The unemployment rate for March was 8.4 percent, while the city’s construction industry’s payrolls fell by more than 12 percent since last year.

The housing industry is not much better. Median home prices are down 14 percent, year over year, and almost 9 percent of mortgage loans were delinquent in March, up from February.

Even when home prices stop falling they are unlikely to rise, either in Mobile or the nation. Housing’s shadow inventory – properties that are near, or going through, foreclosure – is forcing home prices down, while interest rates, which have been near zero since the recession, are eventually going to increase. And rising interest rates make it less appealing to buy a home.

“Is there a housing bottom? Yes, there’s going to be a bottom – prices aren’t going to zero. But a bottom and a recovery are two different things,” said Lance Roberts, CEO of Streettalk.

That is because short-term interest rates are currently below 1 percent, while mortgage rates, which track with the ten-year Treasury bond, sit at 3.83 percent – the lowest it’s been since the 1950s. Treasury notes are very popular among investors due to uncertainty in Europe and less than stellar job growth in the U.S. These historically low rates cannot continue forever, said Roberts, and when they rise people will be less willing to buy a home.

Essentially, this means that when home prices stop falling, they won’t automatically start rising. They might just stay depressed.

“People are assuming that it’s a good time to buy a house right now as prices come roaring back – that’s not the case,” Roberts said.

While lower prices present an opportunity for homebuyers in a position to buy a home, there’s a good chance they will get hurt if prices don’t rise. In the long term, they will be stuck with an asset that is not likely to appreciate anytime soon. So, homebuyers today won’t be able to buy more house tomorrow.

The specter of higher interest rates is not the only things keeping home prices down. A vast morass of foreclosed, or soon-to-be foreclosed, homes hang over the market. Foreclosed homes sell, according to Beata Caranci, deputy chief economist at TD Bank, for 20 to 30 percent lower than normal.

The number of mortgage loans in foreclosure and the number of loans who haven’t made a payment in 90 days ticked up to 9.7 percent in December 2011, according to Foreclosure-Response.org. This is up half a percentage point from June.

While the current supply of homes is around six months, a number that is considered healthy, an additional six to nine months exists in the shadow market, according to Guy Lebas, an analyst for Janney, Montgomery and Scott.

“The main problem is supply and demand,” said Lebas. “It is still not favorable.”

Scott McMahan is well versed in both the supply and demand sides of housing.

McMahan took advantage of Mobile’s low prices and bought his dream house in April. It has five bedrooms, five bathrooms and a three-car garage. There’s a playground for his two children and a big lawn for them to play with. It even came with a riding lawn mower.

Originally listed for $360,000, McMahan purchased his dream house for less than $300,000.

There’s only one catch: McMahan still owns his other home.

McMahan sits uniquely positioned in Mobile’s housing market, playing both the role of opportune buyer and unlucky seller.

“I’m trying to think positively,” McMahan said.

Scott, 44, is a salesman for telecommunications fiber optic cable company and his wife Sharon, 41, is a c.p.a. Together they scrimped and saved until they were able to afford the down payment on their new home. It didn’t hurt that mortgage interest rates are at an all-time low.

But the same conditions that allowed the McMahans to afford their dream house are now thwarting their efforts to sell their old one. It is like a yoke around Scott’s neck.

He can’t sell his home for a price that will allow him to break even, so he’s forced to become something that he never wanted to be – - a landlord.

“I’m going to rent it out at a price that allows me to break even,” McMahan said. “Just as long as they don’t destroy the place, I’m okay. I can wait out the next couple of years, until the price is good enough to sell.” He may have to wait longer than that.

McMahan is something of an oddity among recent homebuyers in Mobile. The current housing market is especially kind to first-time homebuyers who qualify for a federal loan, and investors, many of whom are new to the business, ready and able to buy a home for cheap and rent it out.

“Seventy-five to eighty percent of the people I work with are investors,” said real estate agent Parrish Walker. “It’s a huge opportunity.”

This new investment opportunity has brought on new investors not traditionally involved in real estate.

“I’m seeing a different type of investor than I used to. Less sophisticated buyers, more of the common man,” said Walker. “Instead of being very wealthy person, there are a lot of middle-class people who are using savings to buy homes at good prices.”

