Homestead, farmer look to settle lawsuit with Air Force

The Homestead City Council met Monday night to discuss settling a lawsuit that the U.S. Attorney’s Office filed on behalf of Homestead Air Reserve Base against the city and a family farm near the base.

For decades, the city has struggled to find a balance between property owners’ rights and base officials’ safety concerns. The lawsuit, filed in 2011, alleged that the city had ignored safety restrictions after it allowed Alger Farms to develop residential units near the end of the base’s runway.

Alger Farms President John Alger said he had no intention of building the residential units or selling the property to developers. But Air Force officials were concerned the city was putting lives at risk since Alger Farms lies in the flight paths of F-16s, F-15s and other warplanes that pass 750 feet overhead while coming in for a landing.

“We have no immediate desire for development,” said Alger, a third-generation farmer. “But the development rights allow us to preserve a hypothetical value that can be used for collateral.”

City restrictions established in 2010 limit development in an area of Homestead that the Air Force calls “the accident potential crash zone.”

Councilman Stephen Shelley said this week he worked on a settlement agreement that respects the safety restrictions.

“The settlement will benefit all of the parties involved,” Shelley said. “The solution is so simple. I’m not sure why we didn’t think of it before.”

Shelley said the deal would allow Alger to transfer his development rights to another property he owns that is not in the danger zone.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office filed the lawsuit after the city allowed Alger Farms to build one residential unit per five acres. This translated into 48 housing units in Alger’s 240 acres. The new proposal would allow Alger to transfer the right to build those units to another tract he owns in the city.

The other site “is not the greatest place for homes, but I still have this value,” Alger said.

With the new deal, Alger would have the right to build 55.4 units on a 37-acre property, because he would have the 7.4 units inherent to the 37 acres and the 48 units transferred. Shelley said there would not be a density issue.

“We clustered the density into an area that is not compromising the safety and it’s much less dense than what’s adjacent to it,” Alger said.

Alger’s grandfather, Mason W. Alger, started farming the land in 1934, and in 1942 military planes started taking off and landing at the base nearby. Alger’s father, Richard Alger, and his grandfather purchased land from South Dade farms in the late 1950s. They now grow sweet corn, snap beans, and trees for landscaping.

The base is home to units of the Air Force Reserve Command, Florida Army National Guard, Florida Air National Guard, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, U.S. Coast Guard, and Special Operations Command South.

When Alger found out that the restrictions affected his land, he thought the U.S. Constitution and Florida’s Bert J. Harris Act, which passed in 1995, protected him. The act allows property owners to seek remedies against government regulations causing an "inordinate burden."

But the U.S. Attorney’s lawsuit questioned the existence of Alger’s development rights. Before the council granted Alger Farms the right to build the residential units, city staff and city attorneys said Alger Farms didn’t have any development rights in the first place, because it lost them after annexation into the city in 1996. Alger disagreed.

“It’s an asset,” Alger said. “The federal government was asking me to devalue an asset without compensation.”

Alger said he is in agreement with the settlement that Shelley is proposing. Now he hopes that military officials will be in agreement too.

The settlement the council discussed Monday night will come up for a final vote within the next month or so, Shelley said.

“My family is very anxious to get our name off that lawsuit,” said Alger. “Imagine that your government is suing you because you want to preserve your rights. So I can spend money paying my lawyers while my government uses my own money to pay for their lawyers.”

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Carrie Fisher Briefly Hospitalized

ET confirms that Star Wars legend Carrie Fisher was hospitalized briefly in Los Angeles following a medical incident related to her bipolar disorder.

Pics: Actors Who Almost Got the Part

According to the 56-year-old star's rep, "There was a medical incident related to Carrie Fisher's bipolar disorder. She went to the hospital briefly to adjust her medication and is feeling much better now." Fisher is currently in Los Angeles.

The star was recently honored with the Utah Film Center's Kim Peek Award for Disability in Media for her forthright candor in dealing with her bipolar disorder and for raising awareness about the condition, saying that people suffering from bipolar disorder must choose between being a victim and "taking it on and flying in the face of it."

Related: Carrie Fisher Loses 50 Pounds!

The accomplished writer and performer has also been making headlines as of late with rampant speculation that the original Star Wars trilogy cast will appear in the in-development Star Wars VII, directed by J.J. Abrams.

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Contractor at Sandy damaged school swiped iMacs

A contractor who was supposed to be doing emergency repairs at a Queens school damaged by Hurricane Sandy instead helped himself to two desktop computers, police officials said yesterday.

Iannelli Construction worker Kevin Smith, 43, was arrested today for the alleged November theft of two iMacs from a classroom at Scholar’s Academy in Rockaway Park.

He was charged with burglary, illegal entry of a dwelling and possession of stolen property, authorities said.

