require their banks to build up higher reserves than foreseen under a proposal by the European Commission, the European Union’s executive body, without prior approval. Britain has the largest banking sector in Europe in relation to gross domestic product, followed by Sweden, and has long fought efforts by the European authorities to exercise greater control over the City of London, the biggest financial center in Europe. But central governments in London and Stockholm are also extremely wary of putting taxpayers on the hook for future bailouts of their banking sectors. “My country has been very, very close to very deep problems in the banking sector twice and we don’t want to be there again,” Anders Borg, the Swedish finance minister, told his counterparts at the meeting earlier in the day. Mr. Borg sought to dismiss the view that Sweden and other nations that support more stringent requirements were seeking to attract more business for their sectors on the basis that they would be better capitalized than their rivals. “We are not trying to make our own banking system gain a competitive advantage to somebody else,” he said. “We are trying to safeguard our taxpayers and our society from the risks that a large banking sector is creating.” France and Austria are among nations that firmly opposed that view, saying that raising reserve requirements in one country could lead banks based there to reduce lending to their foreign subsidiaries, in turn damaging the economies of those nations.

Great Britain
European Sovereign Debt Crisis (2010- )
European Union
Banking and Financial Institutions
Basel Committee on Banking Supervision


Allstate Profit Drops 37% on Storm Losses

Abstract: CHICAGO (AP) — The Allstate Corporation , the property and casualty insurer, reported a 37 percent decline in fourth-quarter profit Tuesday on higher catastrophe losses and increased costs. Net income was $760 million, or $1.36 a share, compared with $1.21 billion, or $1.93 a share, in the fourth quarter of 2006. Revenue declined 1 percent to $8.99 billion, from $9.1 billion a year earlier. Analysts polled by Thomson Financial had forecast fourth-quarter profit of $1.32 a share on revenue of $8.86 billion. More frequent fall and winter storms sent the company’s catastrophe losses for the quarter to $472 million, from $279 million a year earlier. Allstate shares fell 25 cents in after-hours trading after closing down 42 cents at $52.25 before the report was released.


Italy: Berlusconi Defends ‘Burlesque’

Abstract: Former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi made a surprise appearance on Friday at a court in Milan where he is on trial on charges of abuse of power and paying for sex with an underage nightclub dancer. Speaking to reporters during a break in the trial, Mr. Berlusconi said that nothing untoward ever took place in his homes and that the dinners he hosted were “elegant” and “proper.” Responding to allegations by witnesses that women at the dinners, dressed as police officers and nuns, carried out stripteases, he explained that his guests were merely “practicing for burlesque competitions.” He added: “Women are exhibitionist by nature. And if they are in show business, they like to put on shows.”

Berlusconi Silvio
Suits and Litigation
Italy
Prostitution
Nightclubs and Cabarets
Politics and Government