One of her customers bought a foreclosed home for $15,000 and spent another $15,000 fixing it up. The house is now being rented out at $685 a month.

Port City Realty broker Julie Marin sees much of the same.

“We sell a lot of home to investors. At one point prices were inflated, right now they seem abnormally low,” Martin said.

Investors are not the only winners in the current housing market in Mobile. First-time homebuyers, with the help of Federal Housing Authority (FHA) loans, are also snatching up properties.

“I have adult children and they really exciting about the deals that they’re getting,” Martin said.

The people who are being hurt by the current market are homeowners who want to buy a new home, but are stuck with their old one. From realtor Brian Baxter’s vantage point, most properties for sale are a result of homeowners who have to leave Mobile because of their job.

“Most sellers have to sell because of a job,” Baxter said.

Walker has seen this lack of mobility first-hand.

“The person in the $200,000 house wants to move into a $300,000 house, but there is no one to buy his house,” she said. Many of would-be buyers are finding it difficult to secure financing from a bank because of more stringent lending requirement.

McMahan was able to buy his dream home because he qualified for a loan.

Whether or not McMahan will be able to unload his old house for a profit in the next couple of years depends on upcoming interest rates, the bottleneck of foreclosured and soon-to-be foreclosed homes and how those factors affect Mobile’s market.

In the meantime, McMahan and his family will enjoy life in their new dream home and hope to have good luck with renters. They will also do what homeowners across the nation are doing –rebuilding their nest egg.

“We’re going to have a stay-cation and cut back until we build back up our savings,” Scott said. “We’re going to live meager for a while.”

Check out this interactive map of other middle market housing markets

TAYLOR: Aaron Ryoo learned about a condition called fistula-in-ano almost a year ago.

He was volunteering in a free clinic in Nepal and a doctor asked if he wanted to observe a surgery. It was Aaron’s first time in a surgical theater.

A man in his late-forties was wheeled into the cavernous room with his legs hoisted in the air by what looked like stirrups. Basically, the poor soul had not passed a bowel movement in a few weeks and his rectum had finally succumbed to the built-up pressure.

RYOO: It’s like plugging a water hose with a rock…it’s going to explode. And that’s what happened to his anal canal, it exploded. And so there were six separate passageways, canals, whatever you want to call it, coming from his ass.

TAYLOR: Aaron was in Nepal because he needed volunteer experience. He needed volunteer experience because medical schools like volunteer experience. Aaron wants to be a doctor.

He wants to be a doctor so badly that he’s spent the past few years and $10,000 paying for things like volunteering in Nepal. He did this to beef up his resume for med school admission boards.

Aaron returned to New York transformed by his experience in Nepal. He knew that being a doctor was what he was meant to do.

Ryoo applied to more than twenty schools. He waited to hear back. Crickets.

RYOO: Knowing that I didn’t get in this time, fine, maybe I’ll have next year to make it in. But, there’s also this thought in your mind that you are doing this whole thing and you still might not get in, and that means the last three years of my life have been a waste, in a way.

Aaron didn’t get into school this last time because he lacked research experience. So, he’s been interning, free of charge, for an economist.

The amount of money and time Aaron has spent augmenting his c.v. is a problem for New York and the country as a whole.

The problem is that after spending so much time and money, Aaron will become a specialist, not a primary care doctor.

And the country is desperate for primary care doctors.

More specifically, it is the poor who need primary care doctors. The Upper East Side, for instance, has eight times as many family care physicians as the South Bronx.

South Bronx residents are in a primary care desert.

Michael Needleman, on the other hand, is going to med school to be a primary care doctor.

Michael wants to get to know his patients’ faces, ingrain himself in a community, be a part of their daily lives. He doesn’t care if this pays less.

MICHAEL: I feel that personally money just isn’t enough to justify my going into medicine. There are just so many more things like – I went to a very good college. I could have become an i-banker, I could make much more money that I could make as a neurosurgeon. Diverting this much time and effort to caring for people is a very different game.

