Outdoor rendering of the planned Tohono O'odham casino-resort hotel near Glendale

The Tohono O’odham Nation has begun an effort to build a casino and upscale hotel near Glendale that could bring $300 million to the state’s economy, Chairman Ned Norris said.

“We’re elated. We’re extremely excited. We’re ready,” Norris said Thursday.

The project would create 6,000 skilled construction jobs and “more than” 3,000 permanent jobs for hotel and casino employees, he said.

The 600-room hotel and casino would have 150,000 square feet of gaming space, including a 1,000-seat bingo hall and 25 poker tables.

Norris said that after “many” meetings with Glendale, Peoria and Maricopa County officials and with Gov. Jan Brewer’s staff, the Indian nation has begun the application process to the U.S. Interior Department that would put the site into trust so that construction could begin.

The resort would have a 3-acre atrium with waterfalls and a botanical garden. Parking would be provided for 4,000 vehicles. Eight food and beverage “options,” two bars and a nightclub are part of the package.

The Tohono O’odham Nation’s most ambitious economic development project must get federal approval as trust land before ground can be broken on the 1.2 million square-foot facility, Norris said.

It would be the largest resort in Arizona and four times the size of the O’odham casino-hotel complex near Tucson. It would draw an estimated 1.2 million visits a year.

The nation purchased the 135-acre Maricopa County parcel in 2003. It was part of the land acquisition granted by Congress to replace Tohono O’odham land in the San Lucy District near Gila Bend lost in the 1970s when a federal government-built dam flooded nearly 10,000 acres.

Norris said he hoped construction could begin in a year. The project would take an estimated 32 to 44 months to complete.

He said the new casino-resort, near Glendale’s “amazingly successful” entertainment district, would take the area “to the next level.”

The area west of Phoenix offers Phoenix Coyotes hockey, Arizona Cardinals football and soon will be the home of baseball spring training for the Chicago White Sox and L.A. Dodgers.

Rendering of hotel atrium for Tohono O'odham casino-resort hotel proposed near Glendale

Udall Foundation won’t enter fray, citing anger in community

Backers and critics of the planned Rosemont Mine in the Santa Rita Mountains are too polarized for discussions to do any good, a mediation expert says.

“Given the current character of public opinion, there appears to be little room for truly collaborative dialogues,” said Larry Fisher, senior program manager at the U.S. Institute for Environmental Conflict Resolution.

Fisher said Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Ariz., had asked the Morris K. Udall Foundation affiliate whether bringing pro- and anti-mine groups together would be productive.

The topic of discussion is Augusta Resource Corp.’s design for a open pit copper mine southeast of Tucson.

Giffords also asked the Institute whether stronger public input into the federal environmental analysis process by the U.S. Forest Service would help.

“There is a strong sense of angst, anger, and polarization in the community,” over the Canada-based firm’s mining proposal, Fisher said.

“We’re not going to waste people’s time to set up a process that is not useful.”

Giffords is deeply disappointed that the Institute for Environmental Conflict Resolution will not convene the work group, said Giffords spokesman C.J. Karamargin.

Mine supporters say that the operation would create hundreds of jobs and boost the area’s economy. They also say the mining operation would be environmentally friendly, and not negatively impact regional groundwater supplies, either.

Critics of the mine say it would degrade the environment, destroy wildlife habitat, draw down already dwindling groundwater supplies and offer only temporary jobs.

The Forest Service has the final say over whether the mine will be approved. The agency first must complete an environmental impact study to determine if the operation would comply with the National Environmental Policy Act.

Arizonans’ approval of the homes initiative will prevent homeowners and businesses from being hit with new taxes for buying and selling real estate in the state’s depressed economy.

Business leaders say the measure, listed as Proposition 100 on the Nov. 4 ballot, also will keep Arizona more competitive with other states vying to attract new companies and jobs throughout the recession and beyond.

The vast majority of voters agreed Tuesday that government should not impose any new taxes on the sale, purchase or ownership transfer of real property.

In a year that was generally unkind to ballot initiatives, Prop. 100 passed with more than 77 percent approval, according to unofficial election results.

The only other initiative out of eight ballot offerings to pass was Proposition 102, which prohibits same-sex marriages in the state.

Like the marriage ban, Prop. 100 prohibits something that doesn’t actually exist within the state.

But advocates for the new tax law, including the Arizona Association of Realtors and the Arizona Chamber of Commerce and Industry, said they had been concerned government officials would implement a property-transfer tax similar to those in other states to help offset state and local budget shortfalls.

“In the type of down economy that we have right now, all kinds of options are on the table to correct the (budget deficit) situation,” said Ann Seiden, Arizona chamber vice president of communications.

A real-estate sales or transfer tax is collected on the purchase, sale or ownership transfer of a home, commercial building or piece of land.

Transfer taxes imposed by 37 other states range from 0.1 percent to 2 percent of a property’s value.

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Real-estate industry led charge to ban new taxes

A committee sponsored and funded by real-estate industry groups funded the campaign to approve Proposition 100, which bans any future tax on the purchase, sale or transfer of property in Arizona. There was no organized opposition to the ballot initiative.

