The saga of Gillian’s Wonderland Pier continues as Ocean City Council voted last night to allow the local planning board to take the next steps in the property’s future.
Councilmembers voted 4-3 to refer the 600 Boardwalk Avenue site to the Ocean City Planning Board to evaluate its possible rehabilitation.
“This is basically a first step in what could potentially be an extensive review process, if it were to continue to move forward,” said Doug Bergen, Ocean City’s public information officer.
City Council President Terry Crowley Jr. and council members Jody Levchuk, Tony Polcini, and Pete Madden voted in favor, while Keith Hartzell, Dave Winslow, and Sean Barnes voted against.
This means the council is requesting the planning board to deem the property “an area of rehabilitation,” which kick-starts a wave of inspections, public input, and planning.
In the next 45 days, Bergen said the planning board must assess the site and make a recommendation to City Council on whether the once iconic amusement park property meets the criteria for rehabilitation. If council votes to make that determination, then the site developer and owners can negotiate with City Council to devise a redevelopment plan. “With lots of further review down the road,” Bergen said.
A coalition of various business associations, from restaurants to boardwalk shops, put pressure on City Council Wednesday in a news conference. Both the presidents of the Boardwalk Merchants Association — co-owner of Surf Mall, Wes Kazmarck — and the local restaurants association — owner of Cousin’s, Bill McGinnity — were joined on Wednesday by the Philadelphian property developer Eustace Mita.
Since the nearly century-old boardwalk amusement park closed last year, plans for the site’s redevelopment have been swirling around town. Mita initially proposed a 7-story luxury hotel, the “Icona in Wonderland Resort,” but council members refused to send that proposal to the planning board in August.
A month later, Mita announced that he was considering transforming the site into townhouses, after courting offers from Phillip Norcross (brother of South Jersey power broker George E. Norcross III) and from Virginia-based NVR Inc., to redevelop the site.
Now, the site’s future will be in the hands of the planning board’s assessment, which, for some business owners, is the right call. In a video posted to Facebook earlier this week, Kazmarck urged Ocean City residents to contact their council members and ask them to vote in favor of the planning board review.
“This is about City Council being able to make a better decision on what to do with this property. Everyone’s opinion here is a valuable opinion, but I think now we’re at that point where we should bring in experts,“ Kazmarck said. ”That’s the planning board. The planning board hires experts to evaluate the site to decide if the site should be an area of rehabilitation.”
While it may feel like redevelopment plans are coming swiftly, Kazmarck reassured residents that local business owners have been discussing these next steps since last year, he said in the video.
Netflix has agreed to buy Warner Bros Discovery’s TV, film studios and streaming division for $72 billion, a deal that would hand control of one of Hollywood’s most prized and oldest assets to the streaming pioneer.
The agreement, announced on Friday, follows a weeks-long bidding war in which Netflix offered nearly $28-a-share, eclipsing Paramount Skydance’s close to $24 bid for the whole of Warner Bros Discovery, including the cable TV assets slated for a spinoff.
Buying the owner of marquee franchises including “Game of Thrones,” “DC Comics” and “Harry Potter” will further tilt the balance of power in Hollywood in favor of Netflix.
It would help the streaming giant, which has so far built its dominance without major deals or a large content library, to ward off competition from Walt Disney and the Ellison family-backed Paramount.
The two companies together will “help define the next century of storytelling,” said Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos, who had once said “the goal is to become HBO faster than HBO can become us.”
Strong antitrust scrutiny likely
The deal, however, is likely to face strong antitrust scrutiny in Europe and the U.S. as it would give the world’s biggest streaming service ownership of a rival that is home to HBO Max and boasts nearly 130 million streaming subscribers.
David Ellison-led Paramount, which kicked off the bidding war with a series of unsolicited offers and has close ties with the Trump administration, had questioned the sale process earlier this week and alleged favorable treatment to Netflix.
Even before the bids were in, some members of Congress said a Netflix–Warner Bros Discovery deal could harm consumers and Hollywood.
Cinema United, a global exhibition trade association, said on Friday the deal poses an “unprecedented threat” to movie theaters worldwide.
“In light of the current regulatory environment this will raise eyebrows and concerns. The combined dominant streaming player will be heavily scrutinized,” said PP Foresight analyst Paolo Pescatore.
“We should expect this to wrangle on given Paramount Skydance pursuit for Warner Bros Discovery.”
Looking to allay some concerns, Netflix said the deal would give subscribers more shows and films, boost its U.S. production and long-term spending on original content and create more jobs and opportunities for creative talent.
The company argued in deal talks that a combination of its streaming service with HBO Max would benefit consumers by lowering the cost of a bundled offering.
The company has told Warner Bros Discovery it would keep releasing the studio’s films in cinemas in a bid to ease fears that its deal would eliminate another studio and major source of theatrical films, according to media reports.
Cash-and-stock deal
Warner Bros Discovery shares were up 2.4% at $25 in premarket trading, while Netflix fell nearly 3% and Paramount 2.2%. Comcast, the third suitor, was trading little changed.
Paramount and Comcast did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Under the deal, each Warner Bros Discovery shareholder will receive $23.25 in cash and about $4.50 in Netflix stock per share, valuing Warner at $27.75 a share, or about $72 billion in equity and $82.7 billion, including debt.