TAYLOR: Michael, unlike Aaron, does not have student loan debt from undergrad. And because of admission fee waivers it cost him a lot less than Aaron to apply to school.

Aaron understands the need for primary care doctors, but the appeal of becoming a specialist, such as oncologist or neurosurgeons, is just so much greater.

Not only will he stand to earn almost three times more money as a specialist, but the work itself is more interesting. Oncologists get rid of cancer. Neurosurgeons operate on the brain. Primary care doctors, well they hand out Tylenol.

AARON: 99 percent of your things are going to be, “he’s got the flu, he’s got a headache.” It’s all going to be very simple and tedious. And I do want to help people, but I also want to do something that I find interesting.

Taylor: And after running through the medical school application gauntlet, after spending thousands of dollars and years of his life in pursuit of a lifelong dream, after traveling around the world and paying organizations to let him volunteer for them, can you really blame Aaron for becoming the kind of doctor he now wants to be?

Taylor Tepper, in New York

HOST: Flooding in the Gowanus Canal is all too familiar to Park Slope residents. New York City’s Department of Environmental Protection is doing something about it – by 2030.

Last week, city officials announced a multi-million dollar effort to stop sewage from running into rivers and creeks, and stop water from drowning avenue blocks. A third of that is dedicated toward the Gowanus Canal.

The money is part of the city’s 20-year plan to create green infrastructure to clean up the superfund site.

Taylor Tepper has this report.

TEPPER: Imagine walking down Park Slope’s busy 4th Avenue and seeing a drain-water ditch covered in plants and soil and vegetation – kind of like a lowered garden.

Imagine roofs covered with blue-tiles that collect rainwater.

You would be looking at a bioswale and a blue roof. Both are part of the city’s “green infrastructure” plan that will, hopefully, end sewage from seeping into the Gowanus Canal.

It just might also stop the Gowanus from flooding.

Joann Amaitrano owns a building on 4th Ave and President Street. The property has been in her family for more than a century. And so too has the flooding.

JOANN (11 Sec.): It’s a nightmare. I could be out having a great time with my friends, and I’ll rush home to sandbag. And every one thinks I’m crazy, but now all my friends help me sandbag because they’ve seen how bad it can be.

TEPPER: And it can get pretty bad. Root Hill Café, a trendy coffee joint on the ground level of her building, flooded twice in one day last summer. That forced them to shut down and clean up the mess – which isn’t cheap.

TEPPER (4 Sec): How much money can it cost you?

JOANN: Thousands a year.

TEPPER: The problem is something called Combined Sewage Overflow. Basically, the same pipes that deal with the stuff that comes from bathrooms also deals with rainwater from the street.

So when there is a downpour, Gowanus’ sewage system is overrun and a combination of bathroom stuff and rainwater leaks into the canal. And Root Hill gets flooded.

Instead of building more treatment plants and holding tanks, or Gray infrastructure, which is expensive, the city is investing in things like blue roofs and bioswales.

These low-tech solutions slow down rainwater’s mad dash for street drains and ease the burden on overwhelmed pipes.

The only problem with green infrastructure is that it takes up a lot of room and everyone in the community has to chip.

It can also be expensive.

HANS (25 Sec): We pay for our storm water management systems by paying water bills – that’s what pays to clean water and that’s what pays to treat our dirty water.

That’s Hans Hesselein. He works at Gowanus Canal Conservancy, an environmental non-profit advocacy group.

HANS: And if we’re going to solve our combined sewer overflow problems in New York City, we’re going to have to spend a lot of money through the DEP to implement those controls.

TEPPER: If planting a garden on the top of your roof is the answer to flooding, hand Joann a shovel. She’s tired of seeing just how high the water can go.

Joann (3 Sec): It can go over the roofs of cars – I have pictures.

TEPPER: For now, though, Joann listens to the weather report with a pile of sandbags nearby.

Taylor Tepper in Brooklyn.

Maybe.

The hold-up revolves around Success Academy’s planned move into Cobble Hill. Neighborhood parents, with the help of union groups, filed a lawsuit claiming that Success Academy broke the law by opening a location in their school district, when they were originally pegged to open in an adjacent one.

