Relocation

After years of decline, the amount of money set aside to relocate frightened witnesses in Philadelphia is about to surge to a record level. The state budget approved by legislators Wednesday contains a 35 percent increase in funding for witness relocation and should steer more than $230,000 in additional funding to Philadelphia's beleaguered program. This increase would come on top of $200,000 that Mayor Nutter set aside this month to combat the problem, the first time that Philadelphia has dipped into its treasury to attack witness intimidation.

NEW YORK - Drugmaker Pfizer Inc. plans to lay off or relocate some of its New York City employees. Spokeswoman Joan Campion says she does not know the number of workers who will be affected. She says the company is moving "a number" of people to New Jersey and Pennsylvania. The company is putting an office tower, at 685 Third Ave., up for sale. Pfizer spokesman Chris Loder said employees who work there will be transferred to other buildings in New York as well as Madison and Peapack, N.J., and Collegeville, Montgomery County.

When Steve and Ann Kravitz moved back to South Jersey from Pittsburgh after being away for 25 years, they were looking for more than a new address. They were looking for a total change in lifestyle. "We didn't need the big house or the big lawn anymore," Ann recalls. "When we left Cherry Hill for Pittsburgh and had two children, we tried to replicate our lives, even down to the neighborhood swim club. This time, it was different. We were empty-nesters, and we were looking for simplicity and convenience.

The Haddonfield doctor whose Rhodesian Ridgeback dogs have landed him in court multiple times has agreed to move one of the animals out of town. Duke, who attacked a 4-year-old girl in Salem County last year, will not reside in the borough until court proceedings are held to decide what should be done with the animal, Haddonfield Commissioner Ed Borden said Friday. One possibility is that the court could order Duke to be put down. In a tentative deal agreed to by the borough and dog owner Bob Taffet two weeks ago, the family will keep no more than two dogs in its Camden County home.

The Dad Vail Regatta - held in Philadelphia on the Schuylkill since 1953 - is officially moving the 2010 race to North Jersey. Regatta spokesman Harry Stinger confirmed last night that the event would be moving about 90 miles northeast to Rumson, N.J. "We are thrilled that the Dad Vail Regatta has decided to relocate to Rumson," said John Ekdahl, mayor of the Monmouth County town. "We think the event will have a tremendous economic impact not only for Rumson but for all of the surrounding Two River towns," he said, referring to the area along the Navesink and Shrewsbury rivers.

Meet the new Barnes Foundation museum, just like the old Barnes - only its Philadelphia home will be far better-suited to an extraordinary art collection, all housed at a world-class location. With the unveiling of a design for what Inquirer architecture critic Inga Saffron described as "a gracious, golden-hued temple - contemporary . . . yet almost classical," the Barnes is shaping up to be everything promised by its move from Lower Merion. The long-awaited plans for the $200 million museum received approval by the Philadelphia Art Commission yesterday.

Looking for bright spots in the economy? One surely is Gratz Gallery's move a week ago from rental space that it had occupied for nine years in New Hope to its newly purchased building in a downtown Doylestown Borough historic district, a block from the Michener and Mercer Museums. It's the former Sabine Rose Gallery location. A conservation studio, vintage 1981, in Collegeville became Gratz Gallery & Conservation Studio in New Hope. Depending on an instinctual feel for kinds of art featured rather than on styles or trends, the gallery has displayed 19th- and 20th-century oil paintings - particularly works by Bucks County and Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts artists.

The official relocation of the Atlantic 10 Conference headquarters from Philadelphia to Newport News, Va., was announced yesterday. The relocation was first reported by the Daily News. "Moving the office to a new region of the Atlantic 10 footprint is an opportunity to further brand the A-10," commissioner Bernadette McGlade said. The A-10 office had been in Philadelphia since 1995.

After spending millions of dollars and years of effort, executives with the American Revolution Center have abandoned their controversial plan to build the museum inside the boundaries of Valley Forge National Park and will move the project to Center City. The museum, which exists only on paper, will be relocated to Third and Chestnut Streets, once the site of a National Park Service visitors center. The building now houses classrooms and archaeology stations. "We're off to a fresh, promising, exciting start," ARC president Bruce Cole said yesterday after the official announcement of the move.

The worsening economy is taking a toll on Oak Lane Day School in Blue Bell. The local pioneer in progressive education is selling its bucolic, 30-acre campus in Blue Bell to survive and will have to find a new home after 2009-10. Karl Walsh, head of the school, with 90 students from pre-kindergarten to sixth grade, yesterday reiterated points made in a letter sent last week to parents and alumni telling them about the decision. "The offer for the entire property was the only way to ensure that Oak Lane Day School has sufficient resources to deliver the same richness in programming for the 2009 camp season and the 2009-10 school year," he said.