The deal represents a premium of 121.3% to Warner Bros Discovery’s closing price on September 10, before initial reports of a possible buyout emerged.
The deal is expected to close after Warner Bros Discovery spins off its global networks unit, Discovery Global, into a separate listed company, a move now set for completion in the third quarter of 2026.
Netflix has offered Warner Bros Discovery a $5.8 billion breakup fee, while Warner Bros Discovery would pay Netflix $2.8 billion if the deal collapses.
Netflix said it expects to generate at least $2 billion to $3 billion in annual cost savings by the third year, after the deal closes.
Netflix growth worries
Analysts have said Netflix is driven by a desire to lock up long-term rights to hit shows and films and rely less on outside studios as it expands into gaming and looks for new avenues of growth after the success of its password-sharing crackdown.
Its shares are up just 16% this year, after surging more than 80% in 2024, as investors worry its breakneck growth could be slowing, especially after it stopped disclosing subscriber figures earlier this year.
The company has leaned on its ad-supported tier to drive growth, but that is not expected to become a major revenue engine until next year, while analysts say its push into video games has stumbled amid strategy shifts and executive turnover.
Buying Warner Bros would also deepen its gaming bet, as WBD is one of the few entertainment companies to notch big successes in the sector, including its Harry Potter title “Hogwarts Legacy,” which has generated more than $1 billion in revenue.
At a former restaurant in a drive-up shopping strip on the edge of Port Richmond, a bilingual credit union has joined the neighborhood.
The newest branch of federally-chartered Finanta credit union, which also calls itself Cooperativa Finanta, “is not just a banking place,” says Pedro A. Rivera II, Finanta’s board chair, president of Thaddeus Stevens College of Technology in Lancaster, and a graduate of Kensington High School.
“We are focused on people that are unbanked: small business owners and workers who go to check-cashing agencies and use money orders and sometimes predatory [high-rate private] lenders,” said Daniel Betancourt, the credit union’s president and CEO.
Finanta Federal Credit Union offers mortgages, personal and small business loans, Visa debit cards, and interest on deposits.And credit union staff help customers learn to use these products — in English and Spanish.
Branchmanager Iris Santiago signed off on one of its first home mortgages to cleaning-service co-owner Libra Rivera, on Wednesday. The credit union office at 2313 E. Venango St. officially opened Friday but began accepting deposits and booking loans earlier.
Iris Santiago, branch manager, and Bart Rivera, assistant branch manager, at Finanta Federal Credit Union, in Philadelphia.
Rivera said the concept takes him back to his North Philly youth, when he banked both the funds of the Amigos de Roberto Clemente youth track and field association and his newly minted teacher’s pay at the former Borinquen Federal Credit Union at Front and Allegheny, which shut in 2011.
“It was the size of a rowhouse. You’d go in and connect to the tellers in a space where you could catch up what was going through the community and ask questions about percent yield, about how to leverage dollars in a place that was trusted,” Rivera said.
He got that same feeling when he visited Finanta’s pilot branch in Lancaster after it opened in 2023. Rivera agreed to serve as Finanta’s chairman and went to work lining up support to speed its growth.
Now, bolstered by private foundations and a state investment, Finanta is opening what it expects to be its largest branch in Port Richmond, with others to follow in Reading, Northeast Philly, Allentown, and other communities with large English-and-Spanish-speaking populations.
The Lancaster branch signed up 2,000 members in three years. Betancourt expects as many in Philadelphia by next fall.
This growth is not yet organic. Mackenzie Scott’s Yield Giving foundation in 2023 pledged $2 million a year for seven years to help finance loans. Santander Bank and M&T Bank each invested $1 million as part of their community-banking mandates.
State House Appropriations Committee chair Jordan Harris, at the recommendation of state Rep. Jose Giral and state Sen. Tina Tartaglione, all Philadelphia Democrats, granted $4 million to build the Reading and Port Richmond branches.
The credit union made its first mortgage this summer and offers home loans up to $400,000, enough to purchase homes in many but not all Philadelphia neighborhoods.
The credit union also has made business loans to local firms like Puerto Rican bakery and restaurantEl Coqui in Kensington. El Coqui had previously borrowed from the Finanta loan fund, which Betancourt also leads.
The fund’s Philadelphia clients include developers such as HACE, projects such as Charles Lomax’s Village Square on Haverford in West Philly, and family-owned stores such as Silvia’s Bakery and Mucho Perú.
Alicia Placeres, member sales representative, working at Finanta Federal Credit Union.
A new credit union, open to everyone but anchored in the Latino communities, “is very much needed,” said Pedro Rodriguez, cofounder of Café Don Pedro coffee roasters in Brewerytown.
He’s worried about loan volume amid the Trump administration’s push to arrest and deport immigrants. “They have people scared of their shadow,” he added.
Others call the credit union a lifeline for people under pressure.
“Our immigrants are very brave. A lot of the people who come to us are pursuing mortgages, pursuing small business loans, they say what’s going on is not unusual for them, and they are persisting” in building lives here, said Will Gonzalez, head of Ceiba, a Philadelphia-based economic-development advocacy coalition.
