Latest news with #RobertScott
News.com.au
07-05-2025
- Business
- News.com.au
New era dawns for landmark Geelong home opposite Pevensey Park
A landmark heritage property described as 'Geelong's most iconic residential home' has hit the market opposite Pevensey Park. The grand, six-bedroom, six-bathroom Pevensey House is poised to fetch $5.95m after a painstaking restoration by the current owners. They added an open-plan extension to the rear of the two-storey home several years after buying it in 2007 and have returned its original Federation Queen Ann features to their former glory. Future decided for entire mountain top property near Geelong Landmark 1951 'trophy home' Newtown Brae for sale A distinctive, octagonal tower is the crowning glory of the residence, which occupies a prominent 1136sq m corner site at 17 Pevensey Cres, Geelong. McGrath, Geelong agent David Cortous said the lookout offered views right across Geelong and the nearby botanic gardens. He said the house, originally built in 1891 for Geelong businessman Robert Scott, an ironmonger and importer, was extraordinary. 'It has quite a history over the years, it has been a bed and breakfast, I think it was two dwellings at one point before these guys bought it and did the renovation on it,' Mr Cortous said. 'It's an incredible house – the condition of it is just remarkable. 'For the size of the home, let alone the land it sits on, in this day and age you wouldn't be able to built it for that price. For what it is, it shows exceptional value. If that property was sitting in Melbourne it would be $20m.' Nine decorative fireplaces, extraordinary leadlight windows and an entrance hall showcasing archways, marble floors and a grand mahogany staircase are among restored features that contribute to Pevensey House's standing as one of Victoria's finest heritage residences. A music room, a dining room with a built-in bar and a formal lounge with a bay window overlooking Pevensey Park are among the traditional highlights. They're complemented by a newer open-plan living zone at the rear where custom steel-framed windows take in the pool and immaculate gardens. Park views are also a highlight of the first floor main bedroom suite, which Mr Cortous said was more like a private wing incorporating a sitting room, home office, bathroom and balcony. He said it could be accessed either via the grand main staircase, the commercial, hotel-style lift or second private internal staircase. 'It's got a separate self-contained unit there as well. They don't Airbnb it, it's for private use only, but there is an opportunity there if you want to get an income from the property,' he said.
CBS News
09-04-2025
- Business
- CBS News
Trump overstates the number of U.S. factories lost since NAFTA while defending tariff hikes
President Trump has argued his new tariffs will help reverse the long decline of U.S. manufacturing, pointing to the loss of "90,000 factories" since the North American Free Trade Agreement took effect in 1994. "Since the very beginning of NAFTA, our country lost 90,000 factories," Mr. Trump said during his Rose Garden speech on April 2, as he announced a host of tariff hikes . The president repeated the claim in his Monday remarks . While the U.S. has seen a decline in the number of factories, the claim of 90,000 factories lost appears to be based on outdated data and includes small facilities with only a few employees. The 90,000 figure matches a 2020 analysis by the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank, which found that there was a net loss of about 91,000 manufacturing establishments between 1997 and 2018. However, the analysis relied on Census Bureau data that was significantly revised in 2021, the group told CBS News. The updated figures show a net loss of about 70,500 manufacturing establishments from 1997 to 2022, the most recent year for which data is available. The data, from the Census Bureau's Business Dynamics Statistics, also suggests that many of these shuttered facilities employed only a handful of people. Nearly a quarter of the 70,500 closed manufacturers employed four or fewer workers, the data shows. Only 2% of the shuttered plants employed 500 or more people — there were 4,569 of those in 1997 and 3,136 in 2022. The White House did not respond to a CBS News inquiry about the data. Mr. Trump also said in the Rose Garden that "5 million manufacturing jobs were lost" since the beginning of NAFTA. The same Economic Policy Institute analysis in 2020 found that 4.7 million manufacturing jobs were lost. More recent data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows job losses from January 1997 to January 2025 are closer to 4.5 million. For years, Mr. Trump has called NAFTA the "worst trade deal ever made," blaming that agreement for undermining U.S. manufacturing jobs. The pact eliminated most trade barriers between the U.S., Mexico and Canada, and remained in effect until 2020 , when Mr. Trump signed the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement, or USMCA, into law. The USMCA agreement, negotiated by his administration, continued many aspects of NAFTA with updates to some of the rules . Supporters argued NAFTA made the U.S. richer, but critics say it cost jobs — particularly in industries facing competition from lower wage workers in Mexico. Estimates vary, but Economic Policy Institute economist Robert Scott suggested in a 2014 analysis that NAFTA led to the loss of nearly 690,000 U.S. manufacturing jobs . However, free trade with China has been a bigger factor than a North America trade agreement, many economists say. MIT researchers found that nearly 1 million manufacturing jobs were lost to China from 1999 to 2011 as the U.S. normalized trade relations with the country. Economists note free trade is far from the only cause of factory closures. Multiple U.S. recessions in the last few decades have also contributed. And a rise in automation has caused manufacturing to shrink as a share of GDP in many developed countries across the globe since the 1950s, according to Joshua Meltzer, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, a nonprofit think tank. "Essentially manufacturing has just become increasingly efficient, automated and so forth. And we've just needed less labor to be producing more and more stuff," Meltzer said. The number of U.S. workers employed in the manufacturing industry peaked at 19.6 million jobs in 1979, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics . The sector shed over 6 million jobs since then, and roughly 12.7 million people work in manufacturing today. "You can always count manufacturing plants that have shut down, but without a broader set of context to understand why that's happened [and] what's happening to the manufacturing sector more broadly, it's just a cherry picked data point," Meltzer said.
