Albuquerque Journal from Albuquerque, New Mexico • Page 32

BUSINESS Albuquerque Journal Page 6, Section Thursday, February 17, 1994 Business digest Contraction Gains Apple Camera Downtown Firms Endure Central Improvements ig at Shops it 1 1 1 I i THE ASSOCIATED PRESS By Nancy Baca i t. i i 11 4 i 'j A JOURNAL STAFF WRITER It's been nearly a month since construction consumed Central Avenue in the heart of Downtown between Third and Sixth streets. While merchants agree the finished product will be good for the area, right now, some say, times are tough. Skip Maisel, owner of Skip Maisel Indian Jewelry, said his business has been affected tremendously. "It's not much fun," he said.

Maisel said he is dependent on drive-by traffic which is virtually nonexistent. He added that foot traffic is also down. "People don't even like to walk down Central Avenue," he said. "They say 'we'll come back down and shop when the road is Even the Downtown night life has felt a bit of a pinch. Dean Van Doren II, one of the co-owners of Brewster's Pub near Central and Third Street, said business is down during the early part of the week but climbs again on the weekends.

"People park one place and walk to the clubs anyway," he said. Van Doren said the general Downtown night life is suffering and will continue to suffer for the short term. "In the long run, it will be beneficial," he said. For now, Van Doren offers specials to lure customers to the bar and restaurant. "If we can all just bear down and deal with it, it will benefit everyone," he said.

At Lindy's restaurant, a fixture on Cen tral since 1929 at the corner of Fifth Street and Central SW, general manager Steve Vatoseow seemed to take the construction in stride. "It's gone down a little bit," he said. "It's gone down enough to notice." However, Vatoseow praised the construe- along Central Avenue Downtown Includes widening and repavfng sidewalks, Honeywell, GE Deny i The $2.8 million construction project installing turn bays and adding trees. tion crew for its hard work. He said he hasn't heard any complaints, but instead customers are happy about the improve ments.

"You've got to look to the future," he said. "It's going to be beautiful." The $2.8 million project will include widening and repaving sidewalks, adding left turn bays, converting the street parking from diagonal to parallel and replacing a 60-year-old waterline. Modesto ash and chanticleer pear trees will line the street by the time the project is complete. City program manager Richard Sertich said the construction project is running on schedule. He said the Third to Sixth streets based on productivity, performance and job assignments," according to the company, and all received full separation benefits.

A 23rd worker was fired "due to violations of written workplace rules and received no severance pay," the company said. Like one of its plants in Albuquerque, Honeywell's Chihuahua plant is part of the company's home and building controls business, which manufactures components for heating, air conditioning and security systems. 9 GE spokesperson Jack Batty said Wednesday the Electrical Workers' complaint is part of the union's attempt to organize workers in the company's Mexican factories. GE subsidiary Compania Armadora, which operates a manufacturing plant in Ciudad Juarez, fired 10 employees, "allegedly because of pro-union activities," Batty said in a telephone interview from GE headquarters in Deerfield, Conn. Mexicans Claim Reprisals for Union Drives Apple Computer unveiled Wednesday in Toyko the QuIckTake 100, a light weight, digital color camera designed to transfer photographic Images Into a computer without film development or scanning.

The camera, priced at $749, features point-and-shoot capa bility and comes with a built-in flash. N.M. Business Newspaper Starts Publisliing Soon A statewide business newspaper will begin publication next month. New Mexico Business will be published biweekly for the first year, then convert to weekly publication, said Rick Homans, president of Starlight Publishing of Albu querque. The newspaper will feature local business news and personalities, "timely features and reports on notable comings and goings," said Homans, who will be editor-in- chief for New Mexico Busmess.