Name: Protect Our Homes In Support of Prop. 100

Total contributions: $5.5 million.*

Total expenditures: $4.7 million.*

*Through Oct. 15.

Source: State campaign finance reports

When you hear an economist is being honored for being one of the most accurate forecasters in the country, naturally you have ask him when will we see the end to these endless foreclosures, bailouts, triple-digit bouncing stock markets, tightwad shoppers and comparisons to the Great Depression?

Joel Naroff, a Philadelphia economist being honored in New York City Thursday , says a turnaround could come next year if consumers, banks, businesses and investors would just stop overreacting. He analyzes the economy with as much psychology as math and attempts to see past emotion, uncertainty and fear.

While he said it’s impossible to be absolutely accurate in today’s weird economy, he believes that once people start to see that things aren’t getting worse sometime next year, they’ll start shopping again vigorously.

“While there is a lot of reason to be concerned right now, I think people are overreacting to the situation,” he said. “When the psychology changes, you will wind up getting a stronger reaction in the economy than basic economic factors would argue for.”

Naroff, president of Naroff Economic Advisors, was selected by Arizona State University’s W.P. Carey School of Business to receive the 2008 Lawrence R. Klein Award.That recognizes him as having the most accurate predictions from 2004 through 2007 among 50 economists who forecast for the Blue Chip Economic Indicators published by Aspen Publishers in New York City. Naroff also will be the keynote speaker at the 45th annual economic forecast lunch sponsored by JPMorgan Chase bank and the ASU business school Dec. 10 at the Phoenix Convention Center. Naroff has also been honored as a top economist by MSNBC and Bloomberg Business News.

Here’s what he has to say about some parts of the economy.

• Housing market. When prices come back down to where they were in 2002 or 2003, wiping out the unusual run-up in prices that occurred in 2005 and 2006, the market will settle down. In Arizona, prices have dropped back to their 2004 levels, according to the Arizona Regional Multiple Listing Service, so he says we probably have about another six months of price drops to go.

“The housing market in large parts of this country is really not that bad,” he said.

One reason Naroff was so accurate about how bad the economy would get in the last few years is that he visited Phoenix in September 2005 and read a newspaper article that quoted Realtors predicting prices would continue to rise. He spotted a bubble and was able to predict what would happen when it burst.

“I really came face to face (in Phoenix) with what the excesses of the market were, and the idea that so many people thought that this housing boom could just go on and on and on. That was the start of the idea of looking at what ultimately could be a collapse in the housing market.”

But he was caught by surprise, as was everyone else, at how the mortgage mess ballooned because it turned out the risks had been spread and intertwined with financial companies around the world.

• Financial markets. A major problem in the housing market is that lenders are reluctant to give mortgages to borrowers who are a “reasonable risk. It is those people who are “the difference between a weak and a decent market.”

Still, he understands why lenders are being cautious.

“The reason is they simply can’t afford to make another mistake. Their losses were so huge and their financial situation so tenuous, they overreacted.”

• President-elect Barack Obama. Having Democrats ruling both the White House and Congress means we should see more action.

“Having a Democratic Congress, you are going to have much more aggressive action coming out of Washington D.C.. Yes, there will be mistakes made and there will be a lot of money wasted. There has already been a lot of money wasted,” Naroff said.

“We may be able to get more things done and get us going a little sooner. I’m not saying everything will be done right. It will not. But so much has to be done. Having the same party will be an advantage.”

• Unemployment rate. He predicts the national unemployment rate, which reached 6.5 percent in October, will peak at 7.5 to 7.7 percent next year. But he said no one can be certain about that because of the emotions ruling the market today.

“Businesses are doing everything they can to survive these circumstances, so we could see an overreaction,” he said.

• Next year. What is likely to happen is that the economic indicators are bound to be better than this year and start to make people feel better, Naroff predicts. If auto sales, for example, increased from this year’s expected dismal 10 million to 14 million next year, that would still be a weak market by historical standards. But it would be a 40 percent increase and possibly enough to restore the country’s confidence.

More and more shoppers are using layaway, long thought to be out of fashion.

The sign over the entrance to a tiny room in the back corner of a Kmart store is familiar to anyone above a certain age and below a certain economic level. It reads: “Layaway.”

It describes a practice that’s poised for a comeback across the country.

“It’s really picked up over the last month or so,” said Bill Gier, manager of a Des Moines, Iowa, Kmart. “It’s probably double from normal. It’s a combination of regulars and a lot of new people who are finding a way to pay for their Christmas.”

Kmart has made layaway a centerpiece of this year’s holiday advertising campaign. It is one of a handful of national retailers – along with Burlington Coat Factory and TJ Maxx – who still offer layaway to their customers.

Wal-Mart dropped layaway in 2006, saying the practice had “really become very obsolete” in an era where most shoppers preferred the convenience of easy-to-get credit cards.

Analysts predict that a souring economy, combined with the credit crunch, is going to have more shoppers searching this season for plastic-free bargains. Layaway could be a boon to the few retailers who offer it.

