Business Journal-Portland articles from July 1995

Business Journal-Portland archives from July 1995

Birtcher buys Jantzen mall, plots revamp. (Birtcher Northwest; Jantzen BeachCenter, Portland, OR)
July 7, 1995... Developer Mason Frank has purchased Jantzen Beach Center and will begin a $50 million makeover to raze half the sleepy mall and convert it into Oregon's largest assemblage of "power" retailers. Home Depot, Circuit City, Copeland's Sports,...

Flightcraft joins movement to employee perks. (employee discounts on services, trips and goods)
July 7, 1995... Kim Elliott already loves her work. But the discounts on services, trips and goods that Portland's Flightcraft Inc. has offered as perks during the last three years certainly don't hurt. Every month she gets her $10 bank checking fee waived...

Shamrock pizza? Papa Aldo's takes on Irish moniker. (Papa Aldo's International Inc. to change franchise name into Papa Murphy's)
July 7, 1995... 'Papa Murphy's' to expand, move offices to Vancouver The Papa Aldo's restaurant chain is counting on the luck of the Irish to sell its take-and-bake pizza pies. Locally owned Papa Aldo's will soon change its franchise name to Papa Murphy's....

McCaw expands area's wireless data options. (McCaw Cellular Communications Inc. starts its AirData digital service in Portland, OR)
July 7, 1995... Portland businesspeople who work away from their office have a new weapon to add to their arsenal of communications devices. Portland is one of the first cities chosen by the Wireless Data Division of AT&T's McCaw Cellular Communications Unit...

Care Ambulance seeks county review of bidding process.
July 7, 1995... Care Ambulance Inc. filed a legal action with Multnomah County Circuit Court June 30 to try to force county officials to revisit their decision to award an emergency ambulance contract to American Medical Response Northwest (AMR). The court is...

A recovering entrepreneur. (Marcia Pry, former co-owner of Pry Publishing Co.)(Small Business Enterprise)
July 7, 1995... Couple sold their business and tried to move on, but something happened Tom and Marcia Pry put their 20 years of running a small publishing empire behind them. Or so they thought. But more than a year after selling five community papers...

BankAmerica Corp. (Proxy Report Excerpts)(Company Profile)
July 7, 1995... 555 California St., San Francisco, Calif. 94104 BankAmerica Corp. and its subsidiaries provide financial products and services throughout the world. Based on assets, BankAmerica is the second-largest bank holding company in the United States...

PacTrust cashing in on chip plants. (real estate development planned near semiconductor plants in Hillsboro, OR)
July 14, 1995... Time ripe for retail, residential projects as Hillsboro booms The sleepy crook in the road on the way to Hillsboro is about to become a field of dreams for Tigard real estate developer PacTrust. PacTrust - spurred by Intel's $2.2 billion...

Cineplex Odeon bursting back on screen scene. (plans for new movie theaters in Tualation, OR)
July 14, 1995... Cineplex Odeon may return to the Portland screen and star in a $12 million Tualatin theater and ice skating complex. Crystal Lake Enterprises Inc., a newly created Portland company, plans to buy the vacated Tualatin Costco store and develop two...

PACC eyes national partner to fuel growth. (PACC Health Plans Inc.)
July 14, 1995... PACC Health Plans is looking for a national partner willing to invest in - or buy - the home-grown insurer. The 108,000-member PACC needs $5 million to $20 million to upgrade its information systems and build its blossoming networks with...

Port floats idea of light-rail bridge across Columbia. (Port of Portland; Columbia River)
July 14, 1995... As the battle over light-rail funding continues in Salem, local officials are considering a novel plan to circumvent at least one of the line's major obstacles. A new bridge for both heavy and light rail jointly operated by the Port of...

Gerber public relations team breaks away, forms new agency. (Gerber Advertising Agency Inc.; Power Public Relations)
July 14, 1995... Half of Gerber Advertising's public relations staff walked out the agency's front door June 30 and set up their own shop. Olga Haley, former vice president and public relations director for Gerber, started her own public relations firm, Power...

