Wednesday, December 31, 2008

Last '08 Post

DYNABOUGHT. GreeneLand’s aerospace technology company, DynaBil Industries, has been sold. The buyer is another aerospace specialist, California-based Duocommun Inc. As announced by Duocommun president Joseph Berenato and reported in various news organs, the purchase price is $46.5 million in cash ($39.5 million) and promissory notes.

That sum will be paid to four private investment funds and to GreeneLanders Hugh Quigley and Michael Grosso They started DynaBil in 1977 in a Coxsackie garage, built it into a substantial fabricator of titanium firewalls, bulkheads, and nacelles for aircraft, and sold control of the 200-employee facility in March 2006 to venture capitalists while retaining a 20 per cent equity interest.

DynaBil will become part of the buyer’s Ducommun Aerostructures division, which, according to the company’s web site, “designs, engineers and manufactures the largest, most complex contoured aerostructure components in the aerospace industry. Our integrated processes include stretch-forming, thermal-forming, chemical milling, precision fabrication, machining, finishing processes, and integration of components into subassemblies.” We are also the largest independent supplier of composite and metal bond structures and assemblies in the US, including aircraft wing spoilers, helicopter blades, flight control surfaces and engine components.”

Duocommun Incorporated’s 1865 employees work at 12 sites in six States and in Mexico and Thailand. Sales in the past year, with Boeing as the biggest customer, reached $396million. Company shares, listed on the New York Stock Exchange (as DCO) have ranged in price from $12.03 to $38.53. In early November, Ducommun shares were touted in a Forbes magazine column as a “cheap growth stock.”

AWARDED to Cairo-Durham Middle School, as a prize in Samsung Electronics of America’s Hope for Education program: $61,000 worth of electronic digital hardware and software plus cash. The award was one of 30 First Place prizes given to schools around the country. Winners were chosen on the basis of essays responding to the question “How has technology educated you on helping the environment and how or why has it changed your behavior to be more environmentally friendly?” Authorship, on behalf of a school or a school district, could come from anybody. In this case the author was Cairo-Durham Schools Superintendent Sally Sharkey.

GRANTED to the Greene Arts Foundation, for use in creating the Quadricentennial musical show “River of Dreams” based on Hudson Talbott’s book, with songs by Frank Cuthbert and stage parts performed by high schoolers: $1000 from the Athens Cultural Center and $2000 from the Department of Environmental Conservation. Those awards are fractions of what was requested. More grant applications, says impresario Casey Biggs, still are Out There.

LITIGATION FRONT. Law partners Eugenia Brennan and Edward Kaplan are suing the Trustees of Coxsackie Village. The plaintiffs want to be paid for representing Mayor John Bull in connection with his contentious firing, many months ago, of the police chief, Robert Helwig. As reported in The Greenville Press (12/18), the Board majority has refused to pay the fee out of Village funds because Mr Bull retained the firm and incurred the debt without being authorized to do so. The lawsuit is an “Article 78” action, like those brought recently by “Unk” Slater and by Galen Joseph-Hunter against Cairo officialdom. Those cases are slated for court hearings early in 2009, along with volunteer firefighter Joel Shanks’s long-stalled suit against the Village of Catskill.

NAY SAYERS in the Coxsackie-Athens School District voted down, by a whopping margin of 1066 to 426 (in an electorate of about 6000), a $20million construction and renovation project (euphemistically priced at at $19,954,420). According to a Daily Mail report (12/17; Billie Dunn), preponderantly negative votes, in about the same proportions, were cast in Coxsackie and in Athens. Disappointed advocates pointed out that much of the contemplated work was in nature of mandated repairs, and that much of the State money that was available for the work will not be, or may not be, available. That portion amounted to $14.5 million. Did the voters understand that?

GREENVILLE now has an official web site: www.townofgreenvilleny.com. In contrast, Cairo’s official web site is defunct. And www.coxsackie.com leads to the Antiques Center.

RUMOR has it that a GreeneLand man has lodged a complaint alleging to his employer that a female colleague harassed him sexually, when it really was the other way around. Rumor also has it that a GreeneLand teen-ager rented a room at the Friar Tuck resort, invited friends in for a bibulous party, led or joined them in trashing the place, will be facing charges. Rumor has it too that a recent shuffle of administrative staff in a GreeneLand public organization was not driven altogether by the quest for efficiency. But then, “Rumor has it” is bafflegab.

MADOFF JUNIOR? Just as many victims of Bernard Madoff’s monumental swindle remain to be counted, so do victims of the late-December stunt by Catskill Buick Pontiac GMC Cadillac. GreeneLanders galore received an advertising card to which a key, resembling an ignition key, was pasted. Recipients were invited to play Scratch Match. “If your number matches the wining number below,” the dealer promised, “you’ll definitely win one of the four prizes!” Available to win, specifically, were $5000 cash or a 2004 Pontiac Grand Am, a Flat Screen TV, $500 cash, or a Golf Spa Package. Eureka! Catskillian Jerry Sarlin’s uncovered number, 78425, matched the winning number! But then so Valerie Johnson’s number. And her neighbor’s. And his neighbor’s. And yours. Let’s hope for better dealings in 2009.

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