Today we ran a quick story on the plans by Spokane's Dry Fly Distilling to develop a system of getting more of its gin, vodka and whiskey across the state, once the floodgates open on June 1. That's when the vast changes pushed through by Initiative 1183 take effect.

The story said the state will likely have more than 1,600 spirits retailers when that date comes, and that Dry Fly clearly wants to be more widely distributed than it is today.

A day later, we can be a bit more precise than that.

According to the state Liquor Control Board website, one can look and find exactly how many spirits retailer licenses have been applied for.

Statewide, as of April 24, the total is 1,404 applications, including applications by former operators of contract liquor stores (for an example, we wrote about the store in Medical Lake a month ago).

Add the 167 or so state stores whose liquor licenses were recently auctioned off, that brings the current total to 1,571 licenses, either approved or pending.

One caution: applications for the state stores are not yet officially filed.

Will it hit 1,600?  Very likely. The Spokane County application total, as of April 24, is 99 locations.

A month ago when we wrote about the list of applicants, the statewide count was just 1,200 and the Spokane County count was 90 license applications.

A week ago we ran out some numbers on the increasing number of home sales in Spokane County. The trend here is an increase number of sales, especially over the final six months of 2011 and continuing in January.

But average and median home sales continued to fall, compared with one year earlier. The reason, as stated by Rob Higgins of the Spokane Association of Realtors, is the large supply of distressed properties still being moved off the market.

So we will here offer a statewide view: Washington’s housing market in the final quarter of 2011 saw the highest seasonally-adjusted sales since the second quarter of 2010, according to the Runstad Center for Real Estate Studies at the University of Washington.

Sales strength reflected bargain hunting as well as the persistently large number of distressed properties being sold in lower-priced neighborhoods, said Glenn Crellin, associate director of the Runstad Center.

Statewide the seasonally adjusted sales rate during the quarter was 91,080 homes, meaning that if the relative sales rate for the quarter were continued for a year, that number of homes would be sold. The rate is 6 percent above the prior quarter and 9.6 percent higher than the closing quarter of 2010, when tax credit programs to stimulate housing demand were ending.

Just like in Spokane, statewide sales prices continued dropping. Median home prices continued to reflect the weak economy, Crellin said. The statewide median home price was $219,700, the lowest fourth-quarter price since 2003 when the median was $205,700.

That median home sale price declined 8 percent between the end of 2010 ($238,800) and the end of 2011.

Sales, median home prices and affordability data for each of Washington’s 39 counties are available at the Runstad website.

Spokane-based Greater Spokane Inc. is launching a preliminary study to determine if area voters would support a port district.

Mentioned during the recent GSI annual meeting, the idea of a port district has resurfaced several times among proponents who say it can help economic development.

GSI CEO and President Rich Hadley said on Friday that the group will likely create a task force from area officials and business leaders to study the idea.

 In 1982 Spokane business leaders put a port district to voters and saw it defeated resoundingly, 4-to-1 against.

State law allows counties and government bodies to form a port district and raise funds through taxes. Port districts can be formed anywhere regardless of proximity to water or an airport.

Hadley said Spokane leaders met with officials from Benton County and Moses Lake, both of which have used port districts to boost economic activity.

Moses Lake used its district in 1998 to enlist a large expansion by Genie Industries, which makes construction equipment. Genie built a manufacturing plant there after port officials spent $2.5 million renovating a former airplane hangar for the company's use.

Districts can focus on adding infrastructure to attract businesses or help existing firms expand. That can range from building new roads to adding utility lines, Hadley said. They also serve as marketing arms, encouraging new investment.

Spokane and Yakima are the only two Washington counties to not have a port district, he added.

In 2000 area officials studied the port district idea but shelved it when interest and momentum behindg the idea lagged.

About 2,500 people turned in applications this week to work at the new Spokane Trader Joe's store, said company spokeswoman Alison Mochizuki.

A new photo of applicants filling out forms outside the building will appear in Saturday's edition of The Spokesman-Review and Spokesman.com.

Mochizuki said not all the Spokane store jobs have been filled, and more applications will be accepted next week.  The location is the Spokane Lincoln Heights Shopping Center.

CoreLogic, a company that aggregates real estate data, said Spokane County's foreclosure rate inched up in June compared with 12 months ago.

Here are the general data, which are not pleasant. They show a clear steady increase in delinquencies. Though the increase is minimal month by month, the trend is disturbingly upward. (Click the map of Spokane County for a larger format version.)

The trend line for 90-day delinquencies and foreclosures in Spokane.

Source: CoreLogic: www.corelogic.com

READ below the jump for a key explanation of what CoreLogic is tracking in these data.

We were snoozing or on vacation when, earlier this summer, Comcast announced TV and other service rate hikes for Washington customers. The formal announcement said:

“We are making investments in next-generation technology to add value to our products and improve service. We’ve also launched new interactive applications and multi-platform content that customers want and value.  We’ve worked hard to hold down price adjustments, even given the impact of higher programming costs, and in 2011, the average customer bill will increase by 2.8 percent.  These adjustments will not impact about half of our customers because they currently receive services as part of a promotional offer.”

