Retirement is no longer about trading in one’s career for a rocker in front of the TV. For many of the retirees who move to the Lowcountry, retirement is another chapter in their lives that began innocently enough with a vacation to the Hilton Head area.
Joanne and Stephen Murray moved from Fort Washington, Pa., just outside of Philadelphia, to Sun City Hilton Head in October 2011, but were part-timers since 2006. Joanne was finance director for a dance school and Stephen retired as a conductor for the Southeast Pennsylvania Transit Authority (SEPTA).
“We started to vacation in Hilton Head and wanted to move to warmer climates when we retired,” said Joanne. “It made perfect sense to choose a retirement community here. And because we’d been here so much, we felt like we were home when we got here.”
With more than 14,000 residents and dozens of groups to join, it’s like a small town, one that the Murrays enjoy.
“What I like about Sun City is the resort atmosphere when you drive through the front gate,” said Joanne. “You feel like you’re still on vacation even though you’ve come home. There is so much friendliness. I love the fact they have a community theatre and a really good one. And everyone has made us feel welcome quickly.”
The Cypress, with nearly 430 residents, and TidePointe, with about 300 residents, are much more intimate, offering first-class independent living along with different levels of continuing care, nursing care and assisted living on the grounds.
Tom and Beverly Conner kept their options open before finally moving into The Cypress. They were in the market for a move and looked around while en route to visit his brother in Vero Beach, Fla. On the way back from Florida, they looked in The Crescent in Bluffton and bought a house right away. That was in 2001. In November 2012, the Conners moved to The Cypress.
“We picked up our life in Bluffton, moved it down to Hilton Head and now we are just 14 miles closer to everything we do,” said Tom.
Tom, a former school superintendent in Washington, Pa., is part of the Center for Medical Excellence, one of the newest businesses accepted into the incubator at the Don Ryan Center for Innovation. He is also a volunteer at the Allendale prison where he takes his Labrador therapy dog. Beverly, a former program officer for Alcoa Foundation, participates in her church activities. Both are active in the annual Hilton Head Motoring Festival & Concours d’Elegance.
“We were really looking down the road as we get older. We were looking at when’s too early, when’s too late? You really have to be able to walk in here in order to live here,” Tom said. “It’s comfortable here, the service here is great. We have really enjoyed it, our health is good, and now Bev’s sister is moving into the house next to us. We have never looked back.”
Mary Moser lives at The Seabrook of Hilton Head, a non-profit, independent living retirement community with more than 200 residents. The Seabrook’s 21-acre campus includes the Fraser Health Center, a 33-private bed skilled nursing facility.
Originally from Reston, Va., Mary’s husband was career civil service and golf was his passion.
“In 1980 we came to Hilton Head for a 3-day/2-night golf package and went home proud owners of a lot in Hilton Head Plantation,” Moser said. “We were captivated by the island’s natural beauty and couldn’t wait to make it home.” After several years in a nice condo area after her husband died, Moser knew it was time to move. She moved to The Seabrook, which is nestled in the natural beauty of a peaceful maritime forest with easy access to the beach.
“A number of my friends live at The Seabrook and I’ve found it to have a small-town feel, where people are welcoming and friendly,” Moser said. “It’s the perfect place to call home.”
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2013年8月27日星期二
2013年7月1日星期一
Could SC see a revival in video poker?
Last winter as the Legislature took its first steps to outlaw Internet sweepstakes games, an experienced lawyer with the S.C. Attorney General’s office warned lawmakers that video poker barons always have another card up their sleeves.
Just months after that warning, a bill filed late during the legislative session has some worried the next card may have been played.
The bill, sponsored by S.C. Rep. Bill Herbkersman, R-Beaufort, was introduced, referred to a committee and even received a hearing late in the legislative session. Lawmakers will be able to pick up on the bill where they left off when they return in January.
Herbkersman said the bill would not allow the return of video gambling. Instead, he said, he is filing it on behalf of his constituents in the Sun City retirement community who have complained that the state’s gambling laws are too restrictive.
“We want to get ladies in Sun City to be able to go in the clubhouse, have a glass of wine and play cribbage,” Herbkersman said. “It’s not a gambling law. It’s a personal freedom law.”
Others who have battled video poker for years said some of the same industry players who have been around for years were at the spring hearing, leading to concerns that the bill is another back-door attempt to bring back video poker. This summer, Herbkersman and others who support the bill will meet with State Law Enforcement Division Chief Mark Keel to discuss it.