Gonzalez has noted a drop this year — from almost one a day to less than two a month — in noncitizens filing for the first time to pay their income taxes with help from his agency, but those who have already been assigned IRS numbers have returned to file again even if their own immigration status is unresolved.
“People are paying taxes because it’s the right thing to do,” Gonzalez added. “And because they want to borrow to put their kids in college and to buy a house. To do that, they know they need to show the lenders they have paid their taxes.” It’s a sign they see their long-term future in Philadelphia.
He said the former Borinquen credit union was badly needed but was underfunded — “a little tree in a desert.” It operated from 1974 to 2011 until it was taken over by regulators and closed after suffering losses. A manager was sentenced to 7½years in federal prison for stealing from the institution and members from 2006 to 2009.
The Finanta credit union board Rivera heads, which oversees Betancourt and his growing staff, includes Mennonite Church USA moderator Elizabeth Soto Albrecht, Amalgamated Bank first vice president and 2016 Democratic National Convention CFO Jason O’Malley, and other professionals based in cities with large bilingual populations.
For all his experience overseeing institutional budgets, Rivera said he and the other directors have had to learn banking in accordance with National Credit Union Administration guidelines.
“I take my fiduciary responsibility seriously. We are now facing the regulatory expectations and demands of the banking world,” he said. “We know what is expected of us.”
Gonzalez said Finanta’s focus on Pennsylvania cities with large and growing Latino populations makes it a natural support network.
”They are helping these communities build political and economic power,” he said. “They are in the right place at the right time.”
Right now, any Philadelphian 21 or older can go online or walk into a regional smoke shop and buy a THC-infused drink as potent as products in legal dispensaries.
But soon, that might all change.
The billion-dollar intoxicating beverage industry exploded in recent years, with THC-infused seltzers, lemonades, and teas that resemble popular products like Surfsides or White Claws. Sold in local gas stations, smoke shops, and liquor stores outside of Pennsylvania, these weed drinks deliver a cannabis high that is infused into bubbly, sweet canned beverages.
While marijuana is still federally illegal, the hemp industry had found a way to manufacture and sell hemp-derived THC drinks across the country through a legal loophole that is soon closing.
Last month, Congress banned all intoxicating hemp products, a slew of THC-infused smokeable, vape-able, and edible products that are derived from hemp plants but could be mistaken for actual marijuana. In many cases, the drinks are just as potent as conventional weed.
Starting in 2027, almost all of them will be illegal, spurring a nationwide movement within the industry to save the burgeoning market.
Arthur Massolo, the vice president of national THC beverage brand Cycling Frog, which sells its wares locally, saidthese restrictions will have devastating effects on the producers of thousands of hemp-derived products, like THC, but also CBD, the non-intoxicating cannabinoid popular for treating anxiety, sleep, and pain.
Will Angelos, whose Ardmore smoke shop and wellness store, Free Will Collective, relies on THC drinks for nearly 40% of its business, is hoping for some saving grace. “We’re either looking to pivot or we’re disappearing,” he said.
Adults share Cycling Frog canned THC drinks in this marketing photo provided by Cycling Frog.
What are THC-infused drinks?
Seltzers, sodas, teas, mocktails, and lemonades all infused with THC — and sometimes non-intoxicating CBD — exploded onto the scene a few years ago and grew into a billion-dollar business, said hemp market analyst Beau Whitney.
“These drinks have transformed the hemp industry into this low-dose intoxicating health and wellness, alcohol-adjacent product,” said Massolo, who is also the president of U.S. Hemp Roundtable, a hemp business advocacy organization.
The THC-infused drinks sold in gas stations, smoke shops, and liquor stores are supposedly formulated using legally grown hemp, which is allowed to be grown under the 2018 Farm Bill that opened the door to hemp farming in the U.S.
Lawmakers carved out an exemption from federal drug laws for cannabis plants containing 0.3% or less of THC. These low-THC plants are considered “hemp” and are legal to grow. Cannabis plants over that THC threshold are considered marijuana and can carry felony charges if the plant is not being grown by state-licensed growers in places where adult use or medicinal marijuana is legal, like New Jersey and Pennsylvania.
While intoxicating hemp products have enjoyed consistent growth in the past years, these THC-infused drinks have increasingly appeared in aisles of liquor stores and supermarkets in some states, allowing adults who normally don’t visit dispensaries to pick up a bottle of infused wine in the same place they grab groceries, said New Jersey cannabis lawyer Steve Schain.
Hemp products photographed at the Philadelphia Inquirer, November 21, 2025.
The ease of access to THC drinks allowed the national market to grow to $1.3 billion in annual sales, and if access continues, Whitney said, that figure could reach $15 billion in the coming years.
This is all thanks to what Whitney calls the “FPS,” or “Female Power Shopper.” These women, ages 29 to 45, are the ones who are likely shopping for a household in grocery and liquor stores, and may jump at the chance to try cannabis products without diving headfirst into dispensaries, Whitney said.
