Bert Caldwell

Washington Water Power Co. has launched a new subsidiary that provides fiber-optic data communications in Spokane and, possibly, Seattle. WWP Fiber is built around cable the Spokane utility put in the ground to link its own substations and other facilities, said Sales Manager Steve Yunker. About a year ago WWP began experimenting with other applications, he said, and formally organized WWP Fiber in October as a subsidiary of Avista Corp., the holding company for its non-regulated operations.

Members of a panel that proposed $159 million in potential budget cuts for the Bonneville Power Administration on Wednesday indicated they might modify reductions in conservation and alternative energy spending. Witnesses at a Spokane hearing on the plan released last month also asked them to reassess other recommendations. "Too many proposals simply shred the fabric of Bonneville," said Bill Arthur, Northwest regional director for the Sierra Club.

A complicated merger announced Monday with Anderson-Tully Co. will add balance and value to Potlatch Corp. timber holdings, Chairman John Richards said Tuesday. The deal envisions a new company, Timberland Growth Corp., that will combine 514,000 acres of Potlatch's mostly softwood timber holdings in Arkansas with Anderson-Tully's 324,000 acres of hardwood in Arkansas and Mississippi. The Anderson-Tully property will be purchased for $410 million from the proceeds of a public stock offering by Timberland Growth, plus borrowings.

Sterling Financial Corp. has agreed to purchase 33 branches in Washington, Idaho and Oregon from KeyBank National Association for $72 million, Sterling Chairman Harold Gilkey said Wednesday. When completed later this year, he said, the deal will put Sterling among the top five Washington banks and thrifts in number of branches. The $585 million in deposits involved in the deal also will boost the total in Sterling vaults by 50 percent compared with deposits on hand at the end of 1997.

Itron Inc. Tuesday reported profits for 1997 and the fourth quarter compared with losses for the year-ago periods. Quarterly revenues set a new record, as did the 12-month order backlog as of Dec. 31, 1997. Net income for the quarter was $3.3 million, or 22 cents per share, compared with a loss of $2.3 million, or 17 cents per share, a year earlier.

Washington customers of TCI must respond quickly if they want to stop a deal that could deny them millions in refunds, a Washington, D.C., lawyer said Tuesday. Phil Friedman said the cable television provider has negotiated a "sweetheart deal" with an Okanogan County attorney that does not adequately roll back late fees, or return past overcharges.

Inland Northwest Bancorporation has agreed to purchase Hege Company Inc., a locally owned mortgage company that has been in business in Spokane since 1906. Terms were not disclosed, although Inland President Fred Schunter said the transaction would involve both stock and cash. He said the deal should close by the end of the month. The agreement would fold Hege, which has done business as Creative Mortgages Inc., into a new subsidiary of Inland, INB Mortgage Co. Inc.

Washington Water Power Co. surpassed several financial and service milestones for the first time in 1997, collecting more than $1 billion in revenues, and earning more than $100 million. The Spokane utility also added its 300,000th electricity customer and 250,000th natural gas customer. WWP net income for the year was $109.4 million, or $1.96, compared with $75.5 million, or $1.35 per share, in 1996.

The sun set on the Suntree Inns name in January. The three properties surrendered to the horde of lodging franchises that has surged into the Northwest over the last decade.

Washington Water Power Co. could spend $160 million over 50 years to maintain the licenses on its two Clark Fork River dams, according to a plan released Wednesday. The expenditures, about equal to the cost of building the Noxon Rapids and Cabinet Gorge projects in the 1950s, would underwrite a long list of efforts to restore fish and wildlife resources in the watershed. The dams flood more than 10,000 acres of land and block the migration of bull trout and other fish species up the river from Lake Pend Oreille.

Washington residents bewildered by their experience with telephone deregulation might be spared a repeat if an "Electricity Consumers Protection Act" introduced in the Legislature last week is enacted. The bill would help preserve the low cost and high reliability of power in Washington as the nation moves toward loosening the bonds on one of the last regulated industries, said Spokane Sen. Lisa Brown, D-3rd, one of 14 sponsors. She cited studies that project rate increases of as much as 25 percent. "As deregulation unfolds in other industries, like telecommunications, we're seeing that mistakes were made that are hurting consumers," Brown said. "We don't want those mistakes to happen again."

