Election reform, bridge repairs top Miami-Dade Commission agenda

Miami-Dade commissioners are expected Wednesday to urge the state legislature to allow Election Day voters to drop off their absentee ballots at their local precincts, and ask the mayor to identify funding to repair and upgrade the county’s 203 bridges.

Returning absentee ballots to local precincts was one of 13 recommendations in a report by an Election Advisory Group that needs local and state approval to become law. Now, absentee ballots can only be returned to election headquarters in Doral.

The advisory group, created after the embarrassing November presidential election saw people waiting in lines for up to six hours, also wants to change the name of absentee ballots to “Vote by Mail.”

Other recommended voting changes include expanding early voting days from eight to 14, including the last Sunday before an election; expanding the number of permissible voting sites; limiting ballot language on constitutional amendments to 75 words; and expanding the number of days elections supervisors are allowed to total and check votes from 15 to 20.

Commissioners are also expected Wednesday to urge Mayor Carlos Gimenez to identify funding sources to repair the county’s bridges. The county estimates that over the next two decades it will need as much as $450 million for repairs. The issue came to light in early January when the county was forced to close down the west-bound half of Bear Cut Bridge leading to Key Biscayne, after structural flaws were found.

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Worn Out? Stars Step Out in Same Style

Shailene Woodley vs. Gemma Arterton

Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters star Gemma Arterton sported this black Stella McCartney tuxedo jumpsuit to the British Fashion Awards -- a look that has already been worn by The Descendants breakout star Shailene Woodley to the 2012 MTV Movie Awards. Both paired the designer jumpsuit with Stella McCartney shoes, though Shailene went with a chic pair of strappy sandals, while Gemma sported a more daring pair of chunky platform wedges.

Who looks best in the sexy menswear-inspired look, Shailene or Gemma?

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Sen. Golden backs Lhota for mayor

The dean of New York City’s Republican elected officials is backing Joe Lhota for mayor, The Post has learned.

“I’m a Lhota guy. Joe Lhota is the only guy who has a chance to win,” said state Sen. Martin Golden (R-Brooklyn).

And Golden predicted that most — if not all — of the city’s eight elected GOP lawmakers will end up supporting Lhota.

“A lot of the elected leaders will go with Lhota,” he said. “There will be an endorsement across-the-board.”

Golden’s endorsement of Lhota puts him at odds with his GOP Brooklyn chairman, Craig Eaton, who is backing former Bronx Borough President Adolfo Carrion, a former Democrat turned independent who is expected to run on the Independence Party line while also seeking GOP support.

Robert Miller

Joe Lhota

Golden, a 15-year legislative veteran, said he also admires supermarket mogul John Catsimatidis, whom he described as a “great guy” and a “real leader.”

But he concluded that Lhota, the former MTA chairman and deputy mayor under Rudy Giuliani, has “been on the ground longer” with more knowledge to address city issues.

The Independence Party is expected to endorse Carrion at a meeting tonight.

But because he’s not a registered Republican, Carrion needs support from three of the city’s five GOP county committees for the right to run in a Republican primary. He only has the support of two — Eaton of Brooklyn and Bronx GOP chairman Jay Savino.

Meanwhile Catsimatidis today will press for a break on property tax assessments for owners whose homes were damaged or destroyed during Hurricane Sandy.

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Remote employees require care to feel like part of the team

Working from home, hundreds of miles away from your boss, may sound like a perk, but that’s not always the case.

Ken Condren remembers the moment when he experienced the frustration his remote employees face. He was working from home, participating in a conference call and heard a side conversation going on, but had no idea what was being said. “I felt so out of the loop,” Condren recalls.

Today, businesses want the talent they want – and are more willing to hire or retain someone to fill a job even if they live or move thousands of miles away. Yet even with a great number of employees working remotely, nobody wants to be that guy who doesn’t get the inside joke during a conference call.