It will be mailed statewide to business executives identified by Dun and Brad- street and will be available at area news stands, he said. Starlight currently publishes Albu querque Monthly, in-flight magazines for Mesa Airlines and United Express and numerous visitor, newcomer and economic development guides throughout the West. The company employs 40 people. Hewlett-Packard Enjoys 41 Gain in Earnings PALO ALTO, Calif. Hewlett-Packard Co.

on Wednesday said it earned $368 mil lion in its first quarter, a 41-percent gain due to higher sales and control of expenses. The company earned 1 .42 a share for the three months ended Jan. 31. It earned $261 million, or $1.03 per share, during the same period last year. Revenues were $5.7 billion, up 24 percent from $4.6 billion.

HP said orders for the first quarter rose 18 percent to a record $6.1 billion from $5.2 billion in 1993's first quarter. U.S. orders totaled $2.6 billion, a 23-percent gain over last year, while foreign orders increased 15 percent to $3.5 billion. Xerox Will Close Two Customer Service Centers Xerox Corp. said Wednesday it will close two customer service centers as part of the Stamford, company's previ ously announced restructuring effort.

The two facilities, in Stamford and Arlington, each employ about 350 peo ple. Most of the 700 employees affected will be offered transfers to Xerox's four remaining customer service centers in Tampa, Park Ridge, 111., Lewisville, Texas, and Santa Ana, Calif. Uniroyal Workers OK Plan To Keep Plant Open WOODBURN, Ind. Uniroyal Goodrich Tire Co. has withdrawn a notice that it was closing a plant and canceled layoff notices sent to about 800 workers at its Woodburn tire factory.

Tuesday's announcement followed a vote Saturday in which workers voted to accept the company's conditions for keeping the plant open. The company indicated it made the move based on the United Rubber Workers Local 715 approval of the company's proposal of work-rule and scheduling changes. The proposal still must be approved by a six-member international URW policy committee; the union membership of the two Alabama plants, which already have approved similar work-rule changes; and the 14-member international URW executive board. International URW President Ken Coss said he believes the pact will be approved. Dutch Paper Company Will Buy California Office AMSTERDAM, Netherlands The Dutch paper and packaging giant Konin-klijke KNP BT NV on Wednesday announced it had agreed to buy a California office products firm, Kielty and Dayton Co.

KNP refused to reveal the price for the company from Hayward, Calif. Europe's second biggest paper producer, KNP said buying Kielty and Dayton roughly will double sales of its office products in California to about $60 million. KNP's current U.S. operation also is active in New York, Chicago, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, Washington and the Dallas-Fort Worth area.

FROM JOURNAL STAFF AND WIRE REPORTS -i. f-K i i l-3rZ mM JEFF ALEXANDER JOURNAL the group helps notify merchants of street closings or when waterlines will be shut down. "I think things are not as bad as every-; body thought they would be," she said. At the Gizmo store, floor manager Sharon Osburn said business is down, but the loyal customers and uniform sales help out. Z' "We're just praying that they hurry," she said.

At the Freed owner Leba Pierce said business for her import clothing, jewelry and gift store is "way off," but she is opti- "I mistic. I "We're hopeful that the future will be very rosy," she said. Fading Market Closes Up Investors Await Data On Inflation, Trade War By Patricia Lamiell THE ASSOCIATED PRESS NEW YORK Stocks rose Wednesday in a nervous session dominated by concerns about an escalating trade war with Japan and upcoming inflation data on the U.S economy. The Dow Jones industrial average closed I up 9 points at 3,937.27. Big Board volume totaled 295.39 million shares, against 306.72.

million in the previous session. Advancing issues outnumbered decliners by about 6 to 5 on the New York Stock Exchange, with 1,175 up, 967 down and 626 unchanged. Broad-market indexes were also higher. The NYSE's composite index rose 0.19 to 262.55. At the American Stock Exchange, the market value index rose 0.48 to 475.32.

