Arizona Daily Sun from Flagstaff, Arizona • 7

THE FRONT PAGE www.aalailv-4in.timi Friday. Auinisi V2U 7 Arizona Daily Sun Jobless claims hit highest point since March 2002 Unemployment nears 6-year high Claims for unemployment benefits increased by about 7,000 applications last week, reaching the highest level since 2002. Weekly jobless claims, seasonally adjusted Week ending 500,000 March 30, 2002 Aug 2- high energy prices. We would like to see more job creation," said White House spokesman Tony Fratto. He credited the government's stimulus program as a helpful cushion.

To that end, consumers fortified by the rebate checks boosted their borrowing at a 6.7 percent pace June, the most since November, the Federal Reserve reported. And, Wal-Mart, the worlds largest retailer, along with Costco Wholesale Corp. reported solid sales for July. Wal-Marts sales, however, came in a bit below Wall Street forecasts. And, the company projected sales would slow in August as rebate checks dry up.

Many apparel stores including Limited Brands Abercrombie Fitch Co. and Pacific Sunwear of California were stuck in a rut. "Times are tough so people are husbanding their money, said Bill Cheney, chief economist at John Hancock Financial Services. A growing number of economists fear that a pull back by cautious consumers will throw the economy into a tailspin in the final three months of this year. Thats prompting calls from Democrats, including presidential contender Sen.

Barack Obama, to enact a second round of stimulus. The Bush administration has been cool to the notion. GOP presidential contender, Sen. John McCain, favors strengthening the jobs market by helping small businesses and others. THERE'S MORE TO THE STORY 7 Visit www.azdailysun.com to read the full AP version of this story.

JEANMNK A VERSA AP Economics Wnter WASHINGTON The nations jobs market sent a fresh cry of distress as the number of newly laid off people unexpectedly hit the highest level in more than six years, a Labor Department report showed Thursday. The faltering economy and tight credit have forced companies to cut back, and as the job market shrinks, consumer spending may dwindle, too. All that spells potentially more trouble for the country later this year as the bracing tonic of the governments tax rebates disappears. Consumers will be very tight fisted in the coming months, predicted Richard Yamarone, economist at Argus Research. Nothing shuts down the consumer and the economy like the loss of a job." Companies are laying off workers as they struggle with slowing customer demand, harder-to-get credit and high costs for fuel and other raw materials.

New applications filed for unemployment benefits rose last week by a seasonally adjusted 7,000 to 455,000, the department said in its weekly report. That was the most since late March 2002, when the job market was struggling mightily to get back on its feet after the 2001 recession. A program to locate people eligible for jobless benefits played a role in last weeks increase, a department analyst said. However, the analyst couldn't say how much of a role. The latest snapshot of layoff 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 SOURCE Department of Labor AP filings was worse than economists expected.

They were forecasting new claims to drop to around 430,000. The data disappointed Wall Street and the White House. The Dow Jones industrials tumbled 224.64 points to close at 11,431.43. The job market isn't strong right now as wTe work through the downturn in housing and paleo-magnetic laboratory, with researchers Don Elston, Gene Shoemaker and Dave Roddy working there. The work added to data about plate tectonics and continental drift, by noting magnetic signatures that determined where rocks were initially imbedded when they were formed and how far they had moved since, said his wife, Shirley Elston.

Don Elston gathered rocks from the Precambrian layer of the Grand Canyon, with Park Service permission, and from Idaho, Russia, Antarctica, Hungary and Africa to study plate tectonics, all of which went back to his office in Fort Valley. He retired in 1991 after a 38-year career with USGS, Shirley said, but kept doing research until his death two years ago. researchers at Northern Arizona University. RESEARCH TODAY The research station examines bug infestations, thinning, the watershed and asks questions such as why aspens here are dying off. The site is typically not open to the public, but sometimes opens for the Flagstaff Festival of Science.

