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No rest in retirement for Eliassen

May 20, 2010

Jon Eliassen, who retired from Avista Corp. in 2003 after 33 years on the job, now is both chairman of Itron Inc. and interim president and CEO of Red Lion Hotels Corp. That has got to be like working full time plus.The changes Eliassen already

Commellini's to reopen as private facility

Reservation-only dining and catered event center to open later this summer

May 20, 2010

Jeanne Gustafson

Commellini's, a long-time Italian-style restaurant here, will be reopened this summer as a reservations-only restaurant and events center, says Robert Seghetti, who will own the establishment with his wife, Lauri, and his parents.Seghetti's has

Gym owner faces foreclosure on West Plains

Sale scheduled of property where a Global Fitness location had been slated

May 20, 2010

Jeanne Gustafson

A site on the West Plains owned by a Spokane-area fitness chain is scheduled to be auctioned off at a trustee's sale on May 28 to satisfy more than $500,000 in debt on the property.M-R Fitness Inc., owned by Michael Lee, had announced plans in a

Kaiser begins testing water at dump site

May 20, 2010

Kaiser Aluminum & Chemical Corp. has begun taking water samples at a former aluminum by-product disposal site about 10 miles northeast of downtown Spokane in the Mead area that has been found to contain contaminants.The site, located near the of

Farm Credit boosts net to $41.1 million in quarter

Wheat, fruit growers, timber producers look to have good year in 2010

May 20, 2010

Richard Ripley

Northwest Farm Credit Services has reported $41.1 million in net income in the first quarter, boosting its quarterly earnings by 140 percent from $17.1 million in the year-earlier period.Meanwhile, the Spokane-based ag-lending cooperative set in

Sterling proposes merging two units, taking other steps

Spokane company to alter board, envisions buying failed banks as strategy

May 20, 2010

Richard Ripley

Sterling Financial Corp., of Spokane, is proposing to merge its Golf Savings Bank mortgage subsidiary into Sterling Savings Bank, its Spokane-based banking arm, and take other steps as it works to complete its proposed $720 million company also to

A concrete business plan

May 20, 2010

Kim Crompton

After living and working for a time in northern California, Spokane Valley natives Curtiss and Laura Grenz were eager to return here, and they found a concrete way to do that, literally. They founded a business through which they used an initial of

New building planned on West Plains

$2.4 million structure to house entrance station for armed forces recruits

May 20, 2010

Mike McLean

The U.S. General Services Administration says construction will start this month on a 20,300-square-foot building on the West Plains that the agency plans to lease from private developers to house a military unit that processes recruits Spokane be

Lydig erects $56 million jail on West Side

813-bed lockup to house misdemeanor offenders for seven cities in King County

May 20, 2010

Mike McLean

Spokane-based Lydig Construction Inc., which has an office in Bellevue, Wash., is building a $56 million West Side jail, says the director of the facility, which is scheduled to open in September 2011.The jail director, Penny Bartley, says Lydig

Itron meter can be shut off remotely

Company also appears at White House briefing, sells off software group

May 20, 2010

Richard Ripley

Itron Inc., of Liberty Lake, has released what it says is North America's first gas meter with an integrated remote disconnect valve that enables a utility to shut off the flow of natural gas to a customer for safety reasons without sending out a a