“It’s going to be a deal,” said Bob Robicheaux, marketing department chairman at the University of Alabama-Birmingham. “How big a deal remains to be seen. But retailers have to pull everything they can out of their pockets to make it possible for people to buy something this holiday season.”

Layaway was born during the 1930s as a way to help Depression-era shoppers afford purchases. Store owners let shoppers make payments on an item over time, but they held the item in the store until it was paid for in full.

The practice held little risk for the retailer, because the item could always be sold again if would-be purchasers missed a payment. It was a boon to customers unable to finance big purchases in the era before easy credit.

“The beauty of layaway, is that it’s free credit to the customer,” Robicheaux said.

At one Burlington Coat Factory store in Des Moines, layaway is popular year-round, but its use tends to increase around Christmas time.

“We’ve always had a huge layaway here,” said Debbie Olson, assistant manager. “We have a lot of regulars.”

Robicheaux said recent economic turmoil has soured most shoppers on overextending themselves.

“More people will use it,” he said. “Whether it’s 10 or 50 percent more remains to be seen.”

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Questions to ask before a layaway

What happens if I change my mind? Most stores will give money back, minus a required, upfront fee, ranging from $5 to $15, if future payments are skipped. But make sure.

What is the payment amount?

When is it due? Most stores require minimum installments during a set period of time. Some are more flexible.

When must I pick it up? Many stores, hoping to avoid long delays, will require the shopper to take possession of the item well before Christmas Eve. Plan ahead.

Source: creditcards.com and local retailers

PHOENIX – The economic meltdown has hit the airport car rental business in Phoenix.

The City Council is poised Wednesday to raise airport car rental fees at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport by 33 percent.

If approved, the customer facility charge will go from $4.50 per vehicle, per day up to $6 beginning Jan 1.

Airport officials blamed the increase on financial forces that are out of the city’s control.

The fee increase is tied to the construction price tag for the $285 million off-airport car rental facility, which the city bankrolled with $270 million in bonds.

The rental-car center opened in 2006 and covers 141 acres. It consolidated all of the airports rental-car businesses into one facility.

Phoenix also bought bond insurance from the Federal Guaranty Insurance Company for the project.

That insurance firm’s rating tumbled from AAA, the highest possible rating, to BB.

The dip kicked in a contract clause that forces the city to scrape together a $21 million debt reserve in 12 months, prompting the city to raise car rental fees at Sky Harbor. The $21 million is the equivalent of one annual debt payment.

“FGIC’s rating problem is linked to the subprime-mortgage mess,” said Jeffrey DeWitt, assistant finance director for the city.

“Because many bond-insurance companies invested in subprime mortgages, their ratings took a dive,” he said.

Sky Harbor is ranked as one of the most expensive airports in the country when it comes to rental car fees, according to a 2007 Travelocity study.

An average of 4,913 cars are rented each day at the airport.

Sky Harbor’s fees are competitive with similar airports, said Deputy Aviation Director Deborah Ostreicher.

“We are commensurate with other airports,” Ostreicher said. “We are not the lowest, but we are not the highest either.”

When it comes to renting a car and paying a higher fee, business travelers say there’s not much they can do.

“It’s the increasing cost of travel,” said Brent Bebout, 43, a businessman from Santa Monica, Calif., who flies to Phoenix two or three times a month and rents a car each time.

“You really don’t have a choice,” said Cindy Tixeira, 48, of Fresno, Calif. She and her husband, Tom, decided to pay out of pocket for a rental so she could shop during his business trip.

Lora Wee, owner of Baker Wee Bakery and Cafe in Phoenix, prepares pie crusts for pumpkin and fruit pies. Wee said she pays between $700 and nearly $1,000 a month in card-processing fees.

Credit and debit cards provide convenience to consumers but are often a source of headaches for mom-and-pop retailers.

Plastic consistently outranks cash as the preferred way to pay for everything from fast food to groceries.

For example, in a recent survey of 8,167 consumers by Worthington, Ohio-based BIGresearch, 34.9 percent of respondents reported most often using debit cards and 27.7 percent reported most often using major credit cards for dining out. Cash buyers represented 35.6 percent of respondents.

“Whether (businesses) take credit cards or not – that really is not an option in today’s society,” said Neil Nelson, a counselor with Maricopa Community College’s Small Business Development Center in Phoenix.

But processing fees, equipment leases and other contract terms that come with accepting plastic can be an expensive proposition for small businesses.

Every time a customer uses a credit card at Baker Wee Bakery and Cafe in northwest Phoenix, a payment-processing firm charges the business a 16-cent fee plus about 1.75 percent of the transaction.

Owner Lora Wee said the fees add up quickly, especially when some customers spend only a few dollars for a cup of coffee and a doughnut.

The bakery typically does between $30,000 and $35,000 in monthly sales. Wee’s monthly processing bill has ranged between $700 and nearly $1,000.

“I wish I could just pull the plug on the whole machine and say I don’t need it,” Wee said. “(But) it would put a big dent in my business.”

Merchant services

Wells Fargo, Bank of America, Compass Bank and other banks provide merchant-account services to businesses. Many other firms provide payment-processing services.

