Sales of previously occupied homes rose in January to the highest pace in nearly two years, flashing modest signs of health ahead of the spring-buying season.

PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. — Last summer, Carlos Beltran offered to foot the bill if then-Mets teammate Jonathan Niese received a nose job.

SOMERVILLE — Immaculata High School has created a special independent committee led by a recently retired federal court justice to evaluate the school’s policies and procedures for ensuring the safety of students in the wake of a scandal involving a longtime volunteer being arrested in December 2011 and charged with videotaping boys in the locker-room showers for a period of nearly three years.

The boil-water advisory issued on Wednesday morning by Middlesex Water Co. for residents of Fords, Avenel, Woodbridge Proper of Woodbridge Township and the Clara Barton section of Edison Township because of a broken 16-inch water main on Route 35 that caused service interruptions and loss of water pressure.