So, a good number of cable customers in Spokane didn't see a hike. But once those promotional deals end, the hike will come.

What's notable is the timing of the increases. This increase took effect July 1.

The previous new rate hike took effect on Aug. 1, 2010.

The one before that took effect on Oct. 6, 2009.

It used to be Comcast went roughly 12 months before increasing prices. That's apparently been replaced by some other, quicker system. We need to do some research on what the industry practice is.  Do cable companies no longer bother to wait a year before another price hike?

We asked Steve Kipp, a Comcast West side spokesman, to elaborate on the pricing schedule. We wondered if the pattern is to squeeze increases in a little earlier each year.

Kipp emailed back a quick reply, saying he would not comment.
  

Foreclosures in Spokane County are a growth industry. A recent CoreLogic study found Spokane foreclosures increased in May compared to the same period last year.

CoreLogic's data show the rate of foreclosures among outstanding mortgage loans is 1.67 percent for the month of May 2011, an increase of 0.42 percentage points compared to May of 2010 when the rate was 1.25 percent.

Foreclosure activity in Spokane is less than the U.S. rate of 3.45 percent for May. That's a 1.78 percentage point difference in Spokane's favor.

Spokane has a mortgage delinquency rate of 4.56 percent. The term refers to mortgage loans 90 days or more delinquent.

A year ago in May 2010, the delinquency rate was 4.40 percent, showing a 0.16 percent hike year over year.  

The image shows the May 2011 CoreLogic map of foreclosures in Spokane County. Click image for slightly larger version; color key shows the varying foreclosure rates.

The Eastern Washington University-sponsored Community Indicators Initiative recently posted a summary of how Spokane and the area are doing in numbers of patents awarded.

The partents-awarded indicator shows Spokane is doing less well than the rest of the state (forget comparing Spokane with Seattle, as it makes no sense). In general, the number of patents awarded in any community is a fair measure of the level of innovation and dynamic business development.

The summary, penned by Community Indicators Initiative Manager Anna Halloran, is at http://www.communityindicators.ewu.edu/newsletter/page87.html. The chart above is from the CCI newsletter. The red line in Spokane County patents, per thousand; the green line is Washington state.

The key point is that Spokane's economy isn't gaining steam in part because we're not producing enough young companies and eager professionals that are creating patents and product innovations.

First the good news: Spokane County residents or firms obtained more patents in 2010 compared to the year before. The gain was from 75 awarded in '09 to 105 in 2010.

But compared with the state, we're not faring well at all. In general, Halloran notes, Spokane County's patent rate, per thousand residents, has remained flat for the past 10 years.

In 2010, Washington state's patent rate per 1,000 people was 1.02, an increase of close to 143 percent from its patent rate going back to 2000.

Other data worth noting from the report:

• Washington state received 6,835 U.S. patents in 2010.
• Seattle accounted for 2,642 of them.
• Pullman residents or businesses received 39 patents in 2010.

Last week we spotted an item on First Quarter sales taxes for Spokane County.  The item noted the county saw a very tiny uptick, of about 2.7% from the same period a year earlier. (Though listed as first quarter, that number is actually for November-January 2011.)

That made us ask how the City of Spokane fared in total sales taxes collected during 2010.

We go the answer from Rick Romero, the city's internal auditor. No big surprise, the city's take from taxes was down about half of one percent, (.005) for 2010 compared with the year earlier.

That covers not just retail sales, but taxes on services and a few other categories including lodging and dining.

The raw numbers: 

• Spokane's 2009 taxable sales: roughly $3.7 billion.
• Spokane's 2010 taxable sales: roughly $3.67 billion.

Romero noted that for 2010, the city reaped about $33 million from the $3.67 billion collected and sent to the governor.

We love any decent web visualization that explains interesting trends or developments. This map, developed for Forbes.com, nicely illustrates the movement of U.S. residents to and from different areas of the country during 2008.

The link is  here.

The map takes some time to load initially.

By clicking on the county you want, the resulting black or red lines illustrate the relative flow of population, to or from that location.

Click, for instance, on Kootenai County to see where people there have moved from.

My only quibble is that it's not fully up-to-date. It would be even better to have a data map for the years 2007-2010.

McGraw-Hill Construction just published these numbers for construction in Spokane and Kootenai counties during September.

For Spokane, the most obvious big leap in in residential construction, comparing this past September to the same month of 2009. Two other major building trends are evident: Even with Spokane having a 34 percent year-over-year gain in residential building this past month, Kootenai County shows more robust construction in that sector.

And nonresidential buldings (which are basically all commercial, manufacturing or school-related projects) continue lagging along. It’s clear the abundant supply of office vacancies plays a key role in holding down nonresidential construction.

Spokane County

                              2010              2009                Change in percent

• Nonresidential  $5,495,000    $5,454,000     1
• Residential       $18,135,000  $13,535,000  34
• TOTAL             $23,630,000  $18,989,000  24

Kootenai County

                               2010             2009               Change in percent

• Nonresidential $5,420,000   $5,546,000       -2
• Residential:     $19,173,000  $16,847,000    14
• TOTAL            $24,593,000  $22,393,000    10