Cultural Center

The Mount Holly Council has hired a Pennsauken-based planning firm to conduct a feasibility study on creating a cultural center in Mount Holly's downtown. The study, which will be conducted by Resources Equity Corp., is another step in the council's quest to revitalize downtown. About three years ago, the council hired a Philadelphia architectural firm to devise a downtown plan. That study "gave general direction for downtown revitalization," township manager Barry Larson said in an interview Tuesday.

While developer Bill Rouse tries to lure a rock 'n' roll museum to Penn's Landing, another development team is working to roll Beethoven over to 30th Street Station. Houston developer Gerald D. Hines hopes to build a cultural center and make it the centerpiece of his proposed $1 billion commercial development atop the 60-acre railyard just north of the station. The Hines organization, in partnership with Philadelphia developer Leonard Fruchter, hopes to attract the Philadelphia Orchestra and a host of cultural groups to anchor the proposed facility.

Concerned about conditions at the township community center, the Upper Merion Board of Supervisors has hired a Philadelphia engineering firm to inspect the building and recommend repairs. At their meeting Monday, the supervisors agreed to pay $2,900 to O'Donnell and Naccarato Inc., to analyze the structural safety of the 19th-century building. The building, in Valley Forge Industrial Park, houses the township's cultural center, which has occupied the space rent-free since 1968.

The Northeast Philadelphia Cultural Council is looking for a few good members. A recruitment drive to attract new charter members has just begun, and the cultural council hopes to bring its membership to at least 500 by the end of the year. The cultural council, which has grown from 30 to 250 members since its founding in the fall of 1985, hopes to capitalize on the interest and attention given to the future of the property at Philadelphia State Hospital. In December, Gov. Casey announced that the hospital, also known as Byberry, would close within two years.

The developers who have proposed a cultural center on the west bank of the Schuylkill yesterday said they will proceed without the participation of the Philadelphia Orchestra. Although the orchestra never indicated publicly that it was interested in being part of the cultural center over the Amtrak yards and the Schuylkill Expressway north of 30th Street Station, the developers of the site had made an orchestra hall the centerpiece of their plans, and they continued to woo orchestra officials in a series of informal meetings over the last six months.

It is a neighborhood with two identities, a coming together of commerce and calm between Route 73 and the White Horse Pike. Single-lane roads wind past houses with verandas, fountain displays and ceramic gnomes peeking out from front lawns. Yellow signs warn vehicles to watch for children. But trains from a New Jersey Transit line run through the neighborhood, rattling its quiet at regular intervals. A printing warehouse, a lumberyard and a barbershop attest to its Planning Board designation as partly a C1, or mixed-use commercial, zone.

First it was American movie studios. Then it was Rockefeller Center. Now, the Japanese have a more startling target in their sights. A U.S. aircraft carrier. A Japanese business group wants to lease a decommissioned carrier, whose future otherwise would be the scrap pile. The ship is the USS Oriskany, which was commissioned in 1950 and fought in the Korean and Vietnam Wars. The plan is to tow the carrier to Yokohama harbor near Tokyo and convert it into a nonprofit American trade and cultural center.

Widener University is collaborating with the Beijing University of Technology to create a Chinese language and cultural center, the first of its kind in the Philadelphia region. The center, called a Confucius Institute, will be the state's second and is expected to open in the spring. Confucius Institutes, funded in part by a Chinese government agency, have stirred some controversy in the academic community. Some worry that the center's affiliation with the Chinese government will limit what can be discussed.

People who observe the Greek Orthodox faith are in the midst of Holy Week preparations for Sunday's most sacred of Christian services - Easter Mass. For St. Sophia's Greek Orthodox Church, this Holy Week is particularly significant because it is conducting services in its newly built million-dollar cultural center on South Trooper Road. St. Sophia's has moved from its modest quarters on Centre Street in Norristown to this 8-acre tract in Jeffersonville, bordering the rolling lawns of Valley Forge National Historical Park.