When the success of a team depends on the people, and all the people are scattered, it’s the manager who must make sure relationships stay vital and productivity high. Getting the most out of remote workers takes a manager who knows how to motivate and communicate from a distance. “Virtual workers still need a personal connection,” says strategic business futurist Joyce Goia, president of The Herman Group. “They want camaraderie and to feel like they are part of a team.”

More managers are using technologies such as videoconferencing, instant messenger and other collaborative software to help make remote workers feel like they are “there” in the office. Not being able to speak face-to-face can quickly be solved with Skype, Face Time or simple VoIP systems.

Condren, vice president of technology at C3/CustomerContactChan-

nels in Plantation, uses Microsoft Lync to connect virtually with a team spread across geographies and time zones. Employees see a green light on their screen when a colleague is available, signaling it’s a good time to video chat or instant message. Instead of meeting in physical conference rooms, team members get together in a virtual work room where they can hold side conversations during conference calls or meet in advance to prepare for the call. “You lose the visibility of waving hands during an in person meeting, but we can build that with virtual workspaces.”

Beyond that, Condren says he holds weekly video conference calls with his staff to help his remote workers become better team players. He also sets aside 45 minutes to an hour each week to check in with his remote workers. “It’s a little extra effort to make sure they are giving me the updates that happen casually in the office.”

Condren says adapting to a virtual workforce has allowed him to hire talent in any geographic market with the skill set he wants. And he has been able to hire them at competitive salaries.

In the current economy, such flexibility can be critical for a company looking to attract top talent. CareerBuilder’s Jennifer Grasz says the recession has created a less transient workforce, making it difficult for workers to sell their homes and relocate. “Employers are turning to remote work opportunities to navigate the skills deficit.”

Even from a distance, managers say there are ways to hone in on remote workers who are having problems. Billie Williamson managed virtual teams as a partner for Ernst & Young and would focus on the tone of someone’s voice during a group conference call. She would even listen for silences. “Silence can mean consent, or it can mean the person you’re not hearing disagrees or is disengaged.” If she sensed a team member was lacking engagement, she would follow up immediately.

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‘Animal walk’ to help rescue groups find homes for pets

When Laurie Hoffman decided to foster Gracie, a 3-year-old mixed toy greyhound who was found running in the streets and getting caught in the grates of a bridge in downtown Miami, she didn’t expect to keep her.

But she couldn’t help it.

“Many of us have gotten to a point in our lives where we want to give back. We want to be able to help others who can’t help themselves,” said Hoffman, associate executive director at the Humane Society of Greater Miami. “We chose the animals because that’s our passion.”

And it’s this same passion that she hopes many people will feel on Saturday, when this year, for the first time, Walk for the Animals, a yearly event held by the Humane Society of Greater Miami, is launching an “adoption arena.” There, attendees can adopt pets from the Humane Society, an animal shelter, and local animal rescue groups.

“Every step counts!” is the slogan for the walk that will take place on Feb. 23. Registration will open at 8:30 a.m., and the event runs through noon at Bayfront Park, 301 N. Biscayne Blvd.

There will be music, games, prizes, product samples and food after 9 a.m. The one-mile walk around the park will begin at 10 a.m.

The minimum donation for an individual walker is $50, and it includes a Walk T-shirt, a goodie bag and a dog bandana.

Attendees are encouraged to form packs or teams with their family and friends.

Eleven rescue groups are confirmed to attend, but Danijela Kandera, 35, manager of marketing and corporate development at the Humane Society, expects more to join.

“We are already hoping to fundraise enough with the Walk,” said Kandera. “But we are also here to help other organizations because we are all working together for the same goal, which is helping the animals.”

The goal is to reach $50,000 and find new homes for the pets.

“In order for us to care for the 300 animals that are here every day and to provide the programs or services that we do, we need to raise money,” said Hoffman.

Each group will take about five to 10 pets, and all animals set for adoption are spayed, neutered and microchipped.

Requirements for adoption vary per group.

Kandera recommends that interested adopters bring a valid ID and a checkbook.

