Bert Caldwell

Superior Court Judge Kathleen O'Connor approved a $11.3 million settlement Thursday of all claims related to fires that swept through several Eastern Washington areas in October 1991. The funds, already on deposit in a Spokane bank, will help compensate more than 400 victims of flames that claimed 114 homes, livestock and 36,000 acres of timber and grassland. There were two fatalities, including a woman who was seven months pregnant.

Utilities scrambling to position themselves in an increasingly competitive market can't overlook reliability, says the interim administrator of the Bonneville Power Administration. Jack Robertson, who was in the agency's Spokane office Tuesday, called electricity the currency of the 21st Century. Common household appliances and high-tech machinery alike demand an uninterrupted flow of electrons, Robertson said.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration Tuesday released a letter criticizing quality assurance at the Bayer AG plant in Spokane. The facility manufactures more than 100 products for treating allergies. Although no products have been recalled as a result of the FDA's findings, Bayer spokesman Don Hyman said some production has been interrupted and customers are being directed to alternative suppliers until problems at the plant, which employs 260 people, are overcome. "There have been shortages," Hyman said.

Cavanaughs Hospitality Corp. has extended its hotel empire into the heart of downtown Spokane with the purchase of the 342-room Ridpath Hotel. The acquisition announced Monday brings to 1,700 the number of rooms the Spokane-based chain owns or operates in an area extending from Kalispell, Mont., to Seattle. Terms of the Ridpath deal were not disclosed. The sellers, said Cavanaughs President Don Barbieri, are a group of Portland and Seattle investors who acquired the hotel in 1988.

Deregulation of the electric utility industry will have a powerful foe in Rep. Larry Crouse in the upcoming session of the Washington Legislature. The Spokane Valley Republican, who chairs the House Energy and Utilities Committee, said Monday he has shelved plans to introduce his own deregulation bill, and won't hold hearings on any others that originate in the lower chamber.

Thousands of you didn't buy Washington State University football season tickets did you, and now you won't be sitting in the Rose Bowl New Year's Day. Not feeling bad yet? Well, back in September even fewer of you purchased one-year certificates of deposit offered by the State National Bank of Garfield that promised to adjust the rate of interest upward with every Cougar win.

If you buy power from any one of the dozens of public utilities in the Northwest, you are already a winner. Utility managers meeting in Spokane Tuesday said they want to keep it that way. But with the Bonneville Power Administration due to launch a "subscription process" next year, many expressed concern that the outcome would not be best for their members.

Dogear president Bob Kirkpatrick works out of his home in Spokane. Photo by Liz Kishimoto/The Spokesman-Review

The Composite Group of Funds will add 23 jobs in Spokane as its parent, Washington Mutual Bank, and newly acquired Great Western Bank merge their mutual fund portfolios. Composite President Bill Papesh said the new jobs will include administrative, accounting and customer service positions. The workers will be accommodated on the second and third floors of the Washington Mutual Building, he said. The hires will bring total Composite staffing in Spokane to 89.

Washington Water Power Co. will keep its wires to itself, thank you. The Spokane utility will not join other Northwest utilities next spring when they ask federal regulators to approve formation of a new organization that would control the region's transmission systems. WWP officials two weeks ago told backers the company was no longer interested.

All in the family. Alan Ross, president of an 80-year-old Spokane printing business, plans to pass on the family business to his son. Photo by Dan Pelle/The Spokesman-Review

U S West should get little more than half of a proposed rate increase, and none of that should come from residential customers, Washington Assistant Attorney General Rob Manifold said Thursday. In testimony filed with the Washington Utility and Transportation Commission, Manifold said the phone company should be allowed to collect $37 million covering depreciation of its equipment, but not another $30 million the commission staff has suggested be approved. If accepted by the three commissioners, who can override staff, the recommendation would add $3 to monthly residential phone bills. Businesses would pay an additional $2 per month.

Washington Water Power CEO Les Bryan, center, and Anne Marie Asxrthy and Al Fisher, get a chuckle out of a remark by WWP chairman Paul Redmond at Thursday's discussion of plant to cope with future problems like last year's ice storm. Photo by Dan Pelle/The Spokesman-Review

Carnette and Cameron Ball are shown with their children Marc, 3, and Scott, 6. Photo by Shawn Jacobson/The Spokesman-Review

Washington Water Power Co. has upgraded its call center and decentralized management to better respond to weather emergencies such as last November's ice storm, according to a report released Tuesday. "Energy Emergency Response," prepared by the Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission, assesses changes made at WWP and Puget Sound Energy in the wake of severe storms last winter. Outages caused by freezing rain Nov. 19 lasted as long as 13 days in some areas served by WWP. As many as 100,000 customers were powerless at one point.

Top officials from Washington Water Power Co. and Inland Power & Light Co. will meet today to begin negotiating a new agreement separating their service territories. The existing 25-year pact expires next year, but the two utilities already compete for new business in areas where service rights are uncertain. Each is forbidden to target customers already served by the other.

Mari Vanderhoff, left, checks the record volume of stock transactions while Kevin Larkin looks at prices Tuesday at the Charles Schwab office in downtown Spokane. Photo by Christopher Anderson/The Spokesman-Review

Spokane investors remained on the sidewalk Monday as Wall Street skidded to its worst daily point loss in history. Brokerage lobbies were largely vacant, and some brokers reported that outbound telephone traffic exceeded inbound calls from clients. Hand-holding was the order of the day, but some of the more venturesome were placing orders, brokers said. There was little selling.

Tony Gunderson encourages people to throw a Tantrum when fishing. Photo by Jesse Tinsley/The Spokesman-Review

A former official of Old National Bank and Farmers & Merchants Bank has been appointed president and chief operating officer of United Security Bancorporation. Richard Emery will assume his new duties Nov. 1 after 16 years at Pacific One Bank and its predecessor, American National Bank, which he helped organize in 1981. The Kennewick-based bank was bought by First Hawaiian Corp. in 1996 and renamed. The bank has assets of $165 million and eight branches.

Itron Inc. is defending accounting practices questioned in the most recent issue of Forbes magazine. An article in the Nov. 3 edition says the "percentage of completion" method Itron has used to record expected income from a contract with Duquesne Light Co. may be barred by year-end. The method allows Itron, the Spokane Valley maker of electronic meter-reading gear, to book revenues up front that won't be completely in the till for 15 years.

Kaiser Aluminum President Ray Milchovish knows from experience that "the competitive world is not static." Photo by Torsten Kjellstrand/The Spokesman-Review

Spokane brokers and investment advisers who remember the 1987 crash differ when asked if the stock market has learned its lesson. For one thing, they note, many of those in financial services today were not yet in the business when the Dow Jones industrial average suddenly dropped 500 points. Ken Roberts, who heads his own investment service, said he's not sure how the current generation of mutual fund managers and brokers will react if the market's volatility strays beyond their comfort zone. He likened some to 800-pound gorillas on a three-hour coffee jag. One slip could trigger a dangerous response.

Itron Inc. on Tuesday announced a return to profitability and a tentative agreement with the world's largest maker of metering equipment that should improve the Spokane company's fortunes in Europe. The memorandum of understanding with Schlumberger calls for the joint sale of automatic meter-reading equipment compatible with technology developed by both companies. The system will be based on Itron's radio meter technology.