Brian Stone's Moon Inc. makes these stoves for backpacking and other outdoor uses. Photo by Colin Mulvany/The Spokesman-Review

1. Pointing the way. Nathan Batson, president of American Electronic Sign, sees a bright future for the compnay that emerged from bankruptcy in 1996. Photo by Jason Clark/The Spokesman-Review 2. Electronic sign pioneer Luke Williams Jr., who developed the first alternating time and temperature signs four decades ago, started American Electronic Sign in 1988. File/The Spokesman-Review

A tax cut would be a mistake even if the federal Treasury collects more money than it pays out the next couple of years, the chief economist for the Smith Barney brokerage firm said Wednesday. Mitchell Held said he projects surpluses of $40 billion this year and $20 billion in 1999. But those overflows - the first since 1969 - are the result of capital gains revenues and income taxes on huge incentive packages for corporate executives, sources that could dry up quickly if Wall Street suffers a downturn, he said.

The Bonneville Power Administration could trim as much as $159 million a year from its $2 billion budget if managers adopt eight recommendations released Tuesday by a Cost Review Committee. Of the eight, the two likely to be the most controversial are a suggestion that the region's lone nuclear power plant fend for itself in a bruising electricity market, and deep cuts or elimination in some cases in spending for conservation and renewable energy resources. Separating Washington Public Power Supply System Plant No. 2 from the agency's cheap hydropower will help managers determine how much nuclear power increases the overall cost of energy Bonneville sells to utilities up and down the West Coast, said Mike Kreidler, Washington state's representative on the review committee.

Deregulation poses unique challenges for a region that enjoys the lowest electricity rates in the country, U.S. Rep. Rick White, R-Seattle, told a gathering of Northwest energy leaders Wednesday. In other regions, he said, everyone down to welfare officials wants to open up energy markets so businesses and residents alike can cut utility bills that are as much as four times higher than those in the Northwest. Their representatives are supporting efforts in Congress to give consumers that ability, he said.

Bankruptcy filings in the Inland Northwest skyrocketed in 1997, proof - ironically - that the good times continue to roll. Statistics from U.S. bankruptcy courts in Spokane and Boise show a 22 percent climb over year-ago activity in Eastern Washington, and a 30 percent jump in Idaho's four northernmost counties. Filings for Idaho as a whole also went up, 27 percent.

Washington must act on energy deregulation or risk losing the lowest rates in the country, Washington Water Power Co. officials said Wednesday. Although legislation may not pass this year, they said, the issue deserves consideration so the state will be ready when Congress enacts a national deregulation bill. "Deregulation is going to happen," said Chairman Paul Redmond. "Doing nothing is not an option."

New name. New money. New partner. New start. The venture capital company spun off by the Momentum economic development organization dissolved the original $2.9 million fund Dec. 31 and announced the formation of a $10.3 million successor Monday. Formed 10 years ago as Spokane Capital Management, the company has been renamed Northwest Venture Associates, said Tom Simpson.

Coldwater Creek shares doubled in 1997, and so outperformed those of all other Inland Northwest companies in 1997. The Sandpoint mail-order house closed the year at $33.75, twice the closing price on its first day of trading last January. By comparison, Pegasus Gold stock seemed to tumble into one of the company's open-pit mines, closing the year off as the dross not only locally, but globally.

Deer Park residents become power players May 1. Regulators Wednesday approved a Washington Water Power Co. proposal that will allow 2,256 residential and business customers in that community to choose from a menu of rate options. Called More Options for Power Service II, or MOPS II, the program will last two years. During that period starting May 1, participants could buy power based on rates that move monthly or yearly depending on activity in the wholesale market.

Monday's decision by California officials to delay full-scale deregulation of electricity markets until March 31 was welcomed by a Washington Water Power Co. subsidiary competing for business in that state. Avista Energy President Lloyd Meyers said the company had already informed clients its systems would not be ready to deliver power until April 1.

Natural gas rates for Washington residential customers of Washington Water Power Co. will increase almost 10 percent as of Thursday. Washington regulators approved the hike last week. The action will raise the typical homeowner bills $3.64 per month by adjusting the basic monthly charge twice. Thursday, the charge goes to $3.80 from $3.25. The fee goes to $4 next Nov. 1.

Northern Lights Inc. may build a $12 million natural gas system to serve Sagle, Priest River, Oldtown and Newport, General Manager Jon Shelby said Friday. If approved by the cooperative's members, the system could serve as many as 4,500 business and residential customers who now have no access to natural gas, he said.