Mary Ellen, 55, of Bucks County, who asked to not to be identified by her last name over concerns for her cannabis use and employment, said these THC drinks are the perfect way to unwind after a long day, especially for adults like her who choose not to drink alcohol. As a medical marijuana patient, she uses regulated cannabis for a variety of ailments, but also enjoys THC drinks like Nowadays’ infused mocktails that she buys at Angelos’ Ardmore store.
“I’d rather come home and have a glass of Nowadays. That’s a lot better than having a glass of vodka or a benzodiazepine,” she said. “I’m not going to forget what I did the night before, and I’m not going to wake up feeling crappy the next morning.”
City smoke shop exterior in the 1000 block of Chestnut Street Monday, July 21, 2025.
What are the concerns over THC drinks?
As the money started to roll in for THC drinks, fear among local communities and law enforcement began to grow. In the Philadelphia suburbs, the Bucks, Chester, and Montgomery County district attorneys’ offices finished a 10-month investigation into intoxicating hemp products and the local stores that sell them.
The 107-page grand jury report speaks of a public health crisis unfolding in “plain sight” across Pennsylvania, where retailers have little to no oversight, in some cases selling actual marijuana.
Montgomery County District Attorney Kevin Steele said the industry created a “Wild West situation” and urged state lawmakers to regulate the industry similarly to alcohol and tobacco, including age requirements, licensing, and mandatory lab testing.
Stakeholders in the industry support regulation of some kind. While hemp-derived THC companies fear the economic collapse of their industry, Massolo and Angelos say there is concern that these products will leave overt brick-and-mortar operations known by local officials for more covert, illicit operations, similar to how these products were purchased before the 2018 Farm Bill.
“We’ve basically traveled back to 10 seconds before the Farm Bill of 2018 was signed,” Schain said.
Mary Ellen says the lack of regulation is a major sticking point for consumers who flock to these products, but would like some reassurance on the drinks they are ingesting.
But, even if the ban goes into effect, she said, “people will just figure out another way for us to get it. It’ll be like a prohibition that we’ve seen in this country with alcohol and marijuana.”
THC and CBD-infused beverages on the shelves of Free Will Collective, an Ardmore smoke shop and wellness store owned by Will Angelos. As Congress moves to ban most intoxicating hemp products, business owners like Angelos aren’t sure they will be able to keep the doors open long past 2027 if current regulations go into effect.
Will THC-infused drinks be banned or saved by 2027?
Now, as the industry’s yearlong grace period begins before the ban takes effect, companies are scrambling.
The intoxicating hemp manufacturers and retailers who spoke to The Inquirer said the game plan is to offload all of the intoxicating hemp products in stock, including THC-infused drinks, flower, vapes, and even CBD products.
Some companies will see almost their entire product catalog become illegal, in some cases dwindling from 45 products on offer down to two, Whitney said of the firms he works with. The far-reaching impact will also hurt industrial hemp products, cannabis tourism, alcohol distributors, and even the legal cannabis industry, as some of their products, including CBD, will now have to contend with these new regulations, Schain and Whitney said.
At the U.S. Hemp Roundtable, Massolo is having daily board meetings, including on weekends, to coordinate a response to federal lawmakers. It’s now a race against the clock to remedy or claw back some of the new regulations before damage is done to the industry’s distribution pipelines, Massolo said. The group hopes to rally other industries, like traditional beverages, wellness products, and supplements, to bolster its case.
Among the U.S. Hemp Roundtable’s recommendations to lawmakers are an extension of the hemp ban grace period to two years, raising the limit on hemp-derived THC products, and allowing states to regulate these products as they see fit, to name a few.
Stakeholders say they want regulations to help legitimize this billion-dollar endeavor and save it from annihilation, but smaller operators like Angelos hope it’s not at the expense of small independent businesses.
While precautions like rigorous age verification systems and lab testing are necessary, Angelos said, if regulators “overtax, or over gate-keep,” many of the smaller retailers — who he said enjoy the benefit of knowing their local government officials and community — won’t be able to compete in the market.
“There obviously has to be standards, but I’m scared of an overcorrection,” Angelos said of the hemp ban. “It’s not just a singular choice. If you want your kids to be safe, have a mechanism where you can keep your eyes on the product.”
Amazon delivery is getting faster in Philadelphia.
The online retailer is testing out a new delivery model that aims to get items to customers in 30 minutes or less. The service, which is being called Amazon Now, was announced on Dec. 1 and will be available only in areas of Philadelphia and Seattle.
“Building on our decades of delivery innovation, we’re now testing an ultrafast delivery offering of the items customers want and need most urgently in parts of Seattle and Philadelphia,” the company said in a news release.
The service seems comparable to those offered by DoorDash and Gopuff, which allow consumers to purchase food and retail items to be delivered to their homes same-day.
Customers in areas where the new program is offered will see an option in their Amazon app or webpage navigation bar for “30-Minute Delivery.”
Thousands of items are eligible for the service, according to the company, including produce, milk, eggs, diapers, and over-the-counter medicine.
Prime members will pay at least $3.99 for quick delivery, while the fee for nonmembers starts at $13.99. Customers will also incur an additional fee of $1.99 if their order is worth less than $15.
“Amazon is utilizing specialized smaller facilities designed for efficient order fulfillment, strategically placed close to where Seattle- and Philadelphia-area customers live and work,” notes the news release.