By the 1920s, the station had confirmed that fire was a normal part of the ponderosa pine ecosystem. Because foresters were trying to study what promoted tree growth, they kept climatological records and learned that elevation largely dictates what grows where, building on C. Hart Merriams 1889 findings that the Colorado Plateau had different life zones for vegetation based on elevation and latitude. The climatological records are valuable in climate change studies and keep it from freezing, but the cans froze anyway and the labels came off, according to a historical recount from the Forest Service. Pearson never knew what his meal would contain until he had opened a few cans: From 1909 to World War II, forest rangers for the Southwest went to Fort Valley to learn about silviculture, camp maintenance, law, grazing, fieldwork, horse care and office work.

A baseball game pitted the Arizona rangers against the New Mexico rangers, according the historical Web site on the forest. The rules: Base runners had to remove their spurs and firearms. Pearson built an insulated resi-denceoffice now known as the Pearson House. In 1918 came a bathhouse. It was the 1950s before natural gas and a paved road accessed the area.

Today, the forest is a site for might help determine whether the Southwest is heading into a decades-long drought, said Dan Neary, a soils scientist with the Rocky Mountain Research Station at NAU who works at the experimental station. The longer records you have, the better chance you have of getting an accurate picture of climate change, he said. His team has also worked on the impact of severe wildfires versus prescribed burns there and has found that the bacteria and fungi in soils arent affected by prescribed burns, he said. PLATE TECTONICS STUDIED, TOO In the 1970s, the Forest Service sold three of the buildings at the experimental research station. The U.S.

Geological Survey in Flagstaff then offered to lease buildings there. USGS began what it called the FOREST from Page A1 a training ground for foresters could also become one of the older additions in climate change records. I always find it amazing that this is the first Forest Service research site in the country and very few Flagstaff people know about it and its been there 100 years, Olberding said. HUMBLE, COLD BEGINNINGS Forester Gustaf Adolph Pearson became the director at Fort Valley and was the only scientist there in the winter of 1908-1909. His closest friends were two mules, Pat and Mike, who transported supplies for a decade and took men to Flagstaff on Saturday nights.

Pearson lived in an uninsulated cabin and buried his canned food to Cyndy Cole can be reached at 913-8607 or at ccoleazdailysun.com. about the transaction fee. A transcribed list of those messages released by the city found key phrase in common with a pamphlet being distributed in local pawn shops. Among the commonly used phrases the pawn shop is my bank and the pawn fee is discriminatory. The flier also has several inaccuracies, including referring to a $3 fee and list contact information for Joe Donaldson, Kara Kelty and Karen Cooper all of whom left the council in June.

The Flagstaff City Council will make a final decision on the $2 transaction fee during its Aug. 19 meeting. this problem more effectively, Cooper told the council. Phoenix, Peoria and Kingman already impose a $3 transaction fee at pawn shops. Tempe and Mesa are also considering instituting a similar fee.

After Peoria instituted its pawn fee last year, Coons said the Peoria Police Department returned roughly $36,000 in stolen property during the first nine months. 'THE PAWN SHOP IS MY BANK In addition to the owners of the three local pawn shops and a registered lobbyist from the Arizona Pawnbrokers Association, more than two dozen people called the city councils opinion line to voice their concerns Police Department argued otherwise, producing records of various items found in pawn shops during infrequent investigations. Sgt. Roberta Coons said one random inspection of a shop last year found for sale a nail gun engraved with the name of the construction company and a Social Security number that did not match the person who had pawned the item. Coons said frequently stolen property in Flagstaff includes guns, tools, bicycles and electronic equipment, specifically iPods.

A small portion of the community is responsible for a large portion of crime, she told the council. To illustrate her point, she said one subject pawned a total of 179 items between May 2006 and May 2007, including three sets of golf clubs. One set of those clubs was reported stolen, she said. Coons said a couple pawned a total of 13 bikes in a 60-day period many of which were later determined to be stolen. She credited the unnamed pawn shop with the original tip.