The firms charge fees for every card transaction a business performs. They also often charge a monthly service fee.

The fees are meant to cover the interchange rates that credit-card companies such as Visa and MasterCard charge the processor. They also cover the perceived risk the processor assumes by agreeing to handle a merchant’s payments.

Some processors require businesses to lease card-swipe machines; some allow businesses to buy the machines elsewhere, which can be significantly cheaper.

Processing firms and industry trade groups say fees are meant to protect them from the risk involved with card transactions. Fees have increased only slightly, they say.

“What has happened is the volume of payments that are now being processed electronically has grown exponentially,” said Carla Balakgie, chief executive officer of the Electronic Transactions Association.

The Washington, D.C.-based trade group represents banks and other firms that perform payment processing.

Fine-print contracts

Merchant-account contracts are written in fine print, but owners should read any agreement line for line or consult an expert before signing, counselors say.

Two merchant accounts that Donna Doyle and Wade Nichols set up for their Scottsdale-based travel business were frozen by their processors for excessive “chargebacks.”

Chargebacks are payments a business makes back to customers who dispute a charge because, for example, a product or service was defective or because they didn’t receive what they paid for.

Processors will freeze a merchant account if excessive chargebacks occur. The purpose of the freeze is to ensure that there is enough money in the account to pay back consumers who have disputes and to make sure that no fraud is occurring. If a merchant runs out of funds or goes out of business, its processor could be on the hook for paying outstanding chargebacks.

Doyle and Nichols have not been able to access about $215,000 in customer payments in the accounts since they were frozen by Bank of America and National Processing Co. about six months ago.

Assessing risk

Merchant-service providers determine their rates based on the industry in which a business operates, the amount of transactions it performs each month, who its customers are and whether it conducts card transactions in person or over the phone.

Another reason why National Processing Co. froze Doyle and Nichols’ account was because of changes in how their business generated revenue.

Doyle and Wade originally specialized in event planning under the name Event Planners LLC. They currently operate License to Travel LLC, which runs a Web site that finds discounted resort packages.

The business charges around $4,000 for site access.

“This particular business morphed into a whole different business,” said Jim Oberman, senior executive vice president of the Louisville, Ky.-based National Processing Co.

Some providers also freeze accounts if there is a large surge in transactions in a particular month.

Doyle and Nichols said the increase in chargebacks was mostly due to customers having buyer’s remorse.

They say neither National Processing Co. nor Bank of America has given them an accounting of how much money they have left. They have resorted to personal savings to pay some vendors.

“I will agree we were naive in many ways, and I will agree I did not read the contract clearly,” Doyle said. “My biggest concern and my biggest complaint is (that) they never talked to us like two adults and two people that made some mistake and are willing to cover those mistakes.”

Oberman said only about 20 percent of the approximately $143,000 that was in the account at the time it was frozen remains because License to Travel continued receiving chargebacks after the account was frozen.

Bank of America spokesman Will Wilson said the bank was reviewing the matter.

Ask around

Business owners’ advice to others is to compare different options and ask for references when picking a payment processor.

Wee changed providers two months ago after receiving a sales call from Icon Payment Solutions.

Wee said Icon’s sales team told her that switching providers would save her about $400 a month.

When she received her October bill, the fees were nearly identical to what her previous processor, BluePay, had charged.

Brian Peterson, president of Phoenix-based Icon, said the company plans to work with Wee to bring her fees more in line with the quote the company provided her.

He said fees may differ from projections because of the type of cards consumers use. Credit cards tied to frequent-flier miles or other rewards programs typically carry a higher transaction fee than non-rewards cards.

Corporate credit cards also cost more that consumer cards.

Wee said she has considered posting a sign in the bakery asking customers to pay cash if they can.

Most debit- and credit-card companies prohibit merchants from setting dollar limits for accepting their cards, but many businesses still do so to cut back on fees. Some businesses include a surcharge for using cards, which generally is allowed as long as they apply the charge for all cards.

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Shopping for a merchant account

The growing use of debit and credit cards has motivated more small businesses to accept plastic. But processing fees, hardware costs and contract terms can be costly. Business counselors suggest the following when picking a merchant-account provider:

• Comparison shop. Firms charge different fees and require different contract terms. Some may provide card-reading machines for free; others require businesses to lease machines from them. Many charge expensive fees to cancel a contract early, while others are more flexible.

• Know the fees. Transaction fees vary for credit and debit cards. The brand of card a consumer uses can affect the transaction cost for the merchant. Reward cards typically cost more.

• Monitor charge backs. Consumers can dispute charges on their cards and get their money back. Processing firms limit the amount of chargebacks against a merchant as a safety precaution. Businesses that hit the limit can be blocked from accessing funds in their accounts.

PHOENIX – What benefit does Arizona get from stringing another power line between the Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station and the Palm Springs, Calif. area?

Regulators want to know.

Arizona Corporation Commissioners last year voted down the “Devers-Palo Verde No. 2″ power line, in part because they were concerned Arizonans would give up the water used in power plants and face the pollution from them while Californians would get all the benefits, namely cheaper electricity.