For Success Academy this is nothing new. In fact, it is the second lawsuit it has faced in the last eight months. The case is part of a larger trend of charter schools, which are publicly financed by privately run, facing litigation and community protests in an effort to stop them from opening. At the heart of this battle is a debate about how classroom space and education money is doled out between traditional schools and charters.

Success Academy was not originally authorized to open a school in Cobble Hill’s school district. The city’s Panel for Education Policy allowed them to relocate in December, something that Success Academy says is not uncommon.

This move angered some in the community. Politicians, education officials and parents said it would take away resources from the three schools already present in the large, beige building that makes up half a city block on Baltic Street.

“I object to this charter school proposal because it could impede the growth of the existing schools in the building,” said Assemblywoman Joan Millman in a statement. “The Brooklyn School for Global Studies is undergoing a federal school improvement plan that we hope will increase student achievement and thus increase enrollment.” The School for International Studies, a high school, and P.S. 368, a school for students with disabilities, are the other two there.

Jim Devor, Secretary of the District 15’s Community Education Council, agreed. Cobble Hill is in District 15.

“I think it’s a disservice to the people in that building and the good work that they are doing,” Devor said. While he has not joined the lawsuit, he supports it.

Noah Gotbaum, a former District 3 Community Education Council President in the Upper West Side, said that the city cannot be counted on to accurately assess the number of available seats and classrooms in a given building.

“The DOE’s capacity planning and projections are a joke,” Gotbaum said. “They count closets as classrooms. They don’t provide for any growth of existing schools, only shrinkage. Their numbers are completely off.”

Gotbaum was involved in a lawsuit that tried to strop Success Academy from opening a school on the Upper West Side. The case was eventually dismissed, and the school opened in August 2011.

Both Gotbaum and Devor said that Success Academy schools cherry pick the best students throughout the city, ignoring a vast array of minority and special needs children.

Success Academy disagrees. The school uses a blind lottery system that precludes any kind of preferential treatment for students, Success Academy said.

“It is absolutely impossible to cherry pick anybody,” said Kerri Lyon, a spokeswoman for Success Academy.

Success Academy is also, according to Lyon, instituting a new policy that will reserve 20 percent of its available roster spots for students who do not speak English as their first language.

The New York City Department of Education, which is also named in the lawsuit, said in an analysis of a November public hearing held on the school’s move that “it is not uncommon for the DOE to ultimately site a charter in a different Community School District if warranted by space availability or other factors.”

The statement went on to say that there is more than enough space, 30 extra classrooms, available in K293 to fit a new school. Success Academy plans to open the new school year with, at most, 90 kindergarteners and 116 first-graders.

For Success Academy Cobble Hill, the lawsuit may stop the school from opening this August and stymie the plans of area students. Academy officials say they already have more District 15 applicants than available spots.

“Every lawsuit takes resources away from the students,” said Lyon.

Debra Stern knows how Success Academy feels.

She opened Amani, a charter school, in Mount Vernon, New York this past August after being approved by the state. By October, she had been sued by the Mount Vernon City School District, who objected to Amani’s charter. A judge revoked the school’s charter for not including paperwork that said how the existence of Amani would impact area schools. The state completed the study, and has since reauthorized the school’s charter. It now teaches 82 kids.

District officials are not satisfied. They re-filed a lawsuit, disputing the new impact statement’s validity. The ongoing legal battle has eaten into more of Stern’s time.

“I don’t have time to be served with papers.”

Amani, unlike Success Academy, is being sued over money, not location. The District does not want funds diverted from traditional schools. Amani enrolls 80 fifth-graders, each of whom brings almost $17,000 to the school. District officials have refused to pass the state money onto Amani. The character school appealed directly to the state for the money.

Stern said the whole situation has given her “gray hairs” and “headaches.” Not only has it made ingratiating the school in the community almost impossible, but it has put Amani’s students education in jeopardy.

“Eighty-two kids and their families are caught in the cross-hairs.”

For Success Academy, the lawsuit is less about the logistics of moving into a new location, and more of a larger fight between school reformers and the establishment.

