Dodd Unconcerned With Housing Values

In a front page above the fold story, The Hartford Courant is reporting that Sen. Chris Dodd’s Irish Cottage on Inishee island in County Galway, a picture of which is here included, has jumped in value since Dodd reported it on previous financial disclosure forms.

The 1,200-square-foot cottage was valued at about $190,000 in 2002. The most recent appraisal placed the value of the cottage at $658,000. In annual Senate financial disclosures, Dodd claimed the value of the property at never more than $250,000, an undervaluation of $408,000.

Explaining the disparity in valuation, Dodd spokesman Bryan DeAngelis said, “The value of the cottage — or of Irish real estate, generally — isn't something that the Dodds have thought much about. However, questions have been raised and they recognize that it's important to make a good-faith effort at valuation for the Senate financial disclosures. Obviously, they [the senaor and his wife Jackie Klegg Dodd] have operated well within the Senate rules — the Senate Ethics Committee confirms that — but felt it was just time to update the appraisal. There's certainly no incentive whatsoever to lowball the valuation."

The Wall Street Journal reported that, "Mr. Dodd was so uninterested in the value of those 10 acres that he tried to subdivide the property in 1998 and put up another house. No doubt because he had no idea what it was, or would be, worth."

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Donna

I am writing this for members of my family, and for others who may be interested. My twin sister Donna died a few hours ago of stage three lung cancer. The end came quickly and somewhat unexpectedly. She was preceded in death by Lisa Pesci, my brother’s daughter, a woman of great courage who died still full of years, and my sister’s husband Craig Tobey Senior, who left her at a young age with a great gift: her accomplished son, Craig Tobey Jr. My sister was a woman of great strength, persistence and humor. To the end, she loved life and those who loved her. Her son Craig, a mere sapling when his father died, has grown up strong and straight. There is no crookedness in him. Thanks to Donna’s persistence and his own native talents, he graduated from Yale, taught school in Japan, there married Miyuki, a blessing from God. They moved to California – when that state, I may add, was yet full of opportunity – and both began to carve a living for them...

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