Hilton

U.S. District Judge Norma Shapiro served up a fat pitch to her critics when she suggested that the city seek input from the inmates as it plans a new 1,000-bed prison in the Northeast. "I suppose they'll want a rec room, a spa and bathing suits," City Councilwoman Joan Krajewski cracked to the Daily News Tuesday. Why so modest? We imagined that each cell might be equipped with a Jacuzzi, a color TV and a queen-size bed, luxuries made possible by the money saved from doing away with all those unsightly metal bars.

Nickname: Mac. Age: 30. Neighborhood: Italian Market. Education: Bachelor's degree in political science, Davidson College. Job: Chef at Mercato Restaurant. Claim to fame: Coming in first on a Food Network reality TV show called "Chopped," hosted by Ted Allen, featuring four chefs competing to see who can do the best job turning regular ingredients into a three-course meal. Nominated by: A college friend, Tarik Kahn. How she gives back: "I love animals and believe in only sourcing sustainable, local, farm-raised products in my cooking.

Interviews are being held for more than 150 hourly jobs at the Great Valley Hilton and Conference Center in the Great Valley Corporate Center. Peter Saunders, general manager for the 201-room hotel, said he hoped to begin hiring by next week and complete filling the positions by the first week of August. The Hilton is scheduled to open Aug. 15. Positions include front office and reservation personnel, bellpersons, buspersons, cocktail servers, bartenders, housekeepers, housemen, cooks and kitchen utility helpers, conference center facilities staff, engineering staff and accountants and stewards.

Rouse & Associates yesterday said it would build a $20 million Hilton hotel and conference center at Great Valley Corporate Center in Malvern. The 201-room hotel, a Hilton franchise, will be owned by Rouse and managed by Rouse and Boyd Russell Associates, a hotel-management firm. The hotel, to be built on a 13-acre site overlooking a quarry at Great Valley, will seek both travelers and local businesses looking for a place to hold conferences. Construction of the hotel, at the new Presidential Boulevard and Route 29, is expected to begin in late spring.

The Great Valley Hilton, a 201-room hotel at One Liberty Boulevard in Malvern's Great Valley Corporate Center, has been sold by developer Willard Rouse for $12 million to John Desmond & Associates, of Blue Bell, a Desmond partner said yesterday. The deal between Rouse and Desmond closed June 28, Desmond partner Jack Noonan said. Opened by Rouse's company, Rouse & Associates, in August 1988 at a cost of more than $20 million, the hotel has had good occupancy but, like many hotels built in the 1980s, was not generating enough revenue to cover its debt service, Noonan said.

Downsized but upgraded, the former Hilton of Philadelphia is being changed from a somewhat decayed urban hotel to a showpiece and a fitting guesthouse for the University of Pennsylvania, its new owner. The 21-story building is on its way to becoming "the largest bed-and- breakfast in the entire free world," providing a far higher level of service than in the past, said Donald M. Jacobs, executive director of hospitality services for Penn. When Penn bought the hotel in May 1986 for $17.9 million, it was so tacky that the university usually placed its own guests in hotels 20 or more blocks away, even though the Hilton was on campus at 34th Street and Civic Center Boulevard.

Randi E. Golub, a free-lance artist looking for a permanent job, said she did not mind driving about 25 miles to the Great Valley Corporate Center to interview for work as a food preparer and banquet-facilities helper. Golub, 28, who lives in Schwenksville, Montgomery County, was among those interviewed for various positions last week at the Great Valley Hilton and Conference Center, a 201-room hotel that is scheduled to open Aug. 15. The Hilton has 150 hourly jobs to fill, and Golub is confident that her chances of being hired are enhanced by her experience.

It was a confluence of perfection: the perfect moment in a perfect day, set in perfect surroundings. The tide had swept back to present a wide, white beach. The tall palmetto trees trembled with the sea breeze. And then aerial motion drew us to a squadron of pelicans - fat and awkward afoot, the personification of grace in the air - passing single file above the shoreline. Beneath them, and just beyond the surf line, a school of dolphins loped by in the opposite direction. The parade of nature and a thick sheath of tall greenery preserve the image of the second-largest island on the East Coast of the United States as a subtropical paradise.

ITT Corp.'s plan to split itself into three independent public companies, including one for casino and hotel operations, was approved yesterday by the New Jersey Casino Control Commission. The company, which owns Caesars Atlantic City and the Sheraton Hotel chain, would separate that business from its telephone directory publishing and technical school operations. The commission found ITT, its casino licensee Boardwalk Regency Corp., and its intermediary holding companies, Caesars New Jersey Inc. and Caesars World, had "established their financial stability, integrity and responsibility," the major criteria for securing and maintaining a gaming license in New Jersey.