Department of Education officials said Smith was captured on surveillance cameras that were reviewed during a probe by the School Construction Authority’s Inspector General and the Queens District Attorney’s office.

Scholar’s Academy initially reported that 80 computer tablets were stolen during the clean-up after the superstorm — which DOE officials said yesterday caused at least $110 million in damage and personnel costs for the city’s public schools.

At least 10 other schools had reported missing or stolen equipment in the weeks after the storm hit.

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Homestead, farmer look to settle lawsuit with Air Force

The Homestead City Council met Monday night to discuss settling a lawsuit that the U.S. Attorney’s Office filed on behalf of Homestead Air Reserve Base against the city and a family farm near the base.

For decades, the city has struggled to find a balance between property owners’ rights and base officials’ safety concerns. The lawsuit, filed in 2011, alleged that the city had ignored safety restrictions after it allowed Alger Farms to develop residential units near the end of the base’s runway.

Alger Farms President John Alger said he had no intention of building the residential units or selling the property to developers. But Air Force officials were concerned the city was putting lives at risk since Alger Farms lies in the flight paths of F-16s, F-15s and other warplanes that pass 750 feet overhead while coming in for a landing.

“We have no immediate desire for development,” said Alger, a third-generation farmer. “But the development rights allow us to preserve a hypothetical value that can be used for collateral.”

City restrictions established in 2010 limit development in an area of Homestead that the Air Force calls “the accident potential crash zone.”

Councilman Stephen Shelley said this week he worked on a settlement agreement that respects the safety restrictions.

“The settlement will benefit all of the parties involved,” Shelley said. “The solution is so simple. I’m not sure why we didn’t think of it before.”

Shelley said the deal would allow Alger to transfer his development rights to another property he owns that is not in the danger zone.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office filed the lawsuit after the city allowed Alger Farms to build one residential unit per five acres. This translated into 48 housing units in Alger’s 240 acres. The new proposal would allow Alger to transfer the right to build those units to another tract he owns in the city.

The other site “is not the greatest place for homes, but I still have this value,” Alger said.

With the new deal, Alger would have the right to build 55.4 units on a 37-acre property, because he would have the 7.4 units inherent to the 37 acres and the 48 units transferred. Shelley said there would not be a density issue.

“We clustered the density into an area that is not compromising the safety and it’s much less dense than what’s adjacent to it,” Alger said.

Alger’s grandfather, Mason W. Alger, started farming the land in 1934, and in 1942 military planes started taking off and landing at the base nearby. Alger’s father, Richard Alger, and his grandfather purchased land from South Dade farms in the late 1950s. They now grow sweet corn, snap beans, and trees for landscaping.

The base is home to units of the Air Force Reserve Command, Florida Army National Guard, Florida Air National Guard, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, U.S. Coast Guard, and Special Operations Command South.

When Alger found out that the restrictions affected his land, he thought the U.S. Constitution and Florida’s Bert J. Harris Act, which passed in 1995, protected him. The act allows property owners to seek remedies against government regulations causing an "inordinate burden."

But the U.S. Attorney’s lawsuit questioned the existence of Alger’s development rights. Before the council granted Alger Farms the right to build the residential units, city staff and city attorneys said Alger Farms didn’t have any development rights in the first place, because it lost them after annexation into the city in 1996. Alger disagreed.

“It’s an asset,” Alger said. “The federal government was asking me to devalue an asset without compensation.”

Alger said he is in agreement with the settlement that Shelley is proposing. Now he hopes that military officials will be in agreement too.

The settlement the council discussed Monday night will come up for a final vote within the next month or so, Shelley said.

“My family is very anxious to get our name off that lawsuit,” said Alger. “Imagine that your government is suing you because you want to preserve your rights. So I can spend money paying my lawyers while my government uses my own money to pay for their lawyers.”

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Poll: 7 in 10 back FL medical-marijuana plan, could affect governor’s race

As many as seven in 10 Florida voters support a state constitutional amendment legalizing medical marijuana – more than enough to ensure passage and possibly affect the governor’s race — according to a new poll from a group trying to put the measure on the 2104 ballot.

Medical pot’s sky-high approval cuts across party and demographic lines, with Republican support the lowest at a still-strong 56 percent, the poll conducted for People United for Medical Marijuana, or PUFMM, shows.

The outsized support of Democrats and independents brings overall backing of the amendment to 70 percent; with only 24 percent opposed, according to the poll obtained by The Miami Herald.

Regionally, voters from the Miami and Orlando areas, among the most socially liberal in the state, want medical marijuana the most.

Non-Hispanic white women, blacks and Hispanics — all Democratic leaning — are the most-likely to back the measure and could be more likely to turn out to vote in two years if the medical marijuana makes the ballot.