Tents will be set in the arena for each rescue group. All costs are sponsored by Pet Supermarket.

“Our No. 1 priority is animals, whether it is the ones that we sell, the ones that come into our store or the ones we have for adoption,” said Steve Renzelmann, 49, regional manager of Pet Supermarket.

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Stars Without Makeup!

Naomi Watts

February 19, 2013

Oscar nominee Naomi Watts wasn't afraid to show off her less glamorous side riding her bike completely makeup-free in New York City.

ALSO IN THIS GALLERY:

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Google's stock price breaks $800 for 1st time

SAN FRANCISCO — Google's stock price topped $800 for the first time Tuesday amid renewed confidence in the company's ability to reap steadily higher profits from its dominance of Internet search and prominence in the increasingly important mobile device market.

The milestone comes more than five years after Google's shares initially hit $700. Not long after breaking that barrier in October 2007, the economy collapsed into the worst recession since World War II and Google's stock tumbled into a prolonged malaise that eventually led to a change in leadership.

Getty Images

Besides enriching Google's employees and other shareholders, the company's resurgent stock is an implicit endorsement of co-founder Larry Page. He replaced his managerial mentor, Eric Schmidt, as CEO in April 2011. Google's stock has risen by about 35 percent since Page took over. By contrast, the benchmark Standard & Poor's 500 index has climbed by 15 percent over the same stretch. Most of Google's gains have occurred in the past seven months.

In morning trading, Google's stock was at $802.34, up 1.2 percent, or $9.45.

The significance of crossing the $800 threshold is largely symbolic. If Google had its way, the stock wouldn't even be priced near these levels. The company, which is based in Mountain View, Calif., had hoped to split its stock last year in a move that would have at least temporarily halved the trading price by doubling the total number of outstanding shares. But the proposed stock split was put on hold until Google resolves a shareholder lawsuit alleging that the stock split unfairly cedes too much power to Page and fellow co-founder Sergey Brin. Page and Brin have been the company's largest shareholders since its inception. A trial on the lawsuit is scheduled to begin June 17 in a Delaware state court.

Assuming more investors wouldn't have bought the stock had it split, the company's market value probably wouldn't have changed from its current level of about $265 billion.

There is little dispute among analysts that Google appears well positioned for many years of prosperity. The reasons: Its Internet search engine remains the hub of the Web's biggest marketing network; its YouTube video site has established itself as an increasingly attractive advertising vehicle; and its free Android software is running on more than 600 million smartphones and tablet computers to create even more opportunities to sell ads.

The lower prices attached to mobiles ads have raised recurring concerns on Wall Street about the decline in the average rate paid for ads that run alongside Google's search results. The company, though, is trying to reverse the trend with upcoming changes to its ad system that will prod more marketers to buy mobile ads when they are creating campaigns for desktop and laptop computers.

Opinions about Google weren't as upbeat a few years ago. Although Google weathered the Great Recession better than most companies, its revenue growth slowed and its stock plummeted to as low as $247.30 near the end of 2008.

Things looked so bleak in 2009 that Google took the rare step of re-pricing stock options that had been doled out to its employees to give them a chance to make more money when the shares rebounded. The program allowed Google workers to swap their old stock options for new ones with an exercise price of about $308.

Even after the economy snapped out of the recession toward the end of 2009, Google's stock began to lag the rest of the market. Investors began to wonder if the company was losing its competitive age as it morphed from a hard-charging startup to giant organization with thousands of employees working in dozens of offices scattered around the world.

At the same time, Facebook was emerging as the Internet's fastest growing company in a meteoric rise. The social networking company had some people convinced it would eventually become a more important advertising vehicle than Google's search engine.

Perceptions have changed since Page became CEO. Under Page's leadership, Google has streamlined its decision-making and operations while closing dozens of services. It established its own toehold in social networking with the 2011 introduction of Google Plus.