Police Chief Brent Cooper said with property crime in Flagstaff more that double the national average and higher than the state average, the city had to something to address crime. We feel that it is a very necessary tool that we need in our inventory in order to address ferent reservations, some of them come from Dilkon and Kayenta, and they travel quite a bit of distance to get here to pawn and do their shopping here in Flagstaff, she said. Jensen had asked the council to table the issue, hoping find an alternative to the current proposal. One of Jensens primary concerns was that her store would be forced to continually charge her customers the same $2 fee each time they pawned an item. She said it was common for her customers to pawn and then buy back the same item several times over the course of a year.

13 BIKES PAWNED IN 60 DAYS Officials with the Flagstaff PAWN from Page A1 We already report all transactions electronically through leadsonline and absorb the cost of collecting and reporting the data, Geile said. Pawn customers are fingerprinted and all item information is properly recorded and submitted to law enforcement every night. Lorraine Jensen of the Pow Wow Trading Post in downtown Flagstaff said the fee would be a hardship on her clients who come from remote areas of the Navajo Nation. I have some elderly Native Americans that come from dif J. Ferguson can be reached at 556-2253 or jfergusonazdailysun.com.

Misner said the Flagstaff area is part of the Phoenix television market area and programmers prefer to have only one NBC affiliate per market area. Satellite companies have opted not to carry Channel 2, Misner said. After the announcement was made during Wednesdays broadcast, Misner said phone calls of support started streaming in. We had some calls this morning from our long-standing advertising clients expressing their sadness about the stations changing status, he said. One in particular mentioned how grateful they were to advertise with our station because it was good for business.

We held out hope until fairly recently that we would be able to accomplish one of two things: Either to get greater support from the Flagstaff business community for advertising revenue or find a prospective buyer, he said. He said a sharp downturn in the Arizona economy in late 2007 exacerbated the financial problems facing the station and eventually prompted the decision to close KNAZ. Misner said the station itself remains for sale. KNAZ started broadcasting in Flagstaff in May 1970 from offices in downtown Flagstaff, according to its Web site. The station has struggled to increase its market share and was unable to get into homes with satellite TV service.

Starting on Aug. 16, the station will be broadcasting Channel 12 newscasts in Flagstaff, and Misner expects those broadcasts will frequently include local stories submitted by reporters from the new bureau. The new northern Arizona bureau for 12 News will have two multimedia journalists. And what I mean by multi-media journalists are folks who report, write, shoot and edit video, post their videos online and they are live on Channel 12, he said. Misner said the new bureau would put a strong concentration on Web updates.

Giving the example of a breaking news story in Phoenix that happened on Thursday, he said some stories dont necessarily get used as part of a broadcast piece but will be posted online. Stories that (northern Arizona bureau) report on may be posted online only, Misner said. Which employees will stay in Flagstaff has not been decided. We are in conversation with current 2 News employees about these opportunities, and we should probably know in a week or so, Misner said. WEEKEND NEWSCASTS CUT IN 2006 The stations financial trouble first became widely known in late 2005 when Gannett announced it was looking to sell the station.

In September 2006, KNAZ stopped its weekend news broadcasts in an effort to cut costs. Misner said the decision to close the station was made recently. KNAZ from Page A1 Misner said he was working with KNAZ station manager Jerome Parra to help find jobs for most of the employees at either different Gannett affiliates or other media outlets. He also said all employees would be offered severance packages. THREE WILL STAFF BUREAU At least three employees are not going anywhere.

Two of KNAZs broadcasters and the stations chief engineer are expected to remain in Flagstaff, as part of a new northern Arizona Channel 12 bureau, Misner said. J. Ferguson can be reached at 556-2253 or jfergusonazdailysun.com. carefully timed opening ceremony linked to a belief in lucky eights 8808 at 8:08 p.m. (5:08 a.m.