“Supporters of the proposed amendment are less certain to cast ballots in the 2014 governor’s race,” David Beattie, Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson’s pollster, wrote in an analysis of the poll of 600 registered voters taken Jan. 30-Feb. 3 by his firm, Hamilton Campaigns.

If it made the ballot, the measure would draw even more attention to Florida’s nationally watched 2014 election in which Gov. Rick Scott will fight for his political life.

“The proposal to allow the medical use of marijuana could provide a message contrast in the Governor’s race,” Beattie wrote, “heightening its effectiveness as a turnout mechanism.”

But, Beattie warns PUFMM in a memo, “don’t frame turnout efforts on the passage of the ballot initiative in a partisan way.”

To that end, former-Republican-operative-turned-Libertarian Roger Stone is planning to join PUFMM’s efforts to give it a bipartisan feel.

A longtime backer of marijuana legalization, Stone, a Miami Beach resident, is seriously considering a run for governor, where he’ll likely advocate for the initiative called “Right to Marijuana for Treatment Purposes.”

On the Democratic side, former Nelson and Hillary Clinton fundraiser Ben Pollara, of Coral Gables, is signing up as the group’s treasurer. Pollara said they’ve had discussions with Eric Sedler, managing partner at Chicago-based ASGK Public Strategies, which he started in 2002 with former White House advisor David Axelrod, still a President Obama advisor.

“The poll numbers were very encouraging,” Pollara said. “But it’s still a Herculean effort.”

That’s because Florida’s Legislature and voters have made it tougher than ever to get measures on the ballot by citizen petition. PUFMM needs to collect the valid signatures of 683,149 Florida voters. That could cost up to $3.5 million.

Right now, PUFMM has raised just $41,000 and has collected only 100,000 signatures, not all of which are valid. Some might be too old because they were collected as far back as 2009.

PUFMM’s Florida director, Kimberly Russell, said the group hopes that this poll and the top-notch campaign minds could turn things around.

“If we get this on the ballot, we have a great chance of getting this passed,” Russell said. “The more these pass in other states, the more people support it everywhere else.”

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Pretty Little Liars Sneak Peek Clip Out of Sight Out Of Mind Ezra's Son

Since day one, Pretty Little Liars fans have been hot for teacher, and thanks to the revelation that Ezra Fitz fathered a love child, he's now firmly cemented his status as a D.I.L.F. as well.

PHOTOS - TV's 10 Best Dressed Characters

Now, with the secret that threatened to tear Ezria apart out in the open at long last, PLL has also opened the door for Ezra's son to come to Rosewood -- which is exactly what happens in Tuesday's all new episode, titled Out of Sight, Out of Mind.

RELATED - Troian Talks Spencer's Spiral Downwards

ETonline scored a sneak peek at Aria's unexpected first meeting with Malcolm -- but that pales in comparison to the shock Ezra lays on her. Watch!

Pretty Little Liars airs Tuesdays at 8 p.m. on ABC Family.

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Macy’s CEO ‘hung up’ on Martha Stewart betrayal

Macy’s CEO Terry Lundgren testified he was so shocked when Martha Stewart called him to break the news she had a secret deal with JCPenney that he hung up on her.

“I don’t remember hanging up on anyone in my life, “ Lundgren testified during a Manhattan Supreme Court trial over her pact with Penney. “That’s how frustrated I was with Martha Stewart on that phone call.”

After recovering from his initial shock, Lundgren said he repeatedly asked Stewart why she had not first told him about her talks with Penney so that he might have had a chance to counter the deal.

Stewart began answering him in stilted language as if she were reading from a text written by lawyers, he told the courtroom.

“I was completely shocked and blown away by what she was saying,” Lundgren testified. “She said this was going to be good for Macy’s. I think that’s when I hung up.”

Stewart wasn’t the only one cozying up to Lundgren as a friend while also double-dealing behind his back, the Macy’s CEO said.

Shortly after JCPenney CEO Ron Johnson made a splashy presentation to Wall Street on Penney’s turnaround plans, Lundgren said he wrote to Johnson to congratulate him.

“Thank you, Terry. Your note means a ton to me,” Johnson replied in an e-mail dated Jan. 27, 2012, which was submitted as evidence by Macy’s.

“I consider you a friend.”

Lundgren testified that he “didn’t know about those other e-mails [Johnson] was writing at the same time.”

Lundgren was referring to a flurry of catty e-mails disclosed last week, in which Johnson joked with colleagues that the surprise announcement with Stewart would give Lundgren a “migraine.”

Macy’s unleashed more provocative e-mails yesterday, including one in which a top Penny executive snarkily told Johnson it “sounds like Macy’s pretty unhappy with the Martha deal: [frowning- face symbol].”

Johnson’s sarcasm was apparent in his email reply to the colleague: “I am so sad… They look asleep at the wheel.”

