Cortland dividend

Cortland dividend

cortland

Cortland Bancorp has declared a cash dividend of 3 cents per share, payable on or after Aug. 28, 2013, to shareholders of record at the close of business Aug. 12.

The dividend comes after the holding company of Cortland Banks reported a second-quarter profit of $952,000, or 21 cents per share, Tuesday.

Hardest Hit Funds

WASHINGTON, D.C.

U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Avon Lake, on Friday urged the U.S. Department of the Treasury to approve the Ohio Housing Finance Agency’s proposal to use $60 million of the state’s nearly $375 million remaining Hardest Hit Funds (HHF) to demolish vacant and abandoned properties. Brown, a member of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, helped ensure Ohio received $570 million in HHF in 2010. Brown also introduced a bill with U.S. Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-West Virginia, to expand and permanently extend the Health Coverage Tax Credit for Delphi salaried retirees as a part of the Trade Adjustment Assistance program.

Facebook closes above IPO price

MENLO PARK, Calif.

Facebook’s stock has closed above its IPO price for the first time since the online social-networking leader made its debut on Wall Street more than 14 months ago.

The shares gained 56 cents to finish Friday’s session at $38.05. That’s the stock’s highest closing price since ending its first day of trading at $38.23 in May of last year.

The stock has been soaring since last week when Facebook reported better second-quarter earnings than analysts anticipated.

Facebook Inc. priced its initial public offering at $38 per share amid lofty expectations that investors would be clamoring to buy a stake in one of the world’s best-known websites.

Instead, worries about the Menlo Park, Calif., company’s growth prospects triggered a sell-off that dropped the stock as low as $17.55.

Groups seek to block horse slaughter

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M.

Federal officials failed to consider environmental hazards when they gave two companies permission to resume domestic-horse slaughter, attorneys for animal-rights groups seeking to halt the opening of the slaughterhouses argued Friday.

The Department of Agriculture issued the permits in June, and the plants in New Mexico and Iowa plan to open Monday.

But animal-welfare groups are seeking a restraining order from U.S. District Judge Christina Armijo, saying the slaughterhouses should be forced to undergo public review under provisions of the National Environmental Policy Act.

No environmental-impact study ever has been done to examine the effects of horse slaughter, Bruce Wagman, a lawyer for The Humane Society of the United States, the Colorado-based Front Range Equine Rescue and other plaintiffs argued in court Friday. Horses are given more than 100 drugs not approved for other feed animals, he said.

Vindicator staff/wire reports