California customers pay about double what Arizonans pay for a kilowatt-hour of electricity, and the line would allow California to tap cheap electricity and raise prices for Arizonans, they said.

Southern California Edison initiated an appeal in May to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to override the Corporation Commission’s rejection.

The 2005 Energy Policy Act gives the commission the authority to approve new transmission lines even if states reject them.

State commissioners argued that federal regulators are going to want to see “good-faith” negotiations with Arizona from Edison before overruling the decision and said Edison should refile its request in Arizona.

Pedro Pizarro, Edison’s executive vice president of power operations, said the Devers line would help several companies that are interested in building solar power plants along its route in Arizona and California.

“It will help foster significant levels of solar generation in Arizona,” he said. “I would answer it is good for (solar power plant) developers around the West.”

Pizarro said that Edison was talking with the Central Arizona Water Conservation District about connecting to the Devers line to provide solar electricity to pump water along the Central Arizona Project canal, which gets its electricity now from the Navajo Generating Station coal-fired power plant.

A representative from Arizona Public Service Co. told commissioners the Devers line could benefit solar projects in Arizona’s western desert.

But during a commission meeting with California utility representatives, Arizona regulators expressed their displeasure with Edison for not making concessions to Arizona for the power line.

Menta Alicia Armenta Gomez (left ) and Virginia Ponce Mercado disassemble computers at an electronics recycling factory in Fronteras, Sonora, Mexico, as Antonio Chavez Othon looks on.

SIERRA VISTA – An electronics recycling factory in the town of Fronteras, Mexico, is offering the prospect of hiring many unemployed people and, at the same time, helping to protect the environment.

In 2002, Robin Ingenthron, president of American Retroworks, a recycling management company in Vermont, told Bisbee resident Mike Rohrbach that he observed that many illegal immigrants work in recycling-related jobs in the United States. He suggested establishing a factory in Mexico.

“In a way, it doesn’t make a lot of sense to create jobs that people have to jump the fence for,” he said.

Rohrbach put Ingenthron in touch with Alice Valenzuela. Ingenthron was reluctant to get involved at first, but decided it was worthwhile once he visited the site in Fronteras, Son., a town about 40 miles south of Douglas. Retroworks de Mexico was formed in 2006.

The project is a partnership between American Retroworks, a women’s cooperative in Fronteras, the Valenzuela family and the Cochise County Learning Advisory Council.

Valenzuela, who resides in Fronteras municipality, has been responsible for getting the necessary licenses and permits and dealing with legal matters for the project.

Initially, the facility refurbished and recycled computers only from colleges and government buildings within Sonora. About six months ago, it started handling an average of two trailer loads of electronics per six weeks, such as computers and televisions, from recyclers in Arizona, but not Cochise County.

Americans are increasingly discarding old televisions as they prepare for the transition from analog to digital broadcast in the United States slated for February. But those old TVs can still serve a purpose in other parts of the world.

Workers in Fronteras dismantle burned-out televisions and computers and separate the parts into plastic, metal and glass. The materials get transported back to the United States, and some are exported for reuse, with piece parts such as plastic shipped to Hong Kong and cathode ray tube glass sent to Malaysia.

Ingenthron hopes to supply the CRT glass, which contains lead, to mining company Grupo Mexico for use in the smelting process in Nacozari, Son., which is about 35 miles south of Fronteras. Discussions are under way for the refining of copper and precious metals from electronic circuits there.

The workers also are trained to repair televisions and computers. A fixed television, for example, could end up in Peru or Senegal. In the next year, plans call for locating a subsidiary plant from Malaysia in Fronteras for refurbishing and assembly of monitors and TVs.

The operation in Fronteras is not permitted to sell any of the items in Mexico. But a functioning computer can be transported to Douglas and then sold at American Retroworks Incorporated’s warehouse there, said Rohrbach, president of the Cochise County Learning Advisory Council, which refurbishes secondhand computers to be used in communities.

“The partnership we have right now is one in which the flow of computers that will pass through Douglas into Fronteras and back will give my nonprofit a great deal of flexibility in terms of getting equipment we can use in the digital divide program,” he said.

Ingenthron, who served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Cameroon, Africa, from 1984-86, is a strong believer in the practice of repair and reuse. He incorporated American Retroworks in 2001. Then, in 2003, he founded Good Point Recycling, an electronics recycling facility in Middlebury, Vt. He now has 20 employees.

“I always wanted to maximize reuse of every item we take apart here in Vermont, but I can’t afford to do it and pay staff $8.50 an hour. But in Mexico, where there are people without jobs who would like to make $10 a day, it suddenly changes the equation,” he said.

The staff members in Fronteras get paid about $500 a month, including benefits, which is considered a living wage. Valenzuela said the members of the cooperative also own 50 percent of the shares of the Mexican corporation. Because the workers are owners, they participated in determining their own compensation.

Six to eight people are employed there on a regular basis, although that number is expected to increase significantly. The workers at the factory, who are partners in the endeavor, believe they are fortunate to be employed.

Virginia Ponce Mercado, 56, said the creation of employment opportunities is important because one of her daughters who is living as an illegal immigrant in the United States would come home to Fronteras if she could get a job there.

