John Stucke

Cold weather may linger in February and this spring may deliver more snow and rain than initially predicted, according to an expert forecaster who delivered a dose of short-term hope to farmers Tuesday.

First things first: Gracie is not an RV. “No sir,” says Merle Coldwell. “She’s an RH – a rolling house. And she’s really going to be something.” Slowly, Coldwell is turning Gracie from an old yellow school bus into his dream home – a one-of-a-kind driving and living experience.

Idaho health officials are asking residents to check for peanut butter crackers and other products in the wake of a nationwide salmonella outbreak.

Washington’s attorney general has appealed a sharp increase in Avista power bills and aims to unravel the company’s plan to collect an extra $112 million from businesses and residential customers in Eastern Washington. “We think it’s important, especially during this economy, that there’s not one extra penny taken from people’s budgets,” said Simon ffitch, chief of the Office of the Attorney General’s Public Counsel Section, which represents Avista ratepayers.

The Washington Attorney General has appealed a sharp increase in Avista power bills and aims to unravel the company’s plan to collect an extra $112 million from businesses and residential customers in Eastern Washington.

After two years of searching and struggling to hire a new health officer, the Spokane Regional Health District board voted Thursday to reopen the debate over whether a physician should lead the public agency. The alternative would be to split the top job: a physician to oversee the medical decisions and an administrator to manage the budget and operations.

Kaiser Aluminum Corp. will cease smelting aluminum later this year, breaking with its industrial history as one of world’s premier metal makers. The company announced this week that it will not resume production at its 49 percent-owned Anglesey smelter in Wales after a fire curtailed operations there. The smelter’s power contract expires in September and isn’t expected to be renewed. The majority owner of the smelter is Rio Tinto Group.

Kaiser Aluminum Corp. will cease smelting aluminum later this year, breaking with its industrial history as one of world’s premier metal makers.

A national salmonella outbreak linked to peanut butter has been blamed for the death of an eastern Idaho man last fall and sickening nine others in the state since October, including a North Idaho woman. The maker of the peanut butter, sold in bulk to institutions such as schools, jails and nursing homes, has issued a nationwide recall.

A federal judge dealt former Tidyman’s grocery workers a stinging defeat, dismissing their lawsuit seeking recovery of lost retirement savings. The Spokane-based grocery was an employee-owned business with about 1,300 people at work in 21 stores across Eastern Washington, Idaho and Montana.

Former Tidyman’s grocery workers have recouped a fraction of their retirement savings by settling part of their lawsuit against executives. The $575,000 settlement – to be paid by insurers – was filed in U.S. District Court in Montana last month. The workers sued two years ago, alleging that executives of the now-defunct employee-owned grocery chain, which has its headquarters in Spokane, orchestrated the sale of the company that was not in the interest of its employee owners.

Residents in the town of Albion have been advised to boil their drinking water as a health precaution.