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Posts published in “Day: January 20, 2007”

Port problems

As a range of Washington and Oregon communities take a look at their port districts - there's some nibbling around in Seattle about that - they may want to cast a glance to Astoria, where the local daily is running a strong series of articles about problems at the port district there.

Much of the Astorian is behind a subscriber wall but this piece, the leadoff in the series, was not. It points out, "The Port has been accused of taking unusual risks with public dollars, its executive director, Peter Gearin, is under legal scrutiny for his role in violating a federal dredge permit, Port commissioners have been fingered for profiting from their positions, and several Port employees have left their posts without much explanation."

Instructions from out of town

Micron Technology
Micron Technology

If Micron Technology is on your radar screen you have a couple of pieces of information to absorb from this week, both with significant potential reach for Idaho's largest business and private employer.

One was fairly public (though unreported so far on its own web site): The decision by stockholders to adopt language banning discrimination on basis of sexual orientation or gender identity. This was an initiative prompted by the managers of the pension funds of New York City, which are major Micron stockholders, and the proposal was approved by more than 55% of the shares.

Public corporations are not controlled exclusively at their headquarters, and this is certainly an instance of that: Corporate executives had maintained, firmly, that such an explicit policy wasn't needed because existing corporate policy already covered that ground. Our speculation is that the opposition came from some concern about running afoul of the larger cultural environment in Southwest Idaho where a plurality - but no longer a majority - of the firm's employees live and work.

The second item makes the matter of external influences even more explicit.

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