MST). This year has seen a series of food and toy quality scandals, a massive February snowstorm, Tibetan riots in March, torch relay protests in April and the massive Sichuan earthquake in Mayi The government also finds itself battling a chorus of foreign critics howling that it has not met the press freedom and human rights commitments agreed to in 2001. If anything, the government has cracked down harder on critics and activists in recent months to safeguard order and avoid while protesting Chinese rule of their homeland. In response to a speech by President Bush in Bangkok urging Beijing to improve human rights, Chinas Foreign Ministry called (for bilateral dialogue. The ministry added in a statement: We firmly oppose any words or acts that interfere in other countries internal affairs, using human rights and religion and other issues.

In addition, the Turkistan Islamic Party, which has threatened to attack Olympic targets, again urged Muslims to stay away. And pollution in Beijing remains a source of constant concern for the image-obsessed country, even on good days. Early Friday saw the city socked in under a heavy cloud of smog. In some ways the lead-up almost has set aside the fact that representatives from around the world have gathered for a sporting event. About 10,700 athletes from 205 countries will be competing in 28 sports.

China, after finishing second to the United States in gold medals four years ago in Athens, Greece, by a count of 36 to 32, could get the most medals this time, experts say. Chinese sports officials downplay that possibility, saying that it is more important that the country host a successful Olympics. Still, seven years ago they implemented Project 119, garnering new technology, foreign coaches, young recruits and 3,000 sports schools in a national program to make China a sports superpower. The United States features a typically strong Olympic team led by swimmer Michael Phelps, who, after winning six gold medals in Athens, could surpass Mark Spitzs singlegames record of seven gold medals. While some expect the early overhang of tension and heavy-handed security to fade once the games begin, the difficult lead-up has some observers wondering whether this party is worth the price.

In promising a perfect Olympics and pledging to keep protesters and even the weather under control, China has set itself up for disappointment and created a challenge for protesters. Theres been a drastic change in outlook by the political leadership from Coming-out show to Lets let the Olympics pass without a crisis, said Cheng Li, senior fellow with the Brookings Institution in Washington. Theyve really lowered expectations. International Olympic Com mittee President Jacques Rogge acknowledged this week that the Chinese face some challenges. But he remains at least publicly optimistic about the next 16 days.

I think history will view the games as a significant milestone in Chinas remarkable transformation, Rogge said. Seven years ago as Beijing waxed euphoric after winning the bid to host the 2008 Olympics, Chinese envisioned a surging economy, unqualified international praise and an improved media and human rights record that would reverse the stain of the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown and cement Chinas spot at the global table. While some of this has materialized, the fates, combined with fallout from government policies, have not entirely blessed China despite Fridays OLYMPICS from Page A1 At a time when the government should be beaming, however, it has got the jitters. An attack on a border police station in distant Xinjiang province Monday at the nations far western reaches killed 16 paramilitary members. The country has seen a wave of protests by foreign activists who managed to enter China despite stepped-up visa restrictions, a strict ticketing system and extensive screening.

On Thursday, China deported two Britons from Students for a Free Tibet who unfurled banners a day earlier near the Birds Nest stadium, according to a group spokesman, while roughly 2,000 Tibetan protesters in Nepal clashed with police THERES MORE TO THE STORY 7 Visit www.azdailysun.com to read the full Los Angeles Times version of this story. FORUM from Page A1 Republicans and Maupin will speak from 1 to 3 p.m. at the same Candidates receive three minutes for opening statements, two minutes to answer each question and time for closing remarks. Kirkpatricks campaign has said it would send a representative to read a statement on behalf of Kirkpatrick. That individual will not be allowed to respond to questions on the candidates behalf, however.

Personal questions are banned. Questions are taken from the public, meaning a candidate with a lot of supporters can receive more favorable questions than one with few or no supporters present, said Norma Thimot, voter services chair for the Flagstaff branch of the League of Women Voters. The American Association of University Women is also organizing the forum. It is not a debate. Were doing issue forums with the candidates telling us where they stand on the issues, Thimot said.

The candidates are vying for the seat being vacated by three-term incumbent Republican Rep. Rick Renzi, who is facing felony fraud charges and is accused of using his position for financial gain. il 1.