Montclair Museum Show Features American Indian Works

Abstract: Wouldn’t it be nice if we could all live peacefully on this continent, engaging with nature in our myriad ways? History has not unfolded that way, of course. But you wouldn’t know it by visiting “Engaging With Nature: American and Native American Artists (A.D. 1200-2004)” at the Montclair Art Museum . Here, diverging views of nature are generally avoided. Instead, conflicts are smoothed over and a chorus of agreement rises from the walls. The most frequently cited common denominator is a “spiritual” approach to nature and art making. A watercolor by Charles Burchfield from 1945 shows a winter view of backyards seen from his studio in Gardenville, N.Y. The accompanying wall label says Burchfield saw nature “as a source of spirituality.” Next to it hangs a 2001 lithograph by G. Peter Jemison , a member of the Heron Clan of the Seneca Nation, with sketchy markings suggesting shadows and footprints in the snow. Mr. Jemison’s work is also described in spiritual terms, only through the filter of Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) beliefs. Oscar Bluemner’s 1930s nocturnal painting of a “Lent Evening” is said to reveal the “spiritual basis” of his Cézanne-inspired approach to nature. The same goes for the abstract paintings from the ’90s by Dan Namingha and Kay WalkingStick — although the leanings of these two are attributed to their Indian heritages, which are Tewa-Hopi and Cherokee-Winnebago, respectively. Elsewhere, terms like “magic” and that good old landscape-painting standby, “the sublime,” surface. Mark Rothko’s watercolor “Implements of Magic” from around 1945 shows his dual interest in Surrealist automatism and pictographs of American Indian art. Thomas Moran’s misty little canvas of the Snake River in northwestern Wyoming from about 1879 reflects romantic ideas of unbounded wilderness and the sublime. Moran, who worked in Manhattan and later East Hampton, made sketches of the Western landscape while accompanying Francis V. Hayden on his 1871 geological survey sponsored by the federal government and railroad concerns. A similarly complicated relationship between cultures caught in the tangle of western expansion is mentioned in passing on the wall label next to Albert Lorey Groll’s early-20th-century painting “Laguna River, New Mexico.” The local Indians were reportedly so impressed by Mr. Groll’s depictions of the landscape that they nicknamed him Chief Bald Head-Eagle Eye. But what, you are left to wonder as you look at Mr. Groll’s painting, did those Indians’ depictions of nature look like? Vitrines throughout the exhibition display a hodgepodge of Indian artifacts from different periods and locales: early-20th-century baskets used by Indian doctors (generally women) in California and colored with shells and bright mallard duck feathers; pottery from about 1200 A.D., made by the ancestral Puebloans and the early Anasazi of the Southwest; and wild-card objects like Arctic Eskimo boots made of sealskin and Inuit socks woven from grass. The exhibition is drawn from the museum’s collection, which might explain its shortcomings — although the Montclair Museum houses a notable collection of American Indian art. Where “Engaging Nature” falters is in skimming across the surface of objects and ignoring that sticky art bugaboo, context. After all, art is deeply cultural rather than natural. Not only have “Americans” and “Indians” often approached nature differently, but they have also had varying approaches to art and history, too. The European modern tradition works on that expansionist model, rewarding those who stake out new territory. So, while Rothko and his peers were lauded by critics for their “innovative” use of American Indian techniques and motifs, contemporary artists from cultures that value passing down and preserving aesthetic traditions end up looking dated and passé. In this show, Hans Hofmann’s gestural abstraction “Early Fall” from 1945 looks like a fresh vehicle for his signature push-pull approach to color application. However, recent paintings by contemporary Indian artists, which plug traditional materials like sand and tribal signifiers into the European-derived abstract equation, often seem uncomfortably derivative as they trot out, with academic seriousness, the modernism-plus-tribal-art formula. (Younger contemporary artists like Shana Moulton have more fruitfully mined this phenomenon, showing how American Indian art changes shape and meaning as it moves from the pueblo to the gift boutique to the big-box store, where you can buy mass-produced dream catchers , ceramics and polyester blankets with Anasazi motifs.) With all of this to consider, “Engaging Nature” feels like a missed opportunity to excavate and explore some of these ideas around art, nature and North America. But they could be taken up at a later date. After all, if you wander into the nearby exhibition of American Indian art at the Montclair Museum, another world opens up, suggesting a different set of possibilities.