“It’s unfortunate that a few adults intent on protecting the status quo would sue to sacrifice the possibility of a brighter education and future for hundreds of children,” said Jenny Sedlis, a spokeswoman for Success Academy in a statement. “We will fight this lawsuit vigorously to ensure that doesn’t happen.”

And yet.

While the test may be limited, it is still an essential hurdle for most students on their way to college.

To get into Rutgers, the state university of New Jersey, a student, most likely, has to score a 520 – 630 on critical reading, 560 – 670 on math, and 530 – 640 on writing.

To get into Hunter College, in NYC, a student, most likely, has to score a 510 – 600 on critical reading and a 520 – 620 on math. The school does not have numbers on writing.

This is all to say that SAT scores, while flawed, are a necessary component for a student who wants to get into college.

Nationwide, test takers average a 497 in critical reading, a 519 in math and a 489 in writing.

Well, how are New York City students doing.

Not well.

Looking at the data released by nyc.gov from last September, the average critical reading, math and writing score is 437, 460 and 432, respectively. Those numbers are pretty much identical to last years’.

The numbers mean, in earnest, that the average NYC student will have a very hard time getting into Rutgers or Hunter.

So, which schools are doing the best at preparing their kids for college by earning high SAT scores?

The answer is…Staten Island. In 2010-2011, 10 Staten Island schools had students take the SAT scores. They scored, on average, a 1395. Bronx students from more than 100 schools, only managed a 1149.

While there are a lot fewer Staten Island schools than in the other boroughs, their schools, on average, had more than 250 test takers per school. Queens had 171. Manhattan and Brooklyn were at 100. The Bronx, on average, had less than 50 test takers per school.

So, there was an inverse relationship between the number of test takers per school, and that schools score. There is nothing magic about large schools – - in fact, its higher scores probably has something to do with the city’s effort to break-up large bad schools, into a bunch of smaller, more efficient ones. It seems they are still working through that process.

Now there are great schools in all five boroughs. This interactive graphic gives you a chance to look through the map and see which schools are doing well. There is also a snapshot of ten different tiers of schools – that is, an example of a school with test scores in the top one percent, 10 percent, 20 percent….all the way to the bottom 10 percent.

There are, to be sure, mitigating factors behind why certain schools have certain numbers. But the numbers are important. Just ask Rutgers and Hunters and every other college that takes SAT scores into account.

It is, for the foreseeable future, a necessary step of getting into college.

Transcript:

TAYLOR TEPPER: New York City is not fertile ground for the GOP. In 2008, President Obama carried Manhattan by a wide margin. And if Harlem resident John Anderson has his way, 2012 will be no different.

ANDERSON: As far as being President, I think he’s doing a damn good job, excuse my language.

TEPPER: But, Republicans have a different point-of-view. Tomorrow, more than one million Floridians will cast their vote in the fourth primary of the election season.

The Florida contest is particularly important for Romney. After losing South Carolina to Gingrich, Romney needs a win in Florida to get back on track. To get that victory, Romney is trying to convince Floridians that he is the odds-on- favorite to beat Obama.

That is why Henry Roseman, a 23 three-year-old Miami resident, supports him.

Roseman: I like both, but I think Romney has the best chances and the greatest personality to represent us.

Whether or not Romney gets that chance, will depend on how he does in Florida tomorrow.

Taylor Tepper, Times Square

Greenleaf was just one of 60,000 people to submit a public comment to New York’s Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC), the government agency in charge of coming up with hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, regulations. Riverkeeper was one environmental group lobbying to get people to attend events like the one in lower Manhattan last fall.

Riverkeeper, a clean water advocate, is now shifting its focus from grassroots organizing to pushing lawmakers in Albany. In a new effort for the group, they are lobbying elected officials to support a home rule law that would allow individual towns to ban fracking in their area, a Property Owner’s Bill of Rights, as well as a statewide moratorium on fracking until June 2013.

Kate Hudson, an attorney for Riverkeeper, the group’s top priority is helping pass a home rule law that would give cities more autonomy.

“Towns are in the dark,” she said. “They may support a ban, but they are afraid they will get sued.” Ithaca, Syracuse and Cooperstown currently have bans in place, while several other localities have proposed similar legislation. As of right now, according to Hudson, those bans are paper-thin without cover from the state.   Hudson has found one ally from an unlikely source, State Senator Greg Ball (R – Patterson). He is among a minority of Senate Republicans who oppose fracking.