The NASDAQ over-the-counter index added 2.50 to 792.62. The Dow Jones average had risen by 22 points early in the session in follow-through from Tuesday's 24-point increase. But the rally began to fade in late morning amid -concerns about trade tensions with Japan, analysts said. Stocks also did not take much support from the bond market, where prices eased and interest rates moved up. James Solloway, director of research at J' Argus Research said stock traders are concerned the Clinton Administration's Jj increasingly tough stance with Japan could backfire on U.S.

companies by pressuring the yen too high against the dollar. A higher yen, while it would cheapen prices of U.S.-made goods abroad and thus could help U.S. exports, also could chill for- eigners' interest in buying dollar-denomi- nated securities, including U.S. stocks, Sol- loway said. On Wednesday, the dollar fell marginally against the yen and European currencies.

Also Wednesday, Bowman Cutter, deputy director of the White House's National nomic Council, reportedly said the White House has not set a new foreign exchange target for the dollar. January's consumer prices and jobless- claims numbers are due today. Analysts are concerned that if consumer prices are shown to be advanci ng rapidly, that might prompt the Federal Reserve to tighten interest rates. A tighten- ing on Feb. 4 sent the Dow average turn- bling more than 96 points.

i phase should be reopened to traffic by the end of April, with sidewalks completed by June 1. The entire First through Eighth streets project should be complete by Dec. 1, Sertich said. At weekly meetings with block captains, Sertich said, problems are minimal. Another helping hand through the trials of the project is the work of the Center City Council.

The non-profit group has a contract with the city to work as a liaison between the merchants and city government during the construction as well as recruit more retail businesses to the area. Executive director Cathy Robbins said Violations After GE management reviewed those firings, 6 of the 10 workers were offered reinstatement, Batty said. All six declined, asking instead for severance pay. In the other four cases, "we determined the local management had sufficient evidence that these employees directly violated clearly communicated company work rules," he said. "A Juarez labor conciliation board reviewed all these cases and approved the settlements," Batty said.

"There has been no violation of Mexican or U.S. labor laws or any agreements between the U.S. and Mexico." The union complaints ask the National Administrative Office, which was established under NAFTA, to force the two companies to reinstate the fired workers and allow Mexican employees to form and join unions without intimidation from management. Honeywell employs about 3,000 workers in factories in Chihuahua, Juarez, and Tijuana, according to company spokesperson Meta Gaertnier. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS 1 7 Returning Rubles TT By Bob Hagan JOURNAL STAFF WRITER Both Honeywell Inc.

and GE are denying charges they violated the rights of workers in their Mexican manufacturing plants. The allegations are part of "an orches trated anti-NAFTA union campaign," according to a Honeywell spokesperson. The complaints, filed earlier this week by the Teamsters Union and the United Electrical Workers, are the first formal charges of worker-rights violations lodged under the North American Free Trade Agreement. The unions accuse the two companies of firing workers for attempting to lead union organizing drives in their Mexican plants. In its rebuttal, Honeywell claims 23 posi tions were eliminated at its plant in the city of Chihuahua, resulting in the layoff of 22 workers.

Those workers "were selected Maloofs Plan Hotel in Vecas THE ASSOCIATED PRESS LAS VEGAS, Nev. A New Mexico fam ily plans to build a 100-room hotel and casino in North Las Vegas. The Fiesta Hotel will be built on an 18-acre site and will carry a Mexico theme. "I'm pleased we will be providing more jobs for the community and an economic first for North Las Vegas," said George Maloof president of Albuquerque-based Maloof Hotels. "We are privileged to be associated with the tremendous growth of North Las Vegas and the entire northwest corridor." The facility will have 25,000 square, feet of casino space equipped with 600 slot machines, 13 table games, a bingo parlor, and race and sports book.

The family is not releasing the project's estimated cost. It is scheduled to open in December. Maloof, a graduate of the University of Nevada Las Vegas hotel management school, and his family own and operate three hotels in New Mexico and Arizona and a limited-stakes casino in Central City, Colo. The family also is building a luxury 100- room hotel in Downtown Santa Fe. i I I I i I A Russian woman receives U.S.

dollars for rubles at an automatic currency exchange machine installed by a Russian bank in Moscow's GUM department store Wednesday. The machine exchanges foreign currency dollars, francs, pounds, marks for rubles at the official daily rate. It's the first such machine in Russia..