Meanwhile, police across the state continue their efforts to stamp out video gambling that popped up a couple of years ago when game operators argued they had found a loophole in state law that allowed their machines.
At iInternet sweepstakes parlors, customers paid for a product such as phone cards or copying services and then got to play video games for a chance to win prizes, including cash. They said their games were no different from McDonald’s Monopoly promotion. They also pointed to a measure in the state’s gambling laws that says businesses with beer and wine permits can hold promotional sweepstakes.
Law enforcement, including Keel and S.C. Attorney General Alan Wilson, said no loophole existed but urged legislators to rewrite the law to end any debate. Legislators complied, and Gov. Nikki Haley signed the bill into law in March. The warning that the poker industry always will try another tactic came during a Senate committee hearing as legislators moved to close the perceived loophole.
Since then, the sweepstakes parlors, which mostly operated out of strip malls and only served the purpose of gambling, have vanished. Police have reported finding machines scattered across the state in bars, convenience stores and other locations.
Sheriff Leon Lott said sweepstakes parlors vanished from Richland County after he raided one that had opened in the spring of 2012 on Sparkleberry Road Extension. But individual machines occasionally are found in businesses across the county, he said.
Last week, the Columbia Police Department reported it had seized 22 machines from several businesses in Columbia. Most of those machines were called Palmetto Gold or Chess Challenge II, according to incident reports. At one Farrow Road convenience store, the owner told police that customers played the games for a chance to win tickets that could be redeemed for groceries and beverages at the store, according to a May 29 incident report. The machines and $22 were taken by police. Click on their website happmart for more information.
Just months after that warning, a bill filed late during the legislative session has some worried the next card may have been played.
The bill, sponsored by S.C. Rep. Bill Herbkersman, R-Beaufort, was introduced, referred to a committee and even received a hearing late in the legislative session. Lawmakers will be able to pick up on the bill where they left off when they return in January.
Herbkersman said the bill would not allow the return of video gambling. Instead, he said, he is filing it on behalf of his constituents in the Sun City retirement community who have complained that the state’s gambling laws are too restrictive.
“We want to get ladies in Sun City to be able to go in the clubhouse, have a glass of wine and play cribbage,” Herbkersman said. “It’s not a gambling law. It’s a personal freedom law.”
Others who have battled video poker for years said some of the same industry players who have been around for years were at the spring hearing, leading to concerns that the bill is another back-door attempt to bring back video poker. This summer, Herbkersman and others who support the bill will meet with State Law Enforcement Division Chief Mark Keel to discuss it.
Meanwhile, police across the state continue their efforts to stamp out video gambling that popped up a couple of years ago when game operators argued they had found a loophole in state law that allowed their machines.
At iInternet sweepstakes parlors, customers paid for a product such as phone cards or copying services and then got to play video games for a chance to win prizes, including cash. They said their games were no different from McDonald’s Monopoly promotion. They also pointed to a measure in the state’s gambling laws that says businesses with beer and wine permits can hold promotional sweepstakes.
Law enforcement, including Keel and S.C. Attorney General Alan Wilson, said no loophole existed but urged legislators to rewrite the law to end any debate. Legislators complied, and Gov. Nikki Haley signed the bill into law in March. The warning that the poker industry always will try another tactic came during a Senate committee hearing as legislators moved to close the perceived loophole.
Since then, the sweepstakes parlors, which mostly operated out of strip malls and only served the purpose of gambling, have vanished. Police have reported finding machines scattered across the state in bars, convenience stores and other locations.
Sheriff Leon Lott said sweepstakes parlors vanished from Richland County after he raided one that had opened in the spring of 2012 on Sparkleberry Road Extension. But individual machines occasionally are found in businesses across the county, he said.
Last week, the Columbia Police Department reported it had seized 22 machines from several businesses in Columbia. Most of those machines were called Palmetto Gold or Chess Challenge II, according to incident reports. At one Farrow Road convenience store, the owner told police that customers played the games for a chance to win tickets that could be redeemed for groceries and beverages at the store, according to a May 29 incident report. The machines and $22 were taken by police. Click on their website happmart for more information.
2013年6月18日星期二
Five things next-gen consoles should learn from PC gaming
With E3 finished, the industry has the chance to take a deeper look into the next-gen consoles. Some questions have been answered but many remain, particularly pertaining to how next-gen publishers and hardware makers plan to battle tablet gaming and welcome more independent developers and secure more content.
If console gaming is going to maintain the presence it once had, the developers are simply going to have to learn some lessons from the world of PC gaming, which has done an excellent job of keeping up with the changing online community and its increasingly user-centric demands.
