So the University of Cincinnati has hit the figurative, and literal, wall (HT to Doug Ross via e-mail):

A decade-long building boom at the University of Cincinnati is coming to an end.

Faced with accumulated deficits of about $155 million and cutting costs all around campus, UC has decided not to construct more buildings or contribute cash to neighborhood development projects until it figures a way out of its fiscal woes.

UC officials say the building projects, including popular places such as the Varsity Village complex and the MainStreet recreation center, were worth it to attract students, faculty and research funds. They also say they have helped improve neighborhoods surrounding the main campus, but projects depending on UC funds will be delayed.

….. The bottom line: As about 36,500 students start classes this week, the region’s largest university and biggest employer still has at least two years to go in executing a turnaround plan that will cut costs and increase pressure for more revenue in departments as wide-ranging as athletics and campus services.

….. UC’s top officials hope that will stop the bleeding from a decade of spending that has built up $1.2 billion in debt, with payments taking up about 7 percent of the university’s budget. This year, it cut $27 million to close a budget gap, including eliminating more than 100 jobs.

This would appear to mean, among other things, that the once-prosperous area south of campus between Calhoun and McMillan that was taken by eminent domain and leveled, only to have the taking ruled illegal (unfortunately after-the-fact, under then-applicable Ohio law), will earn its BizzyBlog nickname, “The Grassy Knoll,” for some time.

Back in March, Cliff Peale, the author of today’s report, called the consortium of neighborhood development projects “a development powerhouse.” How could he not have known that the statement wasn’t true then, as it obviously isn’t now?

Two heretofore virtually unrecognized names in reports about UC’s financial situation appeared in today’s Enquirer story:

UC trustees have supported President Nancy Zimpher’s budget-cutting program and say she is correcting problems that were in place before she arrived in 2003.

“The most important thing is that the administration and the board faced it head-on,” board member Buck Niehoff said. Enquirer President and Publisher Margaret Buchanan is one of nine UC trustees.

Well, at least Buchanan didn’t try to say that Zimpher, whom the Enquirer strangely deemed unquoteworthy, “faced it head-on.”

I wonder if someone’s nagging about Zimpher’s lack of association with UC’s financial troubles, even though she supposedly runs the place, and about a certain newspaper publisher’s usually-undisclosed presence on the Board of Trustees, had anything to do with the sudden appearance of these two former mystery women?

That’s not important. What is important is that the Enquirer is still giving Zimpher a 3-1/2 year pass on her tenure. That would be like the press covering a presidential incumbent continuing to blame the state of the economy on his predecessor four months before the next election.

The school’s trustees have gone well beyond the free-pass point, giving Zimpher a $30,000 bonus and an 8% raise.

The University, its students, its employees, the city, and the metro area deserve better.

From Yonkers, NY:

Original publication: September 11, 2007

To Kay Kendrick, today is “Heroes Day.”

“That’s what I call Sept. 11,” she said. There are two reasons for this, but only one is obvious.

Like all Americans, Kay will reflect on the brave sacrifices made by New York City firefighters and police officers who responded to the terrorist attacks at the World Trade Center on that late summer morning six years ago.

But she will also be thinking about her husband, Frank, who, as it happened, died in the act of saving a life exactly one year later, on the anniversary of Sept. 11. Ever since, the day has held intensely personal, as well as patriotic, meaning to Kay Kendrick.

Capt. Frank Kendrick was the Yonkers dock master and member of the U.S. Volunteer Life-Saving Corps, who for nearly a half-century kept vigil from his post at the historic Yonkers Pier on the Hudson River.

Estimates are that he pulled between 25 and 40 people out of the river after they fell, or jumped, in. Frank never kept count of the lives he saved, but Kay, who witnessed each and every rescue, puts the number at 30.

Bob Walters, a friend of the Kendricks, remembered how Frank once even saved a sea gull that was entangled in a fishing line. All life was precious to Frank.

When I first met Frank about eight years ago, we talked about his exploits and love for the Life-Saving Corps. His rescues, he told me, were always made from a boat. He never went into the water and rarely got wet. Using a life ring and his big, brawny arms, Frank invariably pulled the victims to safety before they could disappear under the waves. The tough, old salt told me he didn’t consider himself a hero. He was just doing his job.

“I know he said that,” Kay recalled. “But he was my hero.”

The morning of Sept. 11, 2002, was clear, but the Hudson was wind-whipped. “The water was churning and it was treacherous,” Kay remembered.

No one was around at the pier except Frank, Kay and a mysterious young woman. Kay said the woman’s behavior instantly made her anxious. She had seen the body language of would-be suicides so many times before.

“She went out to the pier and was just standing by the railing, looking at the water,” Kay said of the woman “And the wind was blowing and blowing. I just had the feeling she was going to do something. I called Frank on my walkie-talkie. He said, ‘All right, just keep an eye on her.’ He said, ‘I’ll be right over.’ “

Kay momentarily turned her back on the woman to see if Frank was coming.

“And then I heard the scream for help,” Kay recalled. “She climbed over the rail, because it’s a high rail. She had went in.”

By the time Frank arrived, it was too late to get a boat. He knew that this time he would have to jump into the river and swim. “I have to go in,” he told Kay.

Carrying a life ring attached to a rope, Frank struggled through the choppy water and reached the woman, who clung to him. At one point, Kay could see the water going over Frank’s head. She desperately radioed a Mayday.

Rescuers got there in a Yonkers Fire Department patrol boat and pulled the two out of the river. The woman was OK. But the stress was too much for Frank’s heart and he died. He was 71 years old. …..

Go here for the rest of the story.