“This approach prioritizes the safety of employees picking and packing orders, reduces the distance delivery partners need to travel, and enables faster delivery times,” the company said.
When Amazon launched same-day delivery in 2009, Philadelphia was among the first cities elected to roll out the service. At the time, the company already offered two-day delivery on orders, which was available to Prime members for no extra cost after their $79 annual subscription. The same-day delivery service, when it was announced, cost an additional $6 per item.
Prime members today pay $14.99 a month or $139 for a year and get access to free delivery. Amazon saw an increase in Prime membership during the pandemic and has said this year that it offers over 300 million items eligible for delivery with the program compared to 1 million in 2005 when the model first got its start.
The company also continues to expand its network. In April, Amazon announced that it was investing more than $4 billion to broaden delivery in more rural parts of the country.
David E. Loder, 71, of Flourtown, longtime attorney at Duane Morris LLP, multifaceted trustee and board member, education advocate, mentor, and volunteer, died Thursday, Oct. 23, of complications from lymphoma and scleroderma at his home.
A graduate of Germantown Friends School and what is now the University of Pennsylvania’s Carey Law School, Mr. Loder spent 43 years, from 1982 to his retirement in 2024, as an associate, partner, and chair of the health law group at the Duane Morris law firm. He became partner in 1989 and helped the health law practice gain national recognition for its success.
Mr. Loder and his team represented the Hospital and Healthsystem Association of Pennsylvania, the Pennsylvania Trauma Systems Foundation, and other medical providers in all kinds of consequential litigation. In 2006, he helped local hospitals win a multimillion-dollar settlement with an insurance company. In 2010, he supervised a case that successfully revived a state abatement program that alleviated medical malpractice costs for physicians and hospitals.
In a tribute, former colleagues at the Pennsylvania Trauma Systems Foundation praised “his ability to see both the legal complexities and the human dimensions of every situation.”
Mr. Loder stands with Blanka Zizka , the Wilma Theater’s artistic director, at an event in 2018.
He was adept in vendor contract law, board governance, policy development, and human relations issues. He took special interest in doctor-patient relations and told the Daily News in 2016: “While it is critical that the healthcare provider convey necessary and accurate information to patients concerning their health condition, it is also important to remain sensitive to the patient’s interest and willingness to hear such information.”
Matthew A. Taylor, chair and chief executive officer at Duane Morris, said in a tribute: “He was one of the nation’s most respected healthcare lawyers.”
Mr. Loder also represented the Philadelphia Zoo, homeowners fighting increased property assessments, participants in gestational-carrier programs, and other clients. “He was a shrewd judge of character,” said his son Kyle. “He was thoughtful and strategic. He became a confidant and adviser to many of his clients.”
John Soroko, chair emeritus at Duane Morris, said in a tribute: “Dave had a unique ability to turn friends into clients. But, even more importantly, to turn clients into friends.”
This photo of Mr. Loder (right) representing the Philadelphia Zoo appeared in The Inquirer in 1989.
Away from the law firm, Mr. Loder was chair of the board for the Wilma Theater and served on boards at Germantown Friends, the old University of the Sciences, the World Affairs Council of Philadelphia, and other groups. He was a trustee at the Dolfinger-McMahon Foundation and the Christian R. and Mary F. Lindback Foundation, and represented the Lindback regularly at its annual distinguished educators awards ceremony.
“There’s a firm belief in the importance of excellence in education in the public schools,” he told The Inquirer at the 2016 Lindback ceremony. In 2017, he said: “All of us need to recognize that the Philadelphia public schools are serving an incredibly important function.” In 2018, he said: “People need to know that there are some exceptional educators in Philadelphia public schools.”
He mentored many other lawyers and volunteered to help students in need. In online tributes, friends noted his “kind advice,” “voice of reason and compassion,” and “sense of humor, keen intellect, love of sports, and limitless knowledge on so many topics.”
In 1998, he was featured in an Inquirer story about the challenges parents face when dealing with young children stuck inside during the cold winter months. He said: “I find that if you can get the kids down by 6 p.m. and have a glass of wine in front of the fireplace, it gets you through.”
Mr. Loder enjoyed sports and the outdoors.
His family said in a tribute: “He took life seriously but never too seriously, and his warmth, humor, guidance, and generosity will be remembered.”
David Edwin Loder was born April 22, 1954, in Yalesville, Conn. His father, noted theologian Theodore Loder, moved the family to West Mount Airy when Mr. Loder was a boy, and he graduated from Germantown Friends in 1972.
He starred in football, basketball, and baseball in high school, and went on to play basketball and earn a bachelor’s degree in political science at Wesleyan University in Connecticut in 1977. He worked briefly after college as a high school history teacher, served an independent study fellowship in Poland, earned his law degree at Penn in 1981, and studied international law at the London School of Economics and Political Science.
He married Nadya Shmavonian, and they had sons Marek and Kyle, and a daughter, Julya, and lived in Philadelphia and Flourtown. After a divorce, he married Jennifer Ventresca and welcomed her children into the family.
Mr. Loder liked hiking in New York’s Adirondack Mountains and relaxing at his getaway home on Long Beach Island.