With this in mind, here are five things console gaming could stand to learn from their PC cousins:
1. Openness to Publishers and Patches
A patch is a downloadable file that fixes or adds to a game after it's been released. Most people don't know that it can cost something to the tune of $40,000 to get a patch up for an Xbox 360 or PS3 because of internal certification processes. These outlandish costs can make it tough for even the most successful game development companies to afford regular patches and fixes.
This is discouraging to the developers, who may be able to identify bugs within days or weeks of a release, but won't issue patches because of the giant financial burden. Even worse, this leaves the actual players by the wayside, without the fixes the developers want to give them — held up only by the pricing determined by the console makers.
PC gaming is almost entirely opposite, with developers naming their own prices for rolling out patches, and some games taking on user-generated patches.
2. Fewer "Gates"
Why do console games have such proprietary membership systems, and why do they stand in the way of other services gamers may want to use? If people are already paying for a Netflix subscription and internet access, why also require them to pay for another online membership through their consoles?
This kind of "double charging" is already annoying to console users, and something PC users don't have to worry about at all.
3. Don't Ignore the Independents
If Minecraft is any indication of how successful an independent game maker can be, why wouldn't console companies be going out of their way to nurture the careers of up and coming developers?
It seems as though Sony is doing a decent job of incorporating indie games, even sending out free Vita development kits to independents to help fill their game roster. It still isn't a perfect environment for independents, but at least Sony (and to some degree, Nintendo) are recognizing the need to open the doors to independent development — something that has been happening in PC gaming all along.
4. Cater to the Hardcore Gamers
As consoles continue to become more sophisticated, they are starting to function more and more like personal computers — without the customization or range of capabilities. Instead of just playing games, consoles have all sorts of "media center" functions that are easily (and more effectively) met by other devices.
With iPads and smartphones, we don't necessarily need our consoles to stream music or access our Youtube accounts; we can already do these things on the fly, and easily connect with whatever screen or device we choose.
If people are gaming on a console, chances are they want to use it for gaming, not as a replacement for all of the other devices they use. What resources are being wasted turning consoles into multipurpose media centers, instead of powerful, consistently functional game machines?
If console gaming is going to maintain the presence it once had, the developers are simply going to have to learn some lessons from the world of PC gaming, which has done an excellent job of keeping up with the changing online community and its increasingly user-centric demands.
With this in mind, here are five things console gaming could stand to learn from their PC cousins:
1. Openness to Publishers and Patches
A patch is a downloadable file that fixes or adds to a game after it's been released. Most people don't know that it can cost something to the tune of $40,000 to get a patch up for an Xbox 360 or PS3 because of internal certification processes. These outlandish costs can make it tough for even the most successful game development companies to afford regular patches and fixes.
This is discouraging to the developers, who may be able to identify bugs within days or weeks of a release, but won't issue patches because of the giant financial burden. Even worse, this leaves the actual players by the wayside, without the fixes the developers want to give them — held up only by the pricing determined by the console makers.
PC gaming is almost entirely opposite, with developers naming their own prices for rolling out patches, and some games taking on user-generated patches.
2. Fewer "Gates"
Why do console games have such proprietary membership systems, and why do they stand in the way of other services gamers may want to use? If people are already paying for a Netflix subscription and internet access, why also require them to pay for another online membership through their consoles?
This kind of "double charging" is already annoying to console users, and something PC users don't have to worry about at all.
3. Don't Ignore the Independents
If Minecraft is any indication of how successful an independent game maker can be, why wouldn't console companies be going out of their way to nurture the careers of up and coming developers?
It seems as though Sony is doing a decent job of incorporating indie games, even sending out free Vita development kits to independents to help fill their game roster. It still isn't a perfect environment for independents, but at least Sony (and to some degree, Nintendo) are recognizing the need to open the doors to independent development — something that has been happening in PC gaming all along.
4. Cater to the Hardcore Gamers
As consoles continue to become more sophisticated, they are starting to function more and more like personal computers — without the customization or range of capabilities. Instead of just playing games, consoles have all sorts of "media center" functions that are easily (and more effectively) met by other devices.
With iPads and smartphones, we don't necessarily need our consoles to stream music or access our Youtube accounts; we can already do these things on the fly, and easily connect with whatever screen or device we choose.
If people are gaming on a console, chances are they want to use it for gaming, not as a replacement for all of the other devices they use. What resources are being wasted turning consoles into multipurpose media centers, instead of powerful, consistently functional game machines?
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