Ball has sponsored both the Property Owner’s Bill of Rights and an outright ban in the state until 2013. A latecomer to the environmentalist position, Ball made up his mind after visiting a few Pennsylvania family farms in Bradford County last summer. Their farms’ property value declined by 90 percent, he said, because of diesel run off from a fracking platform on their land.

“I’m a Republican and there are those in my conference that want to push, push, push this. But they need to go down and meet with these families,” he said to a town hall audience in Milan in August. “To lay out the carpet, to have no regulations, we can’t allow that.”

Republicans, in general, supporting pro-fracking laws because they believe it leads to economic expansion. Democrats are in favor of tougher regulations and more environmental studies. New York has had a ban on fracking since 2008.

The Property Owner’s Bill of Rights would force gas-drilling companies to disclose all chemicals used, pay property owners one and a half times the market rate for their land and give landholders free medical monitoring for life. The bill is being debated in committee.

While Riverkeeper and other environmental groups cheer Ball’s efforts, others see his legislation as cumbersome and overbearing. Tom West, an Albany-based lawyer who represents Anschutz Exploration Corporation – a Denver based drilling company, believes that natural gas is the key to America’s future energy independence. And fracking is necessary to retrieve it.

“This is going to happen in New York because we are the only place in the country that has not embraced the shale revolution,” West said.

Horizontal hydraulic fracturing forces millions of gallons of water and chemicals into rock beneath the Earth’s surface – Marcellus Shale in this case -causing cracks in the rocks from which natural gas emerges.

West said a home rule law would be ineffective because companies drill based on where the gas is, not which localities allow for drilling or not.

Moreover, he said potential health problems are “overblown by mythical proportions.” Common sense regulations for well construction and fines for gas companies that break the law will inoculate New Yorkers from environmental fall out, he said.

Clean Growth Now, a pro-fracking organization consisting of small businesses and labor, agrees with West that any permits allowing fracking should be accompanied by strict oversight by the state. With so much money and economic development at stake, $250 billion according to it’s website, the group believes that the state has no other choice.

Riverkeeper is not so sure. Hudson thinks that if the DEC compiles a socio-economic impact analysis, which has not been done, they would find job losses in sectors such as tourism and agriculture.

In either case, the decision will come down to Gov. Andrew Cuomo. He did not mention fracturing in his recent State of the State speech and the DEC has pushed back multiple deadlines so they can sift through 60,000 public comments.

“The people I talk to in the DEC say that compared to last spring, there is a lot less pressure on them to put out reports,” said Hudson, speaking on her own behalf, not for Riverkeeper.

West, however, cannot envision the Cuomo administration committing an “economic blunder” by eschewing an opportunity to create jobs in a struggling economy.

“I don’t think the governor is going to walk away from it.”

It will take more than wet weather to dampen the spirits of the Washington Square Park Carolers.

Huddled under umbrellas at the foot of the park’s iconic white arches, the carolers sang holiday favorites such as ‘God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen’ and ‘Frosty the Snowman,’ the December rain running down the laminated pages of their songbooks.

Caroling in Washington Square Park is the second oldest holiday tradition in New York, after the lighting of the Rockefeller Center tree. The Washington Square Park Association pays for their tree and distributes free songbooks to the audience.

Veteran singer and Washington Square Park maven Peggy Friedman, 71, has been attending since she was 10. She remembers the early days when the Salvation Army band used to play.  The event was much more “square” back then, she said.

This year, eight carolers joined the Rob Susman Brass Quartet under the arches. They sang for an audience of about hundred people — families from Greenwich Village, tourists from Europe and students from New York University. Kids in raincoats and galoshes splashed in puddles under the floodlights. At about 6:30 p.m., the tree was lit.

Santa Claus — a.k.a. Will Falzon — fielded a few requests for trains and dump trucks. “Most of the kids this year, because of the rain, didn’t have time to ask me for gifts,” he said. “But they were just happy with their candy canes.”