Mr. Loder enjoyed tennis, squash, and golf at the Philadelphia Cricket Club. He liked hiking in New York’s Adirondack Mountains and relaxing at his getaway home on Long Beach Island, N.J.
He doted on his family and Labrador, and played cards every month for years with an eclectic group of old friends.
“David embodied the values of faith, service, and integrity,” his family said. His son Kyle said: “He was magnetic, gracious, thoughtful, and curious. He was easy to talk to.”
In addition to his wife, children, and former wife, Mr. Loder is survived by a granddaughter, a sister, two brothers, and other relatives.
Mr. Loder “was magnetic, gracious, thoughtful and curious,” his son Kyle said.
A memorial service and celebration of his life were held earlier.
Donations in his name may be made to the Penn Medicine Scleroderma Center, Attn: Amanda Hills, 3535 Market St., Suite 750, Philadelphia, Pa. 19104.
Uri Monson, Gov. Josh Shapiro’s longtime confidant and Pennsylvania’s budget secretary, is the new executive director of the $80 billion-asset Pennsylvania school pension and investment system, known as PSERS.
The move puts Monson, a former top finance officer for the School District of Philadelphiaand for Montgomery County government while Shapiro was its top elected official, atop the agency responsible for paying retirement checks to half a million current and retired school employees.
Monson has shown “exceptional financial leadership and integrity,” Shapiro said in a statement, citing Monson’s bond refinancing work that shaved state interest costs and helped boost its credit ratings so they are no longer among the lowest of the 50 states.
Zachary Reber, a deputy secretary in Monson’s office with 30 years of state government experience, will become the state’s new budget secretary. Shapiro credited Reber as a top negotiator for the 2025-26 budget, helping clinch the deal with legislators.
At PSERS, Monson will lead a staff of 350. The board picked Monson “because of his extensive public-sector financial experience,” board chair Richard Vague said in a statement that also said Monson’s hiring followed “a nationwide search.”
The new executive director “understands both the financial demands of a pension system and the responsibility” to school staff and retirees, said vice chair Sue Lemmo, a retired teacher.
Monson pledged to work with the board, staff, and other stakeholders — who include taxpayers and pension system members — to ensure “retirement security.”
He holds both a master’s degree in public policy and a bachelor’s degree from Columbia University and a second bachelor’s from the Jewish Theological Seminary of America.
PSERS is one of the most expensive state programs, consuming $5.5 billion directly from public revenues last year, including both state and local property tax funds, plus $1.2 billion routed through school workers’ paychecks.
The system also collects profits from its wide-ranging investments, totaling $5.7 billion last year.
The switch will likelymean a significant pay raise for Monson, who earned $211,000 a year as budget czar, the most of any Pennsylvania cabinet officer and more than the lieutenant governor.
While working as the top budget officer in the state since 2023, Monson oversaw Shapiro’s annual state budget proposals, which guide spending for the next five years.
Republican lawmakers criticized Shapiro’s 2025-26 budget proposal for counting on new revenue streams, such as marijuana taxes, that had yet to be approved by the General Assembly.
Monson’s predecessor at PSERS, Terrill Savidge Sanchez, was paid $317,000 in fiscal 2024. A longtime PSERS employee who also headed the smaller Pennsylvania state workers’ pension system (SERS), Sanchez announced her retirement earlier this year. Chief investment officer Ben Cotton stepped in as interim director after she left.
Sanchez was tapped for the top PSERS job in 2022 after the departure of Glen Grell, a former state representative and lawyer who tripled his legislative paycheck by joining PSERS in 2015.
Grell and other top staffers retired during a federal investigation into the system’s exaggerated earnings and secretive land deals, which was followed by changes in pension investment, financial reporting, audit, and travel practices.
As governor, Shapiro has not attempted such a purge, either at PSERS, where he controls three of 15 trustee seats, or at the SERS state employee pension system, where the governor appoints six of the 11 trustees.
PSERS trustees on their own have scrapped hedge funds and cut back on private-equity funds in recent years, citing high fees and poor returns compared to the rising U.S. stock market.
PSERS, like the state workers’ pension system, was among the first state pension systems to invest heavily in private assets in the late 1990s and 2000s.
PSERS’s private investments underperformed U.S. stocks during the 2010s bull market. Those investment returns, plus rising retirements and pension underfunding in the early 2000s, required higher taxpayer payments in recent years to keep the fund from growing less solvent.
Pennsylvanians now pay 34 cents into the PSERS plan for every $1 in school staff wages.
Some owners of private money managers who solicit top leaders of PSERS and other state pension funds for investments are major political donors at the national level, though an SEC rule has barred them from collecting state and local pension fees after donating to state or local candidates.
U.S. Sen. David McCormick (R., Pa.) was chief executive of hedge fund Bridgewater Associates when it was PSERS’s largest money manager. It oversaw about one-tenth of the state’s investments and collected more than $750 million in Pennsylvania investment fees over the 20 years before PSERS trustees voted to drop hedge funds in 2021.
Staff writer Gillian McGoldrick contributed to this article.