Washington grapples with 'takings' initiative. (Initiative 164, property rights initiative)
July 14, 1995... SEATTLE - Supporters say it's exactly what the Founding Fathers would have wanted. Opponents say it's a license to ransack the public treasury and destroy communities. But one thing about Washington's Initiative 164 is certain - if it becomes...

HP struggles to break IBM's hold on midsize computer market. (Hewlett-Packard Co.; International Business Machines Corp.)
July 14, 1995... SAN JOSE - IBM Corp. has staved off major inroads by Hewlett-Packard Co. into the $43 billion midsize computer market. But analysts said HP succeeded in building more awareness for its computers. Looking to muscle into IBM's stronghold in...

With eye on the future, port director has governor's ear. (Mike Thorne, executive director of the Port of Portland)(Interview)
July 14, 1995... The red power tie and electronically controlled door into his office belie the true Mike Thorne. Underneath the executive trappings, Thorne is also a third-generation wheat rancher, a fiscal conservative and former lawmaker from Umatilla County....

Up from the ashes. (Portland community newspapers)(Focus on Advertising & Media)
July 14, 1995... Small neighborhood papers make a comeback, thanks to a few young publishers who wouldn't let them die Teresa Wood keeps an 89-year-old newspaper alive in the back of her North Portland home. The Sellwood-Moreland Bee, within a few minutes of...

Developers aiming to ride the rails. (planned retail development in Gresham, OR, to be sited near light rail line)
July 21, 1995... Gresham seeks new core along rail line The strip mall-packed suburb of Gresham could soon get a walkable, shoppable central city built near the eastside MAX line. Winmar Co. Inc. intends to break ground next spring on several blocks of shops...

No-man's land now busy neighborhood. (area around 172nd Avenue in Portland, OR)(Developers Aiming to Ride the Rails)
July 21, 1995... Fifteen years ago, when regional planners were deliberating on where to build stations along the eastside light-rail line, a bevy of economists and urban design experts arrived from San Francisco warning that zero development would take place in...

Assessments up for downtown property owners. (Portland, OR)
July 21, 1995... Rising Property Assessments (Projected average tax assessment hikes for 1995-96) Multnomah Washington Clackamas Single-family homes 10.5% 11% 12% 2-4...

OHSU grooms primate center. (Oregon Health Sciences University)
July 21, 1995... It's monkey see, monkey develop along MAX line Oregon Health Sciences University has much more than monkey business in mind for its Hillsboro primate research center. One year after OHSU's merger with Oregon Regional Primate Research Center,...

Mental health agencies combining to compete. (Metropolitan Family Service; Network Behavioral Health; Project Stop)
July 21, 1995... Three private, non-profit mental health providers have affiliated and restructured their offerings to gain an edge in the shrinking market for their services. Metropolitan Family Service and Network Behavioral Health have created a holding...

Goldschmidt engineers trolley study deal. (Neil Goldschmidt, former mayor of Portland, OR)
July 21, 1995... 'Father of light rail' helps Central City Streetcar win $2.5 million city contract Neil Goldschmidt hasn't held elective office in five years. But when it comes to pulling strings in the city, the former mayor, governor and transportation...

Controversial Blakeslee expands X-rated video store chain. (Tracy Blakeslee, president of Oregon Entertainment Corp.)
July 21, 1995... In Tracy Blakeslee's version of progress, Mr. and Mrs. Suburbia don't need to journey to some seedy downtown store to rent pornographic movies. They hop in the car and go to a place on McLoughlin Boulevard that used to sell fast-food....

Efficiency expert is rising star at Providence. (Marvin O'Quinn, administrator of Portland Providence Hospital)
July 21, 1995... Marvin O'Quinn got his first taste of medicine as an orderly in the 1,500-bed Los Angeles Medical Center. Quinn thrived in the high-stress environment at the center, which typifies an inner city hospital for the indigent. "I liked it," recalls...

OHSU joins big league in licensing, royalties. (Oregon Health Sciences University)
July 21, 1995... Oregon Health Science University has joined the million-dollar club. For the first time ever, Pill Hill's income from technology licensing deals and royalties topped $1 million for its fiscal year ending June 30. That's a far cry from the...