“My hope is this work will allow her to be here with us,” she said.

Maria Dolores Cota Tarazon, 62, a widow, said jobs in Fronteras basically do not exist for people her age. Her late husband left behind a small hotel to rent out, but she earns no income from it.

“I have been waiting for years to have this job (in the factory),” she said.

Ingenthron said some recyclers ship old televisions overseas, where the reusable tubes are remanufactured, but the unusable ones are just dumped. He said he is focused on protecting the environment by making sure all the CRT glass is put to use.

The Cochise County Learning Advisory Council developed a program over the past few years that led to the collection of electronic equipment on Earth Day in Sierra Vista and Bisbee and at the county’s transfer station. Rohrbach hopes to use the warehouse in Douglas as a collection site in the future.

SEATTLE – In its latest move to increase Internet search traffic, Microsoft Corp. has turned to an old rival, Sun Microsystems Inc., for marketing help.

Under the terms of a deal being announced Monday, Sun will promote a Microsoft toolbar for the Internet Explorer browser to U.S.-based Web surfers as they download Sun’s Java software — which is required to view some Web sites. The toolbar has a built-in box for queries to Microsoft’s Live Search and buttons that give people access to MSN content.

“We need to provide more volume to our advertisers,” said Angus Norton, a senior director in Microsoft’s Live Search group. Microsoft ranks a distant third in the Web search market behind Google Inc. and Yahoo Inc.

Sun and Microsoft have competed bitterly on several fronts. In particular, Sun was one of the most prominent antagonists in Microsoft’s long antitrust battles. In 2004, Sun reaped nearly $2 billion in a patent and antitrust settlement payout from Microsoft.

Sun and Microsoft did not disclose the financial details or the length of their new deal. It comes as Sun is struggling mightily, having posted a $1.7 billion loss in its most recent quarter.

Through the agreement with Microsoft, computer users installing the Java software will be able to check a box to get the MSN toolbar, too. (As the programs download, Sun also opens a window promoting OpenOffice programs — a free competitor to Microsoft Office software.)

Sun has struck similar deals with Google and Yahoo in the past. The Yahoo agreement, which offers a Yahoo search toolbar to people who use the Firefox browser, will continue, but the Google deal is ending, said Sun’s vice president of Java marketing, Eric Klein.

Microsoft is trying several ways of getting unstuck from third place in the search market.

After Redmond, Wash.-based Microsoft dropped a bid to buy Yahoo in May, it vowed to invest in its own search technology and spend money on deals aimed at attracting more Web surfers.

The most prominent deal so far calls for Hewlett-Packard Co. to make Microsoft’s search engine the default on all PCs shipped in the U.S. and Canada, starting in January. HP will also include a browser toolbar on those computers.

Microsoft is focusing on toolbars and default settings because, according to Norton, 35 percent of Web searches are conducted from the browser’s address line, built-in search boxes and add-on search toolbars, as opposed to a search provider’s Web page.

DENVER – Freeport-McMoran Copper & Gold Inc. said Monday it would cut molybdenum production and lay off 14 percent of its work force at a Colorado mine, citing a 60 percent drop in price and slowing global economic conditions.

The world’s largest publicly traded copper producer also said it would delay the long-planned restart of a molybdenum mine near Leadville, Colo., and re-evaluate molybdenum produced as a byproduct at its other mines.

About 100 full-time workers at the Henderson mine west of Denver will be laid off as a result of the changes but no information was available about when that would occur, company spokesman Eric Kinneberg said. The mine had 700 employees, all non-union, at the start of the month.

Contractors also will be affected although Kinneberg had no details about how that would take effect.

Molybdenum, a metal used in strengthening steel and some chemical businesses, has enjoyed a strong market recently but the price has fallen significantly due to slowing global demand, the credit crisis and tumultuous financial markets, Phoenix-based Freeport-McMoRan said.

The price averaged $30 a pound last year and about $33 a pound in the first nine months of the year. However, since mid-October, the price has fallen from $30 a pound to $12 a pound as of Monday, the company said, citing the Metals Week Molybdenum Dealer Oxide price.

Argus Research analyst Bill Selesky said the announcement is a ripple effect of slowdowns in the steel industry. “All of it is in response to the global economic slowdown based off steel demand,” he said.

The company likely will see an impact on earnings from the announcement, Selesky said.

The 25 percent production cut will equal about 10 million pounds at the Henderson underground mine near Empire, about 40 miles west of Denver. The Climax mine, which had been expected to begin operations in 2010, will be put on hold.

In a statement, the company said it expects to restart the mine at some point. “Once a decision is made to resume construction activities, the project would be capable of starting up within a 12-18 month timeframe.”

Shares of Freeport-McMoRan rose $1.28, or 4.7 percent, to $28.38 in midday trading.

The East Valley Tribune will put more focus on its online edition beginning in January.

PHOENIX – A daily newspaper in suburban Phoenix stakes its future on a bold experiment in hopes of surviving a declining industry: reducing the number of publication days of its print edition while posting news on its Web site daily.