The safety practices of major artificial-intelligence companies, such as Anthropic, OpenAI, xAI, and Meta, are “far short of emerging global standards,” according to a new edition of Future of Life Institute’s AI safety index released on Wednesday.
The institute said the safety evaluation, conducted by an independent panel of experts, found that while the companies were busy racing to develop superintelligence, none had a robust strategy for controlling such advanced systems.
The study comes amid heightened public concern about the societal impact of smarter-than-human systems capable of reasoning and logical thinking, after several cases of suicide and self-harm were tied to AI chatbots.
“Despite recent uproar over AI-powered hacking and AI driving people to psychosis and self-harm, U.S. AI companies remain less regulated than restaurants and continue lobbying against binding safety standards,” said Max Tegmark, MIT professor and Future of Life president.
The AI race also shows no signs of slowing, with major tech companies committing hundreds of billions of dollars to upgrading and expanding their machine-learning efforts. The Future of Life Institute is a nonprofit organization that has raised concerns about the risks intelligent machines pose to humanity. Founded in 2014, it was supported early on by Tesla CEO Elon Musk. In October, a group including scientists Geoffrey Hinton and Yoshua Bengio called for a ban on developing superintelligent artificial intelligence until the public demands it and science paves a safe way forward.
A Google DeepMind spokesperson said the company will “continue to innovate on safety and governance at pace with capabilities” as its models become more advanced, while xAI said, “Legacy media lies,” in what seemed to be an automated response.
Anthropic, OpenAI, Meta, Z.ai, DeepSeek, and Alibaba Cloud did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the study.
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Wednesday announced a proposal to weaken vehicle mileage rules for the auto industry, loosening regulatory pressure on automakers to control pollution from gasoline-powered cars and trucks.
The plan, if finalized next year, would significantly reduce fuel economy requirements, which set rules on how far new vehicles need to travel on a gallon of gasoline, through the 2031 model year. The rules will increase Americans’ access to the full range of gasoline vehicles they need and can afford, officials said. The administration projects that the new standards would set the industry fleetwide average for light-duty vehicles at roughly 34.5 miles per gallon in the 2031 model year.
The move is the latest action by the Trump administration to reverse Biden-era policies that encouraged cleaner-running cars and trucks, including electric vehicles. Burning gasoline for vehicles is a major contributor to planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions.
“From Day One I’ve been taking action to make buying a car more affordable.” Trump said at a White House event that included top executives from the three largest U.S. automakers.
The rule reverses a Biden-era policy that “forced automakers to build cars using expensive technologies that drove up costs, drove up prices, and made the car much worse,” Trump said.
Rule change will save money, Trump says
The action is expected to save consumers about $1,000 off the price of a new car, Trump said. New cars sold for an average of $49,766 on average in October, according to Kelley Blue Book.
Automakers applauded the planned changes. They had complained that the Biden-era rules were difficult to meet.
Ford CEO Jim Farley said the planned rollback was “a win for customers and common sense.”
“As America’s largest auto producer, we appreciate President Trump’s leadership in aligning fuel economy standards with market realities. We can make real progress on carbon emissions and energy efficiency while still giving customers choice and affordability,” Farley said.
Stellantis CEO Antonio Filosa said the automaker appreciates the administration’s actions to “realign” the standards “with real world market conditions.”
Environmentalists decried the rollback in mileage standards.
“In one stroke Trump is worsening three of our nation’s most vexing problems: the thirst for oil, high gas pump costs, and global warming,” said Dan Becker, director of the Safe Climate Transport Campaign for the Center for Biological Diversity.
“Gutting the [gas-mileage] program will make cars burn more gas and American families burn more cash,’’ said Katherine García, director of the Sierra Club’s Clean Transportation for All program.
Polluting cars to stay on road
“This rollback would move the auto industry backwards, keeping polluting cars on our roads for years to come and threatening the health of millions of Americans, particularly children and the elderly,” she said.
Trump has repeatedly pledged to end what he falsely calls an EV “mandate,” referring incorrectly to Democratic President Joe Biden’s target that half of all new vehicle sales be electric by 2030. EVs accounted for about 8% of new vehicle sales in the United States in 2024, according to Cox Automotive.
No federal policy has required auto companies to sell EVs, although California and other states have imposed rules requiring that all new passenger vehicles sold in the state be zero-emission by 2035. Trump and congressional Republicans blocked the California law earlier this year.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy urged his agency to reverse existing fuel economy requirements, known as Corporate Average Fuel Economy, soon after taking office. In June, he said that standards set under Biden were illegal because they included use of electric vehicles in their calculation. EVs do not run on gasoline. After the June rule revision, the traffic safety agency was empowered to update the requirements.
Under Biden, automakers were required to average about 50 miles (81 kilometers) per gallon of gas for passenger cars by 2031, compared with about 39 miles (63 kilometers) per gallon today. The Biden administration also increased fuel-economy requirements by 2% each year for light-duty vehicles in every model year from 2027 to 2031, and 2% per year for SUVs and other light trucks from 2029 to 2031. At the same time, it called for stringent tailpipe rules meant to encourage EV adoption.