Martha kept her talks with Johnson secret right up to the end, Lundgren said, despite the fact that she had sought several favors from him in the weeks leading up to the surprise announcement.

In addition to accepting Lundgren’s invite for a business trip to Haiti after its earthquake of the summer of 2011, Stewart also asked Lundgren just last October for a $10,000 VIP ticket to a posh New York event honoring Ralph Lauren and Oprah Winfrey.

A few weeks later, she asked for and got exclusive tickets to the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade.

Lundgren’s testimony is the latest salvo in the battle over whether Stewart can legally keep her deal with Penney, in which the retailer shelled out $38.5 million for a 17-percent stake in Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia.

The pact also includes a 10-year, $200 million licensing agreement for Martha Stewart brand home goods.

jcovert@nypost.com

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Miami medicine goes digital

About 10 years ago, Dr. Fleur Sack quit her practice as a family physician to become a hospital department head. Spurring her decision was the need to switch from paper records to electronic ones to keep her private practice profitable. “At that time, it would have cost about $50,000,” Dr. Sack recalled. “It was too expensive and it was too overwhelming.”

But times and technologies changed, and last year, Dr. Sack left her hospital job to restart her medical practice with an affordable system for managing electronic patient records. She agreed to a $5,000 setup fee and a subscription fee of $500 per month for the system. Her investment also qualified her for subsidy money, which the federal government pays in installments, and to date, her subsidy income has paid for the setup fee and about two years of monthly fees. “So far, I’ve got my check for $18,000,” she said. “There’s a total of $44,000 that I can get.”

That kind of cash flow is one reason why so-called EHR software systems for electronic health records have been among the hottest-selling commercial products in the world of information technology. EHR system development is a growth industry in South Florida, too. Life sciences and biotechnology are among the high growth-potential sectors identified by the Beacon Council-led One Community One Goal economic development initiative unveiled in 2012; already, the University of Miami has opened a Health Science Technology Park while Florida International University has launched a program in its graduate school of business oriented toward biotechnology businesses.

For many young businesses in the area’s IT industry, government incentives are paving the way. The federal government is pushing doctors and hospitals to use electronic health records to cut wasteful spending and improve patient care while protecting patient privacy — sending digital information via encrypted systems, for example, rather than regular email.

Under a 2009 federal law known as the HITECH Act, maximum incentive payments for buying such systems range up to $44,000 for doctors with Medicare patients and up to $63,750 for doctors with Medicaid patients. Hospitals are eligible for larger incentive payments for becoming more paperless. The subsidy program isn’t permanent; eligible professionals must begin receiving payments by 2016. But by then, the federal government will be penalizing doctors and hospitals that take Medicare or Medicaid money without making meaningful use of electronic health records.

“What the government did is, they incentivized, and now they’re going to penalize,” said Andrew Carricarte, president and CEO of IOS Health Systems in Miami, one of the largest South Florida-based vendors of online software service for physician practices. He said insurance companies also may start penalizing physicians for failing to adopt electronic health records because “the commercial payers always follow Medicare and Medicaid.”

It’s all part of the growth story at IOS Health Systems, which has more than 2,000 physicians across the nation using its online EHR system. Carricarte said many of the company’s customers buy their second EHR system from IOS after their first one flopped. “Almost 40 percent of our sales come from customers who had systems and are now switching over to something else,” he said.

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Cessna crashes into Biscayne Bay; four people rescued near Homestead

A Cessna carrying four people crashed into the waters of Biscayne Bay Sunday afternoon within Bayfront Park in Homestead.

The crash occurred at around noon. Four people onboard were rescued from the water by Miami-Dade fire rescue workers,” said U. S. Coast Guard Petty Officer Jon-Paul Rios.

The plane was headed to the Florida Keys at the time of the accident.

“We understand the crash happened at the water entrance to the park,” Rios said.

The four onboard suffered minor injuries but were transported to local hospital for treatment.

It’s unknown if the plane was attempting an emergency landing in the water or crashed. The incident is under investigation

At this time, the Cessna remains submerged in the bay.

“We have sent out a Coast Guard vessel to determine if its a hazard to navigation,” Rios said.

An earlier version of this story implied the crash was near Miami’s Bayfront Park.

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Man commits suicide by leaping in front of Manhattan subway train

G.N.Miller/New York Post

A train at the Manhattan subway stop where a man jumped to his death today.

A suicidal man died after jumping in front of a subway train in Manhattan this morning, police said.

The unidentified victim was near the edge of the platform at Eighth Avenue and West 23rd Street in Chelsea around 9:30 a.m. as the E train neared the station, sources said. He stepped back about 10 feet before taking a running leap just before the train arrived, sources added.

The MTA suspended C trains and rerouted E trains below 53rd Street and Fifth Avenue for about two hours after the incident.

kconley@nypost.com

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