Hilton Hotels Corp. is seeking to purchase the Wyndham Franklin Plaza Hotel, a deal that could put the Hilton name on a Center City building for the first time since 1993, according to industry officials and published reports. The 758-room Wyndham, the second-largest hotel in the region, is owned by Patriot American Hospitality Inc., a Dallas real estate investment trust that is in the midst of a financial restructuring. Hilton, of Beverly Hills, Calif., wants 10 of Patriot American's larger hotels, including the Wyndham here, the Wall Street Journal has reported.

Former New York Times chief art critic Hilton Kramer, 84, died Tuesday. His wife, Esta, said he had had a blood disease. He had been in an assisted-living facility in Harpswell, Maine. Mr. Kramer started as an art critic in the early 1950s and joined the Times in 1965 as art-news editor. He became chief art critic in 1973. He left the newspaper in 1982 and became founding editor of the New Criterion magazine, a monthly journal that critiques the arts and other topics. - AP  

It may have lost the right to use the Hilton name, but the ACH Casino and Resort on the Boardwalk just got another lease on life. The owners of ACH, formerly the Atlantic City Hilton Casino Resort, proposed a new plan this week to pump about $24 million into the ailing casino and save it from a foreclosure sale. In return, parent company Colony Capital L.L.C. of Santa Monica, Calif., agreed to allow lenders to foreclose on its Bally's Tunica and Resorts Tunica casinos in Mississippi instead, according to a petition filed Thursday with the New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement.

ATLANTIC CITY - Emblazoned with its bright-red corporate logo, the Atlantic City Hilton Casino Resort has been a fixture at Boston Avenue and the Boardwalk since the mid-1990s. But its famous name is about to fall. Hilton Hotels & Resorts has severed ties with the gambling hall, one of the city's oldest and smallest, which has struggled against both its bigger local brethren and intense Pennsylvania competition. Hereafter, the casino will be called ACH, according to mailers recently sent to loyal patrons.

In keeping with its gay-friendly marketing strategy, Resorts Atlantic City has scheduled a June 27 bash called Pride Party with Perez. Sponsored by and benefiting the Greater Atlantic City GLBT Alliance, and hosted by the cast of Resorts celebrity-impersonator drag show, "Believe - Divas in a Man's World," the party, which starts at 8 p.m., will also feature Internet gossiptista Perez Hilton, as well as DJ LO and TJ The DJ, a former spinner at the...

HILTON HEAD ISLAND, S.C. - Garrett Willis had a run of six straight birdies to shoot a 7-under-par 64 and take a 1-stroke lead Thursday in the Heritage. Willis was a shot in front of Arjun Atwal, Matt Bettencourt, Chad Campbell, and Tim Herron at Harbour Town Golf Links. Mark Wilson, Camilo Villegas, and 2009 Heritage champion Brian Gay were 2 strokes back. Luke Donald, the world's No. 3 player, topped a group at 67. Defending champion Jim Furyk, a West Chester native, was in a pack at 68. Willis, the 2001 winner in Tucson in his first event as a PGA Tour member, planned to switch to a belly putter this week but stuck with the longtime putter he calls "Old Faithful.

HILTON HEAD, S.C. - Four days into my stay at the fat farm, I found myself in the shallow end of a swimming pool doing jumping jacks with a "nautical noodle," surrounded by nine plump women and an insanely fit instructor, as Lady Gaga blared over a loudspeaker: "Poker face, p-p-p po-ker face . . . . " "Ten more reps," barked the instructor. "Push it!" An already absurd moment in my life became more so when I realized I was about to lose my swimming trunks. It wouldn't be my first humbling moment at Hilton Head Health (H3)

RE THE events at Rutgers with the college student committing suicide, possibly due to his roommate broadcasting his sexual encounter with another man: The event was tragic, and you depicted it as such. But in the same week you glorified the dirtbag known as Perez Hilton. The main problem in the Rutgers case is the invasion of privacy. Yet that is exactly what Perez Hilton does every day. He publishes details of many people's private lives. He runs every detail of the Tiger Woods "scandal," just like the DN . Yes, he's a public figure, and fair game - but the Perkins waitress isn't.

MANY OF THE celebs who've appeared in Perez Hilton 's blog since it started bringing the snark may already refer to him as the biggest loser, but after dropping 60 pounds over the past three years, the name really fits. As do his clothes. Equally fitting is Perez's new fitness-focused website, FitPerez.com. "It's an organic next step for me," said Perez (a/k/a Mario Lavanderia ). On this new site, we guess, when Perez draws something phallic in someone's mouth, it will be a stalk of celery.

EVERY DAY, millions march into liquor stores and stumble home from bars in the wee hours. Lives are destroyed. Homes are broken into pieces. Children suffer, but later replicate. This is, however, if the drunk doesn't drive. Thousands are dead in Pakistan. Unemployment is at 10 percent. The proud promise of a presidency is at a 38 percent approval rating. Thirty-three percent of all African-American males are in jail. But, the big story today (ABC News) is that Lindsay Lohan and Paris Hilton are guilty, again!