News Digest:
Tuesday, October 14, 2008 10:18 AM PDT
GOOD AFTERNOON
OREGON
Report: Ore. has 6.4 percent unemployment rate
SALEM (AP) — The state reports Oregon’s unemployment rate has dropped slightly, to 6.4 percent in September. That was a decrease of just a tenth of a percentage point.
According to state’s most recent figures, about 115,103 Oregonians were unemployed in September compared with 92,067 a year ago.
The national seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was set at 6.1 percent in August and September.
In Oregon, manufacturing, trade, transportation and utility industries saw substantial job losses, while the number of jobs in education and health professions increased. Oregon’s financial sector also appeared to bounce back in September, gaining 300 jobs. The industry has lost about 2,000 jobs in the last year overall as mortgage and credit conditions tighten.
Prof gets $1M to research first Americans
CORVALLIS (AP) — An Oregon State University professor has received a $1 million endowment to research American Indians’ early migration across the continent.
Assistant Professor Loren Davis and history researchers at five other universities have been funded by Joseph and Ruth Cramer of Denver.
Much of Davis’ research looks at the lives of North Americans who lived more than 10,000 years ago.
Davis says the money will pay for lab and field equipment as well as student participation at research sites in Idaho’s Salmon River Canyon and Mexico’s Baja California Sur.
IDAHO
Boise landmark
undergoes makeover
BOISE (AP) — An 83-year-old landmark in the state’s capital city is undergoing a face-lift.
City officials are spending about $500,000 to restore and make cosmetic improvements to the Boise Depot, which has been a part of the local landscape since 1925.
New York architects designed the building in Spanish Mission style architecture and as part of its makeover, the stucco is getting power washed and the window trim painted.
The Boise Depot was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1974.
Eighteen years ago, the Boise-based engineering company Morrison Knudsen bought the depot for $2 million from Union Pacific Corp. In 1995, the city purchased the structure for $1.5 million.
The Boise Depot is scheduled to reopen to the public Nov. 9.
