June 23 / City Council votes to buy YMCA
The Spokane City Council voted to approve the purchase of the YMCA, at 507 N. Howard, next to Spokane's Riverfront Park. The council approved an interfund loan of up to $4.4 million from the city's solid waste fund to the general fund to make the purchase. The price was $5.4 million, but the Spokane Park Board already had made a $1 million down payment when it exercised a right of first refusal to block a Spokane developer's plans to buy the property for a condominium project.

June 22 / City approves sign ordinance
The Spokane City Council approved a sign code containing several revisions to an earlier draft that drew opposition from businesses. The 48-page code allows digital signs to change displays every two seconds and, in some commercial areas, to display video images. It also limits the height of Third Avenue billboards along Interstate 90 to 60 feet, inflatable signs to 30 days in duration, grand-opening signs to 30 days, and the number of off-site garage-sale signs to 10.

June 22 / High court upholds Coeur mine permit
The U.S. Supreme Court affirmed a previously issued permit for a tailings facility at Coeur d'Alene Mines Corp.'s Kensington gold deposit 45 miles northwest of Juneau, Alaska. The Coeur d'Alene-based company praised the decision, which reverses a U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling, and said it clears the way for construction of the last facility at the mine before production can get under way, hopefully in 2010. It said the mine's potential production of 125,000 troy ounces of gold annually could amount to a 135 percent increase over Coeur's current gold production.

June 22 / Ambassadors settles wrongful death suit
Ambassador Programs Inc. announced that its parent company, Spokane-based Ambassadors Group Inc., which provides educational travel, has settled a wrongful death lawsuit with the parents of a boy who died of diabetes-related complications in June 2007, during an Ambassadors-organized trip to Tokyo, Japan. Terms of the agreement weren't disclosed, but Ambassadors Group doesn't believe the settlement will have a material adverse effect on it, a news release said.

June 19 / State denies Sacred Heart new acute-care beds
The Washington state Department of Health said it approved a certificate of need application by Providence Sacred Heart Medical Center & Children's Hospital for 21 level II intermediate-care nursery beds, but rejected Sacred Heart's request for another 152 acute-care beds due to lack of demonstrated community need. The hospital said in a statement that it will review the department's decision before deciding whether to ask the agency to reconsider. The hospital said the decision affected a roughly $80 million portion of a planned $175 million expansion project.

June 18 / Avista gets new license for Spokane River dams
Avista Corp., of Spokane, announced it has been issued a new 50-year operating license by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission for its five hydroelectric facilities on the Spokane River. New conditions that will be implemented include maintaining aesthetic flows in the downtown Spokane area and increasing minimum flows from Post Falls Dam and recreation water levels on Coeur d'Alene Lake. Avista said it began releasing required aesthetic flows at its Post Falls dam on the last weekend in June.

June 12 / SBA takes over venture capital fund
U.S. District Court Judge Robert H. Whaley ruled that the Small Business Administration should take over the assets and management of a fund operated by Northwest Venture Associates LLC, a Spokane-based venture capital group. The fund, Northwest Venture Partners III, was formed in 2000 and at one point reached $133 million in assets, including $52.2 million provided through the SBA, Northwest Venture's Web site says. Since then, however, the asset value has fallen below thresholds required by the SBA, Whaley ruled.