Theater Azuka Theatre Spotlight Series: What to Do When You Hate All Your Friends New comedy exploring friendship & romance in today's world. Closes 1/23. First Baptist Church, 123 S. 17th St. www.azukatheatre.org . Free. Body Awareness A visiting artist's nude photographs arouse conflicting feelings in a college professor & her girlfriend. Closes 2/5. Wilma Theater, 265 S. Broad St.; 215-546-7824. $46-$56; $41-$51 seniors; $23-$28 ages 20-29 with ID. Cats Tony-winning musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber.

MELANIE Sarachman was a caring and loving mother, but her motherly instincts were not confined to her family. As an important cog in the wheels of the Human Resources Department at the Einstein Medical Center, Melanie - with a reputation of going above and beyond her duties - also took care of her fellow workers. "Some say that she spoiled those with whom she worked by bringing her motherly caring to the office," her family said. Melanie Sarachman, who was active in the Ukrainian community of Philadelphia, an avid tennis player and devoted family matriarch, died Aug. 28. She was 66 and lived in Northeast Philadelphia.

This weekend through Monday, the nonprofit Mount Airy Cultural Center will present its 21st annual Tony Williams Scholarship Jazz Festival, with performances by young people and local musicians. Festivities begin at 3:30 p.m. Friday with a free hour-long jam session in the lobby of the Embassy Suites Hotel, featuring the Mount Airy Cultural Center Faculty Band with the center's founder, alto saxophonist Tony Williams. At 7:30, the youth jazz group the Young and the Restless will perform.

I LOVE THIS time of year - with its warm, loving and heartfelt solution-based political ads. Pols beat the heck out of one another, then kiss, hug and shake hands the next day. No wonder turnouts are so low. I know too well as a former ward coordinator and committeeperson that these pols will forget your name the following day. You knock on doors, hang lawn signs, make phone calls and wear stickers to get the vote out, only to have these people forget...

War money needed more here Wouldn't it make far more sense to bring the troops home from Iraq and Afghanistan as soon as possible, and devote at least part of the financial savings to strengthening the CIA and FBI, both of which have been increasingly successful in routing out terrorist plotters? Isn't it abundantly clear that the situations in Iraq and Afghanistan could go on for years? Consider Northern Ireland, where to this day intensive negotiations and even peace agreements are no guarantee that violence can be obliterated.

As the competition begins for choosing a developer to build a new hotel in the Family Court building at 1801 Vine St., there is another idea for how to reuse this elegant and important public building. A group of museums and related organizations, including the Civil War Museum of Philadelphia, have been working to create a consortium of organizations that would become the resident institutions in a restored Family Court building. This WPA-era building was designed with high- ceilinged and classically proportioned waiting and court rooms to inspire the citizens who came seeking justice.

Widener University is collaborating with the Beijing University of Technology to create a Chinese language and cultural center, the first of its kind in the Philadelphia region. The center, called a Confucius Institute, will be the state's second and is expected to open in the spring. Confucius Institutes, funded in part by a Chinese government agency, have stirred some controversy in the academic community. Some worry that the center's affiliation with the Chinese government will limit what can be discussed.

Where passersby see a shattered building, Liberian immigrant Voffee Jabateh sees a future cultural center with offices for social workers inside the former crack house at 55th Street and Chester Avenue. The goal, beyond much-needed neighborhood revitalization, he said, is to foster understanding between Southwest Philadelphia natives and the thousands of West African immigrants who since 1990 have tripled the number of foreign-born residents in that blighted part of the city. While they don't show up on short lists of the region's largest immigrant groups, these immigrants, many from Liberia, are transforming parts of Southwest, renovating houses, opening groceries featuring African delicacies, and reclaiming corners that gang bangers once ruled.

Singer Madeleine Peyroux, who works on the border between pop and jazz, will perform for an intimate crowd Saturday night to celebrate the grand opening of the West Pikeland Cultural Center in Chester Springs. The $150 ticket will include a pre-concert cocktail reception with hors d'oeuvres, as well as a performance by country/blues guitarist Doug Wamble. Only 275 tickets will be sold, though the flexible space can hold up to 400 people, including standing room. By booking Peyroux as the opening performer, township Supervisor Bill Cracas said, the township hopes to establish the venue as a "viable arts center.