News Cut: December 26, 2007 Archive

The most intriguing person of the year

Posted at 5:28 AM on December 26, 2007 by Bob Collins (2 Comments)

Who was the most intriguing person you met this year?

For many of us, even though we didn't meet him personally, Jeremy Hernandez is high on the list.

Even if he hadn't helped rescue dozens of kids on a school bus when the I-35W bridge collapsed, he might've qualified just because he decided going fishing up north with his grandmother was more important than a photo op with President Bush. And in the aftermath of the collapse, there've been profiles after profiles of bridge victims. Jeremy Hernandez has never appeared in any of them.

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When one person can lead many lives

Posted at 1:07 PM on December 26, 2007 by Bob Collins (0 Comments)

The holidays have brought a plethora of organ donation-related stories.

The Shakopee Valley News has the sobering story of Sidney Markie, a 5 month old who needs a new stomach, pancreas, large and small intestine, liver and both kidneys. And the operation, which would need to be performed in Miami, has to happen all at once. So the girl's family "has to pray for another infant to die from SIDS or an accident since the chances of a healthy baby dying at birth are unlikely and a sick baby’s organs are less likely to be useable," according to the article.

The family has waged the insurance war, with doctors in Miami agreeing to accept payment
at the rate Minnesota would charge if the operation were taking place here.

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How bad is it... really?

Posted at 1:15 PM on December 26, 2007 by Bob Collins (1 Comments)

Sometimes, the stories about housing values can make you think you should be out on the ledge, even if you don't feel like jumping. Take the story that was posted this afternoon on the New York Times' Web site, "Home prices fall for 10th straight month."

The decline in home prices accelerated and spread to more regions of the country in October, according to a series of private indexes released Wednesday.

Prices fell 6.1 percent from October 2006 in 20 large metropolitan areas, according to Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller indexes, compared with a 4.9 percent decline in September. All but three of the 20 regions saw real estate values fall, and even the three places — Seattle, Portland, Ore., and Charlotte, N.C. — where prices were up from a year ago saw prices fall from a month earlier.

The survey meaasures price changes of the same property over time, instead of calculating a median price of homes sold during the month. The guy who runs it described the state of the single family home market as "grim."

Sounds serious, and I guess it is. But check out the corresponding price of single family housing for Minneapolis since 2000.

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