Kaiser profit $14.3 million

Kaiser Aluminum earned a $14.3 million profit for the third quarter, its first reporting period since emerging from bankruptcy this summer.

The profit was down from the $16.6 million reported for the July-through-September period last year, although sales of aluminum sheet and plate were higher.

The firm remains a leading Spokane corporate player with its massive Trentwood rolling mill employing more than 700 people. Kaiser closed and sold the Mead smelter as part of its business reorganization.

In a press release, CEO Jack Hockema said demand for aerospace aluminum remained strong.

The company, now headquartered in the Orange County, Calif., community of Foothills Ranch, is investing $105 million in the Trentwood plant to double its capacity.

As part of the bankruptcy proceedings, stock-holding trusts were established to capture portions of the profits to benefit current and former workers who lost some retirement benefits.

For the quarter, per-share earnings were 72 cents.

Net sales for the third quarter reached $331.4 million, up from $271.6 during the same three months of 2005.

Olympia

Unemployment down in Spokane

Spokane’s 4.1 percent October unemployment rate fell below state and national averages, according to the Washington state Employment Security Department.

That’s an improvement over the 4.7 percent rate reported in Spokane last month.

Washington tallied a 4.8 percent unemployment total last month, down from September’s 5.3 percent.

Meanwhile, 4.4 percent of the U.S. labor force was unemployed last month, a slight dip from 4.6 percent the month before.

Philadelphia

Study: 1 percent of sites explicit

About 1 percent of Web sites indexed by Google and Microsoft are sexually explicit, according to a U.S. government-commissioned study.

Government lawyers introduced the study in court this month as the Justice Department seeks to revive the 1998 Child Online Protection Act, which required commercial Web sites to collect a credit card number or other proof of age before allowing Internet users to view material deemed “harmful to minors.”

The U.S. Supreme Court blocked the law in 2004, ruling it also would cramp the free speech rights of adults to see and buy what they want on the Internet. The court said technology such as filtering software may work better than such laws.

The American Civil Liberties Union, which challenged the law on behalf of a broad range of Web publishers, said the study supports its argument that filters work well.

The study concludes that the strictest filter tested, AOL’s Mature Teen, blocked 91 percent of the sexually explicit Web sites in indexes maintained by Google Inc. and Microsoft Corp.’s MSN.

Filters with less restrictive settings blocked at least 40 percent of sexually explicit sites, according to the study of random Web sites.