Meanwhile, Facebook Inc. has lost much of the luster that made its initial public offering of stock one of the biggest in U.S. history. Since going public at $38, Facebook's stock has sunk 25 percent.

By contrast, Google's stock has never slipped below its August 2004 IPO price of $85.

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Sign up for Feb. 21 Miami Herald Small Business Forum featuring Zumba’s CEO, 4 interactive panels

Prepare your best pitch for the Miami Herald’s Small Business Forum on Thursday, Feb. 21, at the south campus of our sponsor, Florida International University.

In addition to how-to panels and inspirational stories from successful entrepreneurs, our annual small business forum will include interactive opportunities with experts to learn about financing options and polish your personal and business brands.

During our finance panel, audience volunteers will be invited to explain their financing needs to the group. During our box-lunch session, they will be invited to pitch their business or personal brand to our coaches.

Those who prefer just to listen will be treated to a keynote address by Alberto Perlman, co-founder of the global fitness craze Zumba (see bio below). Panels include success stories from the local entrepreneurs who founded Sedano’s, Jennifer’s Homemade and ReStockIt.com; finance tips from experts in small business loans, venture capital, angel investments and traditional bank loans; and insiders in the burgeoning South Florida tech start-up scene. Scroll down to see the panelists’ bios

Plus, it’s a real bargain. $25 includes the half-day seminar, continental breakfast and a box lunch.

Register here.

Program

8 a.m.

Registration and continental breakfast, provided by Bill Hansen Catering

8:30 a.m. Welcome

Host: David Suarez, president and CEO, Interactive Training Solutions, LLC

•  Jerry Haar, PhD, associate dean & director, FIU Eugenio Pino and Family Global

Entrepreneurship Center

•  Alice Horn, executive director, Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship (NFTE South Florida)

•  Jane Wooldridge, Business editor, The Miami Herald

Miami Herald Business Plan Challenge Overview:

•  Nancy Dahlberg, Business Plan Challenge coordinator, The Miami Herald

8:45 a.m. Session I – Success Stories

Moderator: Jerry Haar, PhD, associate dean & director, FIU Eugenio Pino and Family Global

Entrepreneurship Center

Speakers:

•  Jennifer Behar, founder, Jennifer’s Homemade

•  Matt Kuttler, co-president of ReStockIt.com

•  Javier Herrán, chief marketing officer, Sedano’s Supermarkets

10 a.m. Session II – All about Tech

Moderator: Jane Wooldridge, Business editor, The Miami Herald

Speakers

•  Susan Amat, founder, Launch Pad Tech

•  Nancy Borkowski, executive director, Health Management Programs, Chapman Graduate School of

Business, Florida International University

•  Chris Fleck, vice president of mobility solutions at Citrix and a director of the South Florida Tech Alliance

•  Charles Irizarry, co-founder and director of product architecture, Rokk3r Labs

11:15 a.m. Keynote

Speaker: Alberto Perlman, CEO and co-founder of Zumba® Fitness

Introduction: Jane Wooldridge, business editor, The Miami Herald

11:45 a.m. Session III – Show me the money: Financing your small business

An interactive session featuring audience volunteers who will be invited to make a short investment pitch before a panel, including experts in microlending, SBA loans, traditional bank loans, venture capital and angel investing. Audience volunteers should come prepared with a two-minute presentation that includes details about current backing, how much money they are seeking and a brief synosis of ow that money would be used.

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Leader of Coconut Grove school to be honored

After 45 years of educating children at Vanguard School of Coconut Grove, Director John Havrilla will retire. His life’s work of helping over 3,000 students with varying learning difficulties will be celebrated at the school’s upcoming annual gala.

Havrilla and four other teachers from Vanguard School in Pennsylvania opened the Miami school with just 13 students in 1968. Along the way Havrilla has been honored and praised for his commitment. The Association of Independent Schools of Florida gave him the Distinguished Educator Award for developing a program to successfully mainstream students with learning disabilities into traditional classrooms or other school settings.