Trevor Sumner was there with his son Raphael. “I’ve been coming here ever since I was a little child,” he said. “As long as I can remember there has been a park and a tree and the lighting.”

Rain or shine, the carolers will reconvene Dec. 24 for another round of holiday songs.

By: Kathleen Flynn | Bernice Bates, on the cusp of 91, leads a yoga class at the Mainlands clubhouse in Pinellas Park. Guinness World Records lists a woman of a mere 85 as the globe’s most seasoned yoga instructor.

By: Taylor Tepper | St. Petersburg Times | June 8, 2011

For the past 50 years, each morning has started with a series of Vinyasa yoga poses that stretch the legs, shoulders and arms.

Yoga instructor Bernice Bates incorporates those exercises throughout the rest of her day as well.

“When you do yoga you are increasing your energy.”

Mrs. Bates, who will soon be 91 years old, has taught yoga in one form or another since 1960, which may make her the oldest yoga instructor in the world.

Guinness World Records currently lists the world’s oldest yoga teacher as Bette Calman of Victoria, Australia. She is 85.

Gladys Morris, 90, of Royton, Oldham, who celebrated her birthday on Jan. 31, has been nominated for recognition by one of her students, Linda Grime of Manchester, England.

But Mrs. Bates is a few months older, and her daughter, Barbara Palmer, plans to nominate her mother, who recently received the forms from Guinness World Records to apply as the oldest yoga instructor.

Mrs. Bates has taught at the Mainlands Unit 5 clubhouse in Pinellas Park for 14 years. Over time, she developed a coterie of dedicated students who continually convince her to postpone her eventual retirement for one more year.

Kathy Bortscheller has taken classes from Mrs. Bates since 2004. “When I started off, I could not touch my toes,” she said, but can now wrap her palms around her soles from a standing position.

She credits Mrs. Bates’ patient instruction for her improved flexibility, reduced muscle pain and newly found balance.

“She is very effective. She talks slow and shows us the positions that she is going to do. The classes are very casual and not strict. There is a lot of laughing and fun and learning,” Bortscheller said.

“Don’t ever say that ‘I can’t do that,’ unless you add the word yet” is one of the instructor’s many mantras.

A 40-something gets hooked on a novelty

Born in Ohio on June 30, 1920, Mrs. Bates began as a swimming instructor for children in Cleveland’s suburbs in the 1950s. Richard Hittleman books and TV programs introduced her to yoga in the 1960s. Pretty soon she was leading yoga classes at a Methodist church and a YWCA branch in Parma.

When she began, yoga was nowhere near as popular as it is now. She convinced church groups and other members of her community of the physical benefits of the exercise, and its accessibility to anyone who wished to partake.

“That is one nice thing about yoga: You can teach students from preschool all the way up.”

Yoga’s precepts appealed to Mrs. Bates, who considers herself a constant student, forever learning positions and breathing techniques and emphasis on self-awareness. She has brought this ideal to her work at the Mainlands, where she volunteers her services.

“The compensation is what you learn,” she said.

It’s an ideal activity for retirees, she adds.

“It is slow motion, which is good for where I am, and it’s noncompetitive. You do what you can, go as far as you can, and when you meet resistance you stop. You don’t push the river. We each have different abilities.”

Her love of teaching rubbed off on her three children. Her two sons taught in central California, and Barbara Palmer is an English teacher at Lakewood High School.

“All my kids are English teachers, and they’re all jocks,” Mrs. Bates, who was widowed in 2003, said with a fair amount of maternal pride.

In her 10th decade, this is a woman who is spry in both body and mind. Palmer links her mother’s mental acuity to her work as an instructor.

It might also be responsible for her equanimity and appreciation for the here and now.

“When you’re walking, you’re not supposed to be thinking about what you’re doing after supper, or what you are doing tomorrow,” she said.

“You are meditating; you are looking at the trees and the sky.”

GULFPORT — Plans to update the fire alarm system at the Town Shores over-55 condominiums has drawn the ire of residents.

The new system, which comes with a $700,000 price tag, or $700 per unit just for installation, has left many residents confused and angry.

To make matters worse, maintenance fees will increase.

