The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will start shutting down all eight locks on the Columbia and Snake rivers in December for repair work, with the last scheduled to reopen in mid-March. The closures will be the longest since the last of the dams between the ocean and Lewiston was completed in 1972, corps spokesman Scott Clemans said.
Where beach chairs and blankets last Labor Day covered the grass at Comstock Park, the Cataldo Catholic School football team practiced on-side kicks. Instead of the Spokane Symphony and Rossini, a boom box poured out Supertramp.
Mead-born Alan Link will retire at year’s end as Washington State Labor Council secretary-treasurer, a post he has held since 1994. With the exception of two years of military service that included a tour in Vietnam, he has been involved in the labor movement since taking a job at Kaiser Aluminum Corp.’s Mead smelter in 1961.
The successful recapitalization of Sterling Financial Corp. may well be the best economic news of 2010 for Spokane. Thanks in part to that “bailout” we all say we hate.
Spokane’s economy is recovering, while Coeur d’Alene’s remains in recession, according to a new analysis of June data released Monday by Moody’s Economy.com. But the Kootenai County city’s rankings for cost of doing business and cost of living are slightly better than those for Spokane, as is the projected employment growth through 2011, the economic research firm concluded.
New Sterling Financial Corp. Chairman Les Biller was paid $1.5 million to accept the position, and will receive a total $4.5 million by Dec. 31, 2012, unless he resigns. Biller’s compensation was contained in a Monday filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The filing also disclosed the resignation of all but four members of the Sterling board of directors following completion Thursday of a $730 million recapitalization.
AmericanWest Bancorporation Chief Executive Officer Pat Rusnak took heart last week from Sterling Financial Corp.’s successful effort to raise additional capital. Like Sterling, AmericanWest was ordered by regulators to reinforce its capital base, although the May 2009 notice did not fix the amount of money to be raised. Rusnak said the bank, headquartered at 41 W. Riverside Ave., needs about $125 million.
A new Sterling Financial Corp. management team did not know what would be expected of them in October 2009. Federal and state regulators had forced the board of directors to remove their predecessors. Atop a long list of other stipulations contained in a cease-and-desist order was a requirement Sterling raise $300 million.
A foot-and-ankle specialist and dentist will occupy a two-story office building just under construction at 3707 S. Grand Blvd. The $2 million building will encompass 8,700 square feet on the main floor and 1,200 square feet upstairs, with another 8,700 square feet in the basement, said project manager Jeremy Keeble of Leone & Keeble Inc.
Economic and political unknowns are slowing Spokane home sales much as they have in the rest of the United States, the president-elect of the Spokane Association of Realtors said Tuesday. Broker Joe Mann of Windermere Valley said the 36 percent drop-off in local closings last month reflected uncertainty among buyers and sellers, with financing problems adding to the market’s fragility.
Economic and political unknowns are slowing Spokane home sales much as they have in the rest of the United States, the president-elect of the Spokane Association of Realtors said today.
Derek Oberholtzer will never again operate a mortgage modification business, or any other credit counseling service, in Idaho. Idaho Attorney General Lawrence Wasden announced Monday that the owner of Coeur d’Alene-base Apply 2 Save, which closed last year, has consented to a settlement that will deny him a license for any activity regulated by the Idaho Department of Finance.
In California’s effort to marshal a symphony of energy resources, the Northwest is the designated woodwind. John White, director of the Center for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Technologies – CEERT for the short-winded – drew the orchestra analogy last week as he tried to explain the implications of two mostly contradictory efforts to reset standards for renewable energy use in the Golden State.
Sterling Financial Corp. has arranged $730 million in new investment that will bring the Spokane bank back into compliance with capital requirements 10 months after huge losses on construction and real estate loans brought it to the brink of failing. The parent of Sterling Savings Bank on Friday said the complicated deal, which includes U.S. Treasury Department involvement, is expected to close by Thursday.