The East Valley Tribune, owned by Freedom Communications Inc., is the largest newspaper in the country to take this approach as the industry struggles with competition from Internet news sources, dwindling circulation, an economic downturn and slumping revenues from advertising, particularly classifieds.

“It wouldn’t surprise me to see more of this as the tsunami that has hit the newspaper business moves on,” said John Morton, a veteran newspaper analyst based in Silver Spring, Md. “It looks like conditions are going to be negative certainly through 2009 and perhaps through 2010.”

The approach intends to reduce the high costs of producing and delivering printed newspapers while retaining readers and advertisers as the industry moves deeper into online and niche publishing.

Two smaller newspapers in Wisconsin — The Capital Times in Madison and The Superior Telegram — have already made similar changes. Earlier this year, both papers went from six to two days a week with print editions and focused their daily news online.

The Capital Times, a paid paper that was converted to a free publication during the change, is delivered with a morning newspaper that has wider distribution. The Superior Telegram, which remained a paid newspaper, mails its print editions.

But the East Valley Tribune, with a combined paid and free circulation in excess of 100,000, will be the largest daily to take the leap when the changes go into effect in January. The Christian Science Monitor, with a circulation of about 50,000, next year will become the first national newspaper to drop its daily print edition and focus on publishing online.

The Trib, as locals call it, had a high water mark paid circulation of 94,500 in 1997. It competes in the Phoenix metro market with nearly 40 weeklies and the Freedom-owned Daily News-Sun in Sun City, but the longtime battle has been with The Arizona Republic, the nation’s 10th-largest newspaper and Gannett Corp.’s biggest daily besides USA Today.

N. Christian Anderson, an Arizona State University journalism professor and a former Freedom Communications editor and executive who had oversight over the Arizona newspaper, said a combination of factors prompted the changes at the Tribune.

The newspaper was suffering from the economic downturn and faced stiff competition for classified ads from Web sites. It also was considered a secondary advertising outlet, behind The Republic, that could be dropped by big retailers once things got tight economically. “It’s not a story that’s unique to the East Valley,” Anderson said.

Tribune Publisher Julie Moreno announced in October that the paper would cut 142 jobs, or 40 percent of its staff, by January. The paper will no longer be distributed in the affluent suburb of Scottsdale or Tempe, home to Arizona State University, or charge subscribers. Papers will be tossed onto driveways and stacked into free racks in four targeted, growing communities, Mesa, Chandler, Gilbert and Queen Creek.

“You give something up on the fringes to get more on the core,” said Jonathan Segal, president of Freedom Communications, which also owns the Orange County (Calif.) Register and 31 other dailies and 77 weeklies.

Freedom, based in Irvine, Calif., is a privately held company partly owned by two of the world’s largest investment groups, Blackstone and Providence Equity Partners.

Segal said Freedom may make similar changes at its other newspapers, but specifics would be dictated by the unique factors of each market.

Clayton Frink, publisher of The Capital Times in Madison, Wis., said changes at his paper in May weren’t intended to cut costs, but to raise the Times’ Internet presence and expand its circulation.

The Times had suffered falling circulation for at least five years, losing 500 to 1,000 readers each year before dropping to 16,500, when the paper decided to focus its reporting online and use the Web to promote its print editions.

Circulation has risen to about 85,000, now that it’s delivered by The Wisconsin Journal, the dominant daily newspaper. The Journal shares an advertising operation and splits revenues with The Capital Times under unique operating rules that are similar to — and yet still distinctly apart from — a joint operating agreement.

If the Times were a single-market paper without such an agreement, the online focus wouldn’t have made sense, since online ad sales, while growing, come nowhere near matching the proceeds from print ads, Frink said.

Three hundred miles away, in a northern Wisconsin town near the Minnesota border, The Superior Telegram began October offering more online content and reducing publication of its paid print edition from six to two days because of falling advertising revenue.

“It’s what the market can support,” said Ken Browall, the general manager of a newspaper group that includes the Superior Telegram.

Jobs were cut. Carrier delivery was eliminated. The paper is now mailed to readers.

The Telegram also considered eliminating the print edition altogether and becoming an all-Web operation, but kept the print edition because it’s still a large piece of its franchise, its older readership is fond of the print edition and some parts of its market are in rural areas with slow dial-up Internet connections.

Dumping the print edition is appealing because it would eliminate a large chunk of a paper’s expense base — newsprint, printing, and paying press operators and drivers, said Rick Edmonds, a media business analyst with the Poynter Institute in St. Petersburg, Fla.

But papers aren’t doing it because online advertising is a small piece of newspaper revenue, and it’s risky to remove the traditional link to readers, Edmonds said.

Edmonds believes the printed newspaper will eventually fade, but it will endure another 10 to 20 years to offer more analytical and investigative content.

Dick White, an East Valley Tribune subscriber and president of a group of religious leaders who lobby the Legislature on immigration, health care and education policies, said the newspaper has a strong record of digging deep into stories that matter to readers and that he is concerned the changes will lead to less scrutiny of government.

White said readers will suffer because the paper will report on fewer communities and journalists who seek deeper explanations and have developed expertise are being laid off. “This is a serious blow to the community’s ability to receive that kind of analysis,” White said.