Yahoo
31-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
NJ netted 46K new jobs in 2024, which put it 20% nationally in job growth
New Jersey net nearly 46,000 new jobs over 2024, or a 1.1% increase, ranking the state 20th in job growth last year. That's according to recent numbers put out by the U.S Bureau of Labor Statistics, a federal agency that tracks employment levels nationwide. New Jersey's numbers are fairly 'middle of the pack,' said Robert Scott, an economist at Monmouth University. 'I would say New Jersey is in OK shape as far as employment is concerned,' he said. 'Job growth is decent, but not amazing over the last year. Our unemployment rate is reasonably low historically.' The state's unemployment rate was 4.6% as of February, just up from 4.4% that same month last a December survey, the New Jersey Business and Industry Association reported that 62% of employers did not expect that many changes to their employment levels in 2025. Fifty-seven percent of New Jersey businesses said they had no plans to expand in the state, the poll added. New Jersey's unemployment rate is the 11th highest in the nation, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. A year ago, it had the sixth highest unemployment rate in the nation. Nevada had the worst unemployment rate at 5.8%, while South Dakota's was the lowest jobless rate at 1.9%. Nationally, the unemployment rate is 4.1%. New Jersey's latest unemployment rate is still a far cry from the 15.4% unemployment seen in May 2020 during the COVID-19 business closures, which was New Jersey's highest unemployment rate since those figures were first tracked in 1976. Higher-paying office jobs became saturated coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic, James Hughes, an economist at Rutgers University, said in an interview last year. That pushed New Jersey's unemployment rate in 2022 coming out of the pandemic down to 3.0% in August that year. Blame the high cost of living and high taxes for New Jersey's unemployment rate hovering above the national average, said Scott, the Monmouth University economist. That translates to fewer new businesses being formed, he said. 'With mature industries already existing in NJ, that makes it more challenging to get new business financing, venture capital,' he continued. The creation of new businesses slowed both in New Jersey and across the entire Northeast U.S between February 2024 and February 2025, according to data from the U.S Census Bureau. Nearly 100 New Jersey companies announced more than 13,300 layoffs combined in 2024, public records show, as white-collar sectors such as pharmaceuticals, banking and finance tightened job counts. Not all 13,332 people were necessarily out of a job. For example, a layoff notice was filed for 157 people from the Metropolitan YMCA in Wayne, but many of those workers were rehired. And Big Lots said in December last year that it was handing 385 New Jersey workers the pink slip, but then announced a last-minute deal to keep 400 of its U.S stores open. Daniel Munoz covers business, consumer affairs, labor and the economy for and The Record. Email: munozd@ Twitter:@danielmunoz100 and Facebook This article originally appeared on NJ was 20th nationally in job growth in 2024
Yahoo
18-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Willmar City Council again defers Municipal Utilities land purchase decision
Mar. 18---- The on Monday again deferred action on a purchase agreement for 27 acres of land for new facilities. The presentation and discussion for that agenda item took more than an hour, after which action was deferred until the April 7 meeting of the City Council. The land that Willmar Municipal Utilities wants to purchase for $600,000 for its new facilities is located just east of the Highway 71/23 Bypass and north of Willmar Avenue Southeast. It is adjacent to, but not within, the city limits. The Municipal Utilities Commission approved the purchase agreement during its Feb. 24 meeting and it was on the City Council's agenda March 3 for approval. This is the fifth property down the list of properties that Willmar Municipal Utilities has tried to purchase since the search for land started in 2023. The City Council on March 3 chose to defer approval for 30 days or until the next council meeting. City Attorney Robert Scott on Monday explained to the council that the City Charter's language is ambiguous, and he interpreted that to mean that the council could continue the matter to the April 7 meeting. Some members of the City Council are questioning why Willmar Municipal Utilities wants to build its new facilities outside city limits — where there is significant cost to extend city sewer and water infrastructure — when there are parcels in the that, in the opinion of those councilors, would be suitable for Municipal Utilities needs. It should be noted that Scott has explained that if the council allows the purchase, the land would be considered owned by the city and be annexed into the city. While most of the presentation and discussion focused on comparing the two properties, Willmar Municipal Utilities Facilities and Maintenance Supervisor Kevin Marti informed the City Council that if the purchase agreement were not approved, Willmar Municipal Utilities would not be looking at the industrial park location because other properties score higher on its list. "This (Willmar Avenue) property scores