The nonprofit school’s motto is “Never, never quit.”

"I have enjoyed the experience of working with all the teachers, students and parents over the past 45 years,” Havrilla said. “It has been very rewarding to watch our students grow and become successful adults. My interest has always to been to help children and I have always tried to do my best to do just that."

Alumni, parents and staff are invited to the gala starting at 7 p.m., March 9 at Shake-A-Leg Miami. Tickets are $75. The volunteer parent group, the Vanguardians, is also holding fundraising for a commemorative tile mosaic wall as a tribute to Havrilla and the school. Current parents, alumni parents and all students may purchase and personalize a tile to add to this ongoing memorial.

For information on gala tickets or to purchase a commemorative tile call 305-445-7992 or write vangcg@aol.com. Vanguard School has individualized programs for first through eighth grade students with learning difficulties and/or attention deficit disorder. For more about the school check www.vanguardschool.com.

“EYES ON THE EARTH” FESTIVAL

The DuMond Conservancy will host a festival to celebrate the Earth from 1-4:30 p.m., Feb. 23 at Monkey Jungle, 14805 SW 216th St.

Dr. Kate Detwiler, one of the members of the history-making team that discovered the Lesula monkey last year in the Democratic Republic of Congo, will deliver the festival’s keynote address.

This youth-led festival will feature performances by Momentum Dance Company, and Brazilian dancers and drummers. There will also be a play written by New World School of the Arts drama student Kaithleen Conoepan, an Eco Fashion Show, and family activities to show ways our community can contribute in conservation.

Pre-sale tickets to the festival are $15 for adults, $10 for children (5-18 years) and students, and free for children under five years of age. Family tickets (two adults and up to three children) are $30. Admission to the festival also includes admission into Monkey Jungle. Buy online because tickets at the door are $29.95 for adults, $23.95 for children ages three to nine, and free for children under three. Pre-sale tickets can be purchased at www.dumondconservancy.eventbrite.com.

39 YEARS OF CHICKEN BBQ

Amazing slow-cooked, fall-off-the-bone chicken meals for $9 are what make the annual Chicken BBQ of the Silver Palm United Methodist Men a 39-year success story in rural Redland. This year the event will be on Feb. 23 with takeout meals served starting at 2:30 p.m. from the bright red First National Bank of South Florida trailer at the front of the parking lot at 15855 SW 248th St. (Coconut Palm Drive)

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Mindy McCready Death Marks Fifth Celebrity Rehab Fatality

Mindy McCready's tragic death on Sunday makes her the fifth Celebrity Rehab patient to have died after appearing on the show. So, how did the show's leader, Dr. Drew, react to the recent news?

The celebrity doctor told Buzz Feed in part: "I am deeply saddened by this awful news. My heart goes out to Mindy's family and children. She is a lovely woman who will be missed by many. Although I have not treated her for few years, I had reached out to her recently upon hearing about the apparent suicide of her boyfriend and father of her younger children. She was devastated. Although she was fearful of stigma and ridicule she agreed with me that she needed to make her health and safety a priority."

RELATED: More Details Into McCready's Death

However, McCready, who died at age 37, did not seek help and for that matter, neither did former Celeb Rehab member and Alice In Chains bassist Mike Starr, who passed away in March 2011 at age 44 due to a prescription drug overdose.

RELATED: Country Stars React to McCready's Death

Then, in May 2011 Grease actor Jeff Conaway died of an accidental drug overdose at the age of 60. Up next, police brutality victim Rodney King passed away in June 2012 at age 47 of "accidental drowning" that was believed to be caused from drug use. Then, Real World star Joey Kovar was found dead in August 2012 in Chicago. He passed away at age 29, with his cause of death said to be from "opiate intoxication."

Despite five deaths, the VH1 reality series is said to return for a fifth season on Sept. 16, according to the show's website.

RELATED VIDEO: What Can McCready's Last ET Interview Tell Us?

Should Celebrity Rehab still be on the air? Is the show to blame?

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