———

On the Net:

East Valley Tribune: http://www.eastvalleytribune.com/

The Capital Times: http://www.madison.com/tct/

The Superior Telegram : www.superiortelegram.com/

The Arizona Republic

Phoenix-based Honeywell Aerospace plans to move 700 manufacturing jobs from Phoenix to Mexico and the Czech Republic.

Employees were notified Thursday of the cuts, which will begin in the second quarter of 2009 and continue for three years. Most of the job cuts are expected in the first year.

Workers who asked not to be identified said the news caught employees completely off-guard.

The affected jobs are at Honeywell’s 34th Street facility at Sky Harbor International Airport, where the company and its predecessors Allied Signal and Garrett have built jet engines for almost 60 years.

The jobs are being moved to existing Honeywell factories in Chihuahua, Mexico, and Olomouc in the Czech Republic in order to make the company more “globally competitive,” company spokesman Bill Reavis said.

Reavis said the move only affects manufacturing jobs and not engineers, who will remain in Phoenix. He added the company has no plans to close the 34th Street facility and will continue to employ about 2,000 people there after the manufacturing jobs are moved out.

Affected workers will be offered severance and invited to apply for other positions at other Honeywell facilities.

In February, Honeywell moved 420 aerospace jobs overseas In June, more jobs were lost when it sold its Phoenix-based hardware-distribution business.

Reavis said the company is hopeful that with retirements, voluntary severance and job transfers, Honeywell will wind up laying off fewer than 100 people.

The layoff announcement followed a Wednesday visit by Dave Cote, chairman and CEO of Honeywell International Inc., the $37 billion-a-year New Jersey parent of Honeywell Aerospace.

Last month, Honeywell announced that its fourth-quarter profit would be less than expected, and its stock price has suffered.

Honeywell shares closed down $2.75, or 9 percent, Thursday and have dropped 55 percent this year. Investors are worried that the economy could hurt its military and commercial-aircraft businesses.

The announcement came two days after Barack Obama, who has promised to take a hard line with companies that move manufacturing jobs overseas, was elected the 44th U.S. president.

Honeywell Aerospace is one of the Valley’s largest employers, with about 10,000 people working at facilities around the Phoenix area.

WASHINGTON – Express Scripts said Thursday it has received a letter demanding money from the company under the threat of exposing records of millions of patients.

The threat was made in an anonymous letter that the company turned over to federal investigators. The letter, received in early October, included personal information on 75 people covered by Express Scripts, including birth dates, social security numbers and prescription information.

Express manages prescription benefits for roughly 50 million people through thousands of clients, including health insurers, employers and union-sponsored plans.

A company spokesman said Express waited to reveal the breach “to give the investigation time to proceed and get under way.”

“We believe informing the public now was the appropriate time to do so under the circumstances,” said spokesman Steve Littlejohn.

Littlejohn said the company alerted customers whose information appeared in the letter but does not know whether additional information has been exposed. Generally, companies are only legally obligated to contact customers when they are certain their information exposed.

The company has set up a Web site for beneficiaries about the incident at: http://www.esisupports.com

According to the site, company staff believe they have identified the area where the data was stored and “have instituted enhanced controls.”

The company said it has not received any reports of identity theft associated with the problem.

“We are cooperating with the FBI and are committed to doing what we can to protect our members’ personal information and to track down the person or persons responsible for this criminal act,” company Chief Executive George Paz said.

Earlier this year 11 people were indicted for allegedly stealing 41 million credit and debit card numbers. The case — believed to be the largest identity theft on record — involved hacking into wireless computer networks of BJ’s Wholesale Club, Barnes & Noble, and other retailers.

Express Scripts shares fell $3.5, or 5.66 percent, to $58.34 in afternoon trading on a day in which the Dow Jones industrial average fell nearly 5 percent.

Carefree is the gathering point this week for hundreds of Arizona’s farmers and ranchers, who will thrash out policy and discuss agriculture at the 87th annual Arizona Farm Bureau convention.

The top initiative this year is domestic food supply. Keeping agriculture production in America is important for the U.S. economy, and Arizona, said Paul Brierley, director of organization for the Arizona Farm Bureau.

Generational transition, or how to pass on a farm to descendants, is also a leading issue.

“If farmers don’t plan, the death and estate taxes make it very difficult to pass on your farm,” Brierley said.

Additional speakers include political analyst Chuck Coughlin, who will recap Tuesday’s election, and Iowa Farm Bureau president Craig Lang, who will speak about prosperity in farm and ranch country.

Carefree Resort & Villas is hosting the two-day conference and trade show through Friday.The desert resort also hosted the event last year.

Other speakers are U.S. Sen. Jon Kyl and U.S. Rep. Jeff Flake, who represents Arizona’s 6th Congressional District. A lunch with bureau president Kevin Rogers is expected to draw more than 300 attendees.

Renowned photographer Paul Mobley will debut his book American Farmer, which features iconic images of farmers from across the country.

“We have a lot of business we accomplish, but a lot of good speakers too,” Brierley said.