Seeking a Fresh Start Without Limitations

Abstract: On a chilly October morning, Talea Childs, 4, still dressed in pajamas, bounced along the living room rug of a United States map. “Konnichiwa,” she greeted in Japanese, and bowed. Surrounded by shelves of her favorite books, she selected a thin volume and sat to read. “She’s been interested in books since she could belly over and look at the pages,” her mother, Trenicia Childs, said as Talea settled into the story. Ms. Childs is applying to kindergarten for next year — a notoriously rigorous process in New York City schools — and nurtures her daughter’s learning at home. A schedule taped to a cupboard by the kitchen lists Circle Time, Music/Movement, Storytelling, Cooking and other activities. Brushes, thick with paint, sit in a canister by the sink, and evidence of recent art projects lines the walls — abstract strokes of pinks, purples and green glitter. Also on the walls are posters of the solar system, the human body, the numbers through 100 and the words “large,” “small,” “run” and “walk” and associated words. While Talea read in the corner, Ms. Childs sorted through piles of housing documents. The Childses, who are among almost 565,000 people in New York State who receive some public assistance, according to state calculations in June, never expected to need help. Ms. Childs, 45, and her husband, Tarrell Childs, 40, an Air Force veteran, have college degrees and work force experience. While serving in the military for a decade as an account finance specialist, Mr. Childs worked through an injury in 1997 that gouged and blinded his right eye. A Bronx native, he returned there in 2003, working full time while studying English literature at Fordham University. He wrote short stories, plays and short film scripts late into the night. The couple met at Moca Bar and Lounge at a spoken word performance in Harlem in 2010. Mr. Childs wondered aloud what their children would be like on their second date. A year later they were married and expecting their daughter. With Mr. Childs’s steady income as a property manager, Ms. Childs postponed completing her master’s in education to raise their daughter. She was one certification shy of graduation. But Mr. Childs lost his job in 2014 when his company restructured because of financial problems. “That’s when we really started getting behind,” Ms. Childs said. With his G.I. Bill benefits set to expire, Mr. Childs dusted off his screenplays and applied to the New York Film Academy. He got in. He planned to work while going to school, but he found that an accelerated yearlong conservatory program packed with 12-hour days did not allow for extra time. Although the military covered his studies, the family exhausted its meager savings. With little time to search for jobs during school, Mr. Childs graduated in September 2015 without work. That month, bringing in just $594.98 in disability payments from Veterans Affairs, the Childses applied for public assistance, confronting a frustrating labyrinth of city departments and aid applications, according to documents provided by the family. They hoped the assistance would be temporary — keeping food on the table and bills paid on time — until they gained full-time employment. In October 2015, a month after they applied for aid, the city’s Human Resources Administration lost their paperwork. A month after that, the Homelessness Diversion Units forced them to reapply. And a month after that: the same story. Their debt quadrupled while they waited for paperwork to be fixed, and they faced imminent eviction after missing rent payments, the family said. With a worsened financial situation, the family was told that December that its rent was too high and its arrears too steep to qualify for assistance from the Homelessness Diversion Units, so it was referred to the Neighborhood Association for Inter-Cultural Affairs , a nonprofit organization providing housing intervention and assistance services. Image Ms. Childs, right, with her husband, Tarrell, and Talea. Credit Catholic Charities Archdiocese of New York That same month, the Childses found out they had qualified for public assistance through the Human Resources Administration. But two days later, another error closed their case, halting all public assistance, including food stamps. In early 2016, the Human Resources Administration reopened the case, and the family reapplied to the Neighborhood Association for Inter-Cultural Affairs. But a week later the nonprofit denied the application. Eventually, in February, the Human Resources Administration referred the family for an eviction prevention subsidy. “It felt personal,” Ms. Childs said. “It was one more stressor when there were already weeks we didn’t have enough food on the table.” In March, HomeBase, an eviction prevention program administered by Catholic Charities Archdiocese of New York, one of the eight organizations supported by The New York Times Neediest Cases Fund, helped them navigate the complicated application process — which included another errant application closing in April — and avoid eviction. By this time, the family was $12,193.46 in arrears. “It’s right out of a Kafka novel,” said Alice Kenny, the organization’s director of special projects. In May, Catholic Charities got the city to help settle the Childs family’s arrears with a lump sum of $12,083.46. Then in June, nine months after initially applying for a housing subsidy, they received their first payment, along with another conciliation notice threatening case closure. The family resolved the notice and now receives $960 a month toward rent from the city. Still, despite noting Mr. Childs’s veteran status in September 2015, the family was not referred to the proper office for public assistance for more than a year. Image Ms. Childs nurtures her daughter’s learning at home with books and posters and hopes to be able to get her into a challenging kindergarten program next school year. Credit Joshua Bright for The New York Times Last summer, Mr. Childs got a job as a substitute teacher. Working toward a teaching license while interning on film projects, he anticipates additional film work this year. In January, he began a work training program at a martial arts school in the Bronx, learning to become an instructor. Ms. Childs also temporarily worked at a part-time job with the federal Women, Infants and Children program. She has also taught English to children in their Bronx neighborhood and plans to return to school to study early childhood education and later open a toddler education program, based on the family’s educational approach at home. The family brings in $950 monthly, and currently has about $2,000 in rent arrears. HomeBase provided the family with $340 in July to buy a dresser and a toddler bed for Talea. Then in September, Catholic Charities provided $162.85 in Neediest Cases funds to cover the cost of Talea’s school clothes and bedding. Through public assistance, the family can use child care centers that are suggested and subsidized by the city. The family tried several of those education programs last year, but the workload and environment were not stimulating, Ms. Childs said, so she enrolled Talea at a Montessori school, where the family receives financial aid, in late October and doubled her efforts at home. The Childses have applied to five independent schools, where they believe Talea could thrive next school year, but the costs — estimated at $25,000 to $45,000 annually — are high. They have applied for financial aid to the schools through Early Steps , a nonprofit intended to increase diversity within kindergarten and first-grade classrooms in independent schools. Talea will find out in February if she is accepted to any of the schools. At night, the family dresses up and improvises plays, which Mr. Childs records. Many end in life lessons. Self-limitation is not one of them. While sitting on a park bench on a recent mother-daughter outing, Ms. Childs said, she had a conversation with another mother who did not agree that everyone deserved the same chances. Unaware that the Childs family receives welfare, the woman depicted recipients as sloths sitting at home, sending their children to overpriced day care centers. “But is that who we are?” Ms. Childs asked, recalling the conversation. “The assumption is if you’re on public assistance, you don’t want to work. Yes, we receive a check every month. But we also work and are involved in our kid’s life. We’re working hard to make something of ourselves. So, no, that’s not who we are at all.”