Pittsburgh Post-Gazette’s Post

Write out personal and family history. Share activities and leadership positions. Craft and proofread essays. Pay a fee, if applicable. Repeat. Those are the traditional steps required for high school students applying to colleges. After a grueling application process that can span hours to days, students then wait weeks or even months to find out if they were admitted. But now — as some colleges watch their enrollments fall and more high schoolers question the worth of a degree — a growing number of schools are taking a more lax approach to admissions. In fact, they’re scrapping the application process altogether for some students through direct admissions: a process that allows schools to proactively offer admission to students who meet certain academic or locational criteria.

A local real estate broker believes he has a perfect property for Allegheny County Executive Sara Innamorato’s “500 in 500” affordable housing plan — a recently closed personal care and nursing facility in Pittsburgh. Gary Wilson, a principal with Hanna Langholz Wilson Ellis, has approached the county about purchasing Vincentian Marian Manor in the Banksville neighborhood near Green Tree. Hanna Langholz is trying to sell the 26.3-acre property at 2695 Winchester Drive for $4.3 million after owner Vincentian Collaborative System shut down the three-building campus at the end of May. In an interview Wednesday, Mr. Wilson said he believes the property could accommodate as many as 178 people for Ms. Innamorato’s initiative to create 500 affordable housing units over 500 days.

Diane McNeill knows the red and blue American history textbooks sitting under her students’ desks are inadequate. The white glossy pages, the edges covered in pencil marks, were published in 1997. In the back, a list of U.S. presidents ends with Bill Clinton. The book is a bulky reminder of the disadvantages East Allegheny School District students face as the underfunded district struggles to afford the kind of modern technology and curriculum readily available in wealthier districts. At East Allegheny, teachers and administrators often fill in the gaps; Ms. McNeill uses outside resources such as History Channel videos while posters hanging on her classroom walls extend lessons past the Clinton administration. And her days are often filled with sending kids to the school’s “free store” for clothing or to the nurse for supplies they don’t have at home.

In four years, Downtown’s second-tallest skyscraper could go from full to empty — perhaps overnight. That could be the fate awaiting the 54-story BNY Mellon Center in 2028 when the master lease of its main tenant BNY ends. By then, the building at 500 Grant St. could be empty. BNY, which leases all of the tower, has begun systematically moving workers from the structure to its service center behind it on Ross Street.

Workers appear to be one step closer to resuming construction at the new $1.5 billion UPMC Presbyterian Hospital in Oakland after the healthcare giant was issued an electrical permit Wednesday afternoon — but they’re still waiting on two other permits to be approved. The city of Pittsburgh halted work at the site last Thursday, claiming some aspects of the project had begun without the required permits. The stoppage by the Department of Permits, Licenses and Inspections forced about 150 workers off the job.

There apparently will be no parole for Western Penitentiary. Despite at least two proposals for the old North Side prison’s redevelopment, the state is moving ahead with plans to raze the buildings at the site.

A broken arm could just as easily break someone’s credit score. An unexpected surgery has left many credit reports scarred for years in the current system. But help may be on the way. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is aiming to revolutionize the way Americans bounce back from health-related setbacks.

The city of Pittsburgh has halted construction at the new $1.5 billion UPMC Presbyterian Hospital in Oakland, claiming that work started on some aspects of the project without the required permits.

A private equity company promised job creation and economic development when it purchased malls nationwide — including Century III in West Mifflin. It left behind a trail of empty, decaying buildings and unpaid property taxes, a PG investigation found. From 2011 to 2014, Moonbeam Capital LLC and its subsidiaries purchased 19 malls and shopping centers in more than 10 states — from West Mifflin, Pa. to Nevada. Steven Maksin, the founder of Moonbeam Investments LLC, was considered a “visionary” and promised the creation of “thousands and thousands of jobs.” Moonbeam has since racked up millions in unpaid property taxes, liens and a litany of building violations in places that were once celebrated as town centers, a PG investigation found. “Their strategy was to pay cash for assets, not invest back in them, bleed the rents, and then leave a vacant, decrepit parcel,” said Ryan McMahon, the Onondaga county executive.