The 2024 standards would have saved 14 billion gallons of gasoline from being burned by 2050, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s 2024 calculations. Abandoning them means that in 2035, cars could produce 22,111 more tons of carbon dioxide per year than under the Biden-era rules. It also means an extra 90 tons a year of deadly soot particles and more than 4,870 tons a year of smog components nitrogen oxide and volatile organic carbons going into the air in coming years.
Mileage rules have been implemented since the 1970s energy crisis, and over time, automakers have gradually increased their vehicles’ average efficiency.
2026 Chevrolet Equinox EV LT front-wheel drive: A no-bells, no-whistles EV test.
Price: $36,495 as tested. No options on test vehicle; price is up by $1,500 from the 2025 model tested.
The all-wheel-drive model starts $5,000 higher and sacrifices about 10 miles of range.
Conventional wisdom:Car and Driver likes that it has “more range than rivals, competitively priced” and is “available with Super Cruise and other tech.” They didn’t love the “underpowered front-drive model, less cargo space than the gas model, no Apple CarPlay or Android Auto.”
Marketer’s pitch: “America’s most affordable 315+ mile range EV.”
Reality: Definitely affordable. Will it be worth the trade-offs?
Plug them in: Mr. Driver’s Seat has compiled a few EVs for comparison. So over the next two weeks you’ll see how this compares to more expensive electron-driven options from Hyundai and Volkswagen.
What’s new: The Equinox EV carries on pretty much unchanged since its 2024 debut, although all-wheel-drive models boast a range boost for 2026.
Up to speed: Car and Driver got one thing right — the 0-60 time is not the stuff of EV legend. The Equinox EV in its barest front-wheel-drive form will not plaster you to the seat when it’s time to leave the red light, but it does move with ease. It’s worth noting that pickup for passing will still leave most drivers impressed, and this can be an important test.
Car and Driver puts the 0-60 time at 7.7 seconds, a not-unexpected number from a small SUV with 220 horsepower. All-wheel drive ups the ante to 300 horses, and it moves to 60 mph in 5.8 seconds.
Shiftless: The Mercedes-ish wiper stalk on the steering column requires a pull and up for Reverse and a pull and down for Drive. The pull is a nice touch, so you don’t feel like you’ll make any stupid mistakes while riding around, the kind I’ve made now and again with these shifters.
On the road: The Equinox EV handles with great ease, being pulled to the road by the heavy batteries in the floor. Highways are smooth, and country roads are nicely followed, with a touch of fun added as well.
The interior of the 2026 Chevrolet Equinox EV LT1 is quite literally the cheap seats. The front are comfortable, but the rear seat is lacking. Upgrades are available.
Driver’s Seat: The cloth seats in the basic model tested provided plenty of comfort and support, although they felt a little warm as the humidity stayed up even as the temperatures fell to high 70s at the end of August.
(If you want heated and ventilated seats, you have to add $7,000 for the LT2 model, and then you have the privilege of paying extra for those options.)
The starter is in the seat sensor, which is not my favorite way to get going, but this one seemed to work more consistently than some I’ve experienced. GM also has added a touchscreen on-off icon for the times when the Equinox can’t tell you’re done driving.
Friends and stuff: Rear seat room is nice in the corners, but the center seat passenger will feel the hump and the console. The seat is designed presumably to make your passengers whine during the test drive, so you buy an upgrade. It’s firm and has weird indentations in the lumbar area.
You can always counter back from the Driver’s Seat that legroom, foot room, and headroom are all awesome so everyone back there should be thankful they’re not riding around in the back of 1980s front-wheel-drive Buicks, because there was a sad seat.
Cargo space is 57.2 cubic feet with the seat folded and 26.4 behind the rear seat.
Play some tunes: The infotainment center features a gigantic 17.7-inch display that’s clear and pretty easy to follow.
The volume dial is a wide shallow thing that GM keeps putting into cars. It reduces me to tears at least once a week after accidentally rubbing the touchscreen and changing something important.
Like maybe the music. Sound from the system is very good, about an A, so any interference becomes a personal affront. (Don’t interrupt the tunes, as the lovely Mrs. Passenger Seat and all the point-ohs know.)
CarPlay is gone, but my notes didn’t mention missing it, so maybe that’s not the end of the world after all.
Keeping warm and cool: Actual knobs control temperature and fan speed, and buttons let you do some of the simple functions. It’s nice that the big touchscreen didn’t eliminate the old-style controllers, even as temperature and fan control options reside in the bottom corners of the touchscreen.
You can really get some air out of the blowers, which is nice. The corners have the round vents that make me happy with their ease of direction and on-off control.
Range: A 319-mile range is great to have, but charging can be slow. InsideEVs tested one at three different chargers in February, and it averaged around 40 minutes to get from 10% to 80%, far slower than most competitors.
Chevrolet advertises just 285 miles of range for the AWD models from 2025 but 309 for the 2026 AWD models.
Where it’s built: Ramos Arizpe, Mexico. Mexico supplies 46% of parts; South Korea, 20%; the U.S. and Canada, 12%.
How it’s built: Consumer Reports predicts the reliability of the Equinox EV to be a 2 out of 5.
In the end: If you don’t mind missing some creature comforts, the Equinox EV can get you charging for a nice price.