quite a bit better than the industrial park property," Marti said. " ... There's other properties that are better, in our opinion, in our scoring system, than the industrial park. We would have to investigate those." The cost to extend sewer and water services to the land on the bypass would be an estimated $2.7 million. However, that infrastructure, if built, would be able to service more than 400 acres of land in that area, not only the 27 acres to be purchased, according to Marti. Of the estimated cost of $2.7 million, Willmar Municipal Utilities is responsible for more than $800,000 for extending the water main, and the remainder would be city costs to extend the sewer main and install a lift station. Although the city does not foresee having the funds to pay for the infrastructure project at this time, one of the contingencies in the purchase agreement would be for Willmar Municipal Utilities to install private water and sewer services until such time that funds become available. Marti asked the City Council if that is something it would consider allowing, which would not result in tax or rate increases because it is already built into the budget for the new facilities. "I guess I worry about doing private services within the city limits," said Councilor Tom Gilbertson. "It obviously sets a precedent for any person in the city of Willmar to say, 'I don't want to hook onto the Willmar Municipal Utilities power grid. I don't want to hook onto their wastewater going forward.' And I don't think it's in your best interest to do that." Although he said he agreed, Marti paraphrased city ordinance that states that if it is cost-prohibitive to extend sewer and water to certain properties, those properties can be served by private sewer and water until such a time that sewer and water services are extended and those properties can connect to the city system. "That's what we would ask here. If there just isn't money in the cookie jar to do this, that would be what we would ask and pursue for this property," Marti said, noting it may be 10 years or more before the city would be able to extend the services across the bypass feasibly. Some councilors also took issue with a perceived lack of communication to the city from Willmar Municipal Utilities about its plans. Although there was not any direct communication with City Administrator Leslie Valiant or Willmar Planning and Development Director Christopher Corbett, Marti pointed out that since October, Willmar Municipal Utilities has been communicating with City Operations Director Kyle Box, who works directly under Valiant, and also with Kandiyohi County Engineer Mel Odens, the county's zoning board, the Minnesota Department of Transportation and a township supervisor. "What does the Planning Commission say as far as what the future annexation of property to add to Willmar looks like?" asked Councilor Stephen Gardner. "Is this (property) even part of it? ... Is this utility pushing us in the direction we don't want to go?" Despite the City Council's hesitancy in approving the purchase agreement, Mayor Doug Reese said he likes the location due to its ability to extend the city east of the bypass. "I like that location because of the possibilities of annexation and extending services, because I know there has to be something that trips it up to allow the expansion to go to the east, because that bypass is a real barrier to expansion," Reese said.
Yahoo
18-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Council takes no action on land purchase for Willmar Municipal Utilities facilities
Mar. 17---- The on Monday again deferred action on a purchase agreement for 27 acres of land for new facilities. The presentation and discussion for that agenda item took more than an hour, after which action was deferred until the April 7 meeting of the City Council. The land which Willmar Municipal Utilities wants to purchase for $600,000 for its new facilities is located just east of the Highway 71/23 Bypass and north of Willmar Avenue Southeast. It is adjacent to, but not within, the city limits. The Municipal Utilities Commission approved the purchase agreement during its Feb. 24 meeting and it was on the City Council's agenda March 3 for approval. This is the fifth property down the list of properties that Willmar Municipal Utilities has tried to purchase since the search for land started in 2023. The City Council on March 3 chose to defer approval for 30 days or until the next council meeting. City Attorney Robert Scott on Monday explained to the council that the City Charter's language is ambiguous and he interprets that to mean that the council could continue the matter to the April 7 meeting. Some members of the City Council are questioning why Willmar Municipal Utilities wants to build its new facilities outside city limits — where there is significant cost to extend city sewer and water infrastructure — when there are parcels in the that, in the opinion of those councilors, would be suitable for Municipal Utilities needs. The cost to extend sewer and water services to the land on the bypass would be an estimated $2.7 million. However, that infrastructure, if built, would be able to service more than 400 acres of land in that area, not only the 27 acres to be purchased. This is a breaking news update from Monday night's meeting. More details of the discussion from the meeting will be published later on