Failed credit union merger gets murkier with leaked letter. (Patelco Credit Union)
July 21, 1995... CEO's letter fails to explain Patelco's breakup with Beaverton's First Technology SAN FRANCISCO - A letter drafted by embattled Patelco Credit Union chief executive officer Ed Callahan intended to "set the record straight" among his...

Sold! (Product.Com Internet Product Services; Equinet)(Focus on Small Business.)
July 21, 1995... After nine months of running his own business, Internet entrepreneur Jon Batcheller sells out to bigger fish From the conference room of his new office on the 15th floor of the 200 Market Building, Jon Batcheller can see all of downtown...

Ashforth closing in on Liberty high-rise. (real state tycoon Henry Ashforth Jr.; Liberty Northwest Cos.)
July 28, 1995... Insurer to lease half of Lloyd District tower A Connecticut developer is closing in on deals to buy several Lloyd District properties and erect a $41 million high-rise in the district anchored by Liberty Northwest Cos. Liberty, facing...

Oregon Health Plan stumbles on maternity.
July 28, 1995... Poor pregnant women aren't getting the quality preventive care state officials sought under the Oregon Health Plan's Medicaid expansion. Medicaid moms who gave birth after the Oregon Health Plan was implemented in February 1994 reported fewer...

Execs' pay more directly linked to performance.
July 28, 1995... Merix's Coleman is first woman among top 10 highest-paid For the first time in Portland history a woman is among the top 10 highest-paid executives in the region. Debi Coleman, chief executive officer at Merix Corp., is one of the newest...

Healthsource buys PACC as Northwest hub. (Healthsource Inc.; PACC Health Plans Inc.)
July 28, 1995... PACC Health Plans Inc. is selling out to a national insurer that will quickly bring it 20,000 new policyholders and access to capital it needs to build its medical network regionwide. The publicly owned Hooksett, N.H.-based Healthsource Inc. on...

Phone competitors jockey for position before PUC ruling. (Oregon Public Utility Commission)
July 28, 1995... Competitors are jostling for position in the race to provide local telephone service, even before the Oregon Public Utility Commission decides where to draw the starting line. Although it's a foregone conclusion that the PUC will allow the new...

Dynic to expand at booming Dawson Creek. (Dynic USA Corp.; Dawson Creek Park in Hillsboro, Oregon)
July 28, 1995... A Tokyo-based manufacturer that moved here in 1988 during the ballyhooed "second wave" of Japanese expansion will triple its size with a new plant at Hillsboro's Dawson Creek Park. Dynic USA Corp., which makes computer printer ribbons and other...

Siltec Silicon expands again to keep up with chipmakers. (Siltec Silicon Div.)
July 28, 1995... Siltec Silicon is expanding its Salem wafer plant for the second time this year. Though work has yet to be completed on a $240 million expansion, the company on July 24 decided to pour in an additional $40 million for another...

Metro to share water planning role with local districts.
July 28, 1995... Metro, the tri-county area's planning agency, should take over regional water planning but leave the plumbing to the dozens of local water districts already serving the area. That's the conclusion of a draft report due next month from the 27...

DeNicola vows to bring Rocco's back from ashes. (Rocco's Cafe founder Nick DeNicola)(Small Business Enterprise)
July 28, 1995... Pizza maker learns some tough lessons from June fire On June 9 Nick DeNicola's day began at 3 a.m., watching the Portland Fire Department quench the hot spots in his smoldering Rocco's Care on West Burnside. Then came the news that the fire may...

Hotel developer reflects 'show-me state' culture. (John Q. Hammons)
July 28, 1995... KANSAS CITY - John Q. Hammons is fidgeting, but his gray pompadour stands at attention. He has no time for pleasantries this morning. "Fifteen minutes," he spurts, extending a hand at the doorway to his office. "I'm busy, real busy. You...

Willamette Valley brewery launches East Coast start-up.
July 28, 1995... ALBANY, N.Y. - An Oregon brewing company looking to develop financial ties to as many as 10 regional breweries throughout the nation has selected Saratoga Springs, N.Y., as the site for its Northeast hub. Willamette Valley Inc., a Portland...