“This is just another 700 bucks that I have to cover,” said resident Rick Gilbert. “It is an archaic system the day it goes in.”

Many residents of Town Shores think the community is relatively safe from fire, and that the advantages of the new system are not commensurate with its cost.

Adding the new fire system stemmed from a series of meetings between Town Shores management and the city of Gulfport, which wants to bring buildings into compliance with the 2007 Florida Fire Prevention Code that went into effect in December 2008.

Some residents have complained that the building is safe, adding that fires have caused no death or significant property damage in Town Shores in its 40-year history.

“This is exactly what we are trying to prevent,” said Gulfport City Manager James O’Reilley.

Currently, each Town Shores unit has a battery-operated smoke detector, and there is a pull box system with a fire alarm buzzer on each floor. The front entrance of each unit leads to an open walkway, so no unit is enclosed. The buildings are composed of thick concrete. Many think this is enough.

According to Critical System Solutions, the company responsible for installing the changes, the upgraded system will include a plug-in sounder that connects to the main fire alarm system in the building.

“If the building fire alarm system goes into general alarm condition, the plug-in sounders that will be installed inside the units will produce roughly 90 decibels of sound, thereby alerting the residents of a fire emergency condition in their building,” explained John Wolfley, a representative of CSS.

“The building’s new fire alarm system can be activated by either pulling a manual pull station or automatically by heat and/or smoke detectors that will be installed in all (common areas).”

Under the new plan, when the fire alarm system is activated it will alert a building’s central monitoring station, which will then call the Gulfport Fire Department. An enunciator in the ground floor lobby of each building will tell firefighters the general location of the fire.

Hard-wired smoke detectors will replace the battery-operated smoke ones, so that if the detector goes off it will alert the building’s control panel.

According to Gulfport fire Chief James Marenkovic, building elevators will be upgraded as well.

“(These improvements) save time in locating where the fire problem exits, and it brings the elevator to the first floor for the firefighters,” Marenkovic explained.

Marenkovic said the elevator and fire alarm system need to be brought up to code by July of 2012.

Town Shores consists of 18 buildings and 1,300 units. Each building is responsible for contracting with a company to make the necessary changes to its system as mandated by Florida and Gulfport. Fifteen buildings have signed with CSS, two are appealing to the city to forgo these required changes and one is already in compliance.

“The city is working on an individual basis with the buildings that have elected not to join in the (CSS) contract. I personally have met with representatives of two of the buildings and have had correspondence with the third to discuss facilitating compliance,” O’Reilly explained.

A major complaint among many residents, who do not wish to be named for fear of retaliation, is that the process was opaque, and the total cost of the project was not told to them until this past March.

Gregg Fata, the Town Shores property manager, disagreed with this assessment. “In our October 2010 meeting, we estimated the cost to do the minimum as being allowed by the fire chief to cost approximately $1 million for the initial 16 associations,” he said. Whether the information was discussed, or passed along to residents, is open for debate.

Another complaint is that Fata pressured residents to sign as part of a group contract with CSS, or face draconian fines by the city.

In an e-mail to a Town Shores resident, Fata wrote, “I met with the city manager, Council members, the Fire Chief this morning and if the associations don’t sign the group contract on (April) 26th, they have till the 18th of May to get their own contract signed or they will be fined the $100 to $500 per day.”

Both Marenkovic and O’Reilly deny that this was ever discussed.

“The city has not established, nor have I stated, any such deadline or broached the point of discussing or issuing any type of citation or fine,” O’Reilly said.

Fata said his misstatement stemmed from miscommunication between him and city officials.

The new fees, which Fata says will be spaced out over two years, come at a time when many units are in foreclosure and many snowbirds have not returned to their apartments because it is too much of a burden.

Residents who still frequent Town Shores are reeling from rising gas and food prices, as well as the general cost of living.

“Is it a hardship?” asked six-year resident Gint Valaitis. “Sure, it is a hardship. Can we manage it? One way or another, we will manage it. But when we moved in, our maintenance fee was $174 a month. Today, it is $335.”

More important, Valaitis said, he and those who oppose the regulation have no power.

“We feel like this is being shoved down our throats.”