Region in brief: Safeway makes cancer donation
Safeway Inc. has donated $276,446 for breast cancer research and prevention programs in Eastern Washington.
The announcement Thursday follows a monthlong breast cancer fundraising and public service campaign in all Safeway stores. Customers, employees and suppliers donated to help find a cure and bring awareness to the disease.
Partnering with Sacred Heart Foundation, Safeway gave $200,000 for the operation of a new mobile mammography van. Safeway also guaranteed annual contributions of $100,000 for the next four years to sponsor the ongoing operation of the mobile clinic on wheels.
The mobile clinic is designed to fill a critical need by significantly increasing the number of women in Eastern Washington being screened with digital mammography for breast cancer. It will travel throughout Eastern Washington.
Safeway also gave $27,446 to Deaconess & Valley Healthcare Foundation for breast cancer programs.
Staff reports
WASHINGTON
WaMu faces mortgage inquiry
The Securities and Exchange Commission is probing how Seattle-based Washington Mutual Inc., the nation’s largest savings and loan, handled mortgages that were possibly based on inflated home appraisals.
“We are voluntarily and fully cooperating with the SEC’s inquiry as well as the [Office of Thrift Supervision] and look forward to bringing the facts to both the regulators and public,” according to a company statement. OTS is the company’s federal regulator.
Washington Mutual shares fell 57 cents, or 3.89 percent, to $14.10 Friday. The company’s stock has traded between $13.99 and $46.38 in the past year.
Shares of WaMu have dropped about 65 percent since mid-September, following some dismal financial disclosures and a lawsuit filed in November by New York’s attorney general against one of its real estate appraisers, alleging the companies colluded to inflate home values.
Associated Press
MOSES LAKE
Herald to test run Sunday edition
The Columbia Basin Herald will begin testing the idea of a Sunday edition this weekend, Publisher Harlan Beagley has announced.
“We’re guaranteeing porch delivery by 5 a.m.,” Beagley said. “In the 66 years this newspaper has been publishing, this will be the first Sunday edition.”
Until now the weekday publication of Hagadone Newspapers has printed its weekend edition Friday. The first Sunday issue will include a questionnaire asking readers what they like and dislike about it, Beagley said.
“The answers on that survey will help shape future Sunday newspapers,” he said. “There has yet to be a date set for the future Sunday papers. Once we gather this data, it will give us cost and content feedback. Then we will take that information under advisement.”
The Tri-City Herald, the Wenatchee World and The Spokesman-Review, all with Sunday editions, offer street delivery in Moses Lake.
Carriers may choose to deliver the paper Saturday evening, he said.
Associated Press