The Sacramento Bee from Sacramento, California • D1

V1N39VIAI yiovna S0EI-90 I. 31V1S 3383VS -Q- The Sacramento Bee MONDAY June 13, 2005 INSIDE What's up? The Business Calendar is loaded news you can use about events of interest to the business community. PageD2 BUSINESS ON THE MOVE D2 CONVENTIONS D2 RECALL WATCH D3 www.sacbee.combusiness I I feel more energetic. Sometimes you need a little push to do something that you know is a good idea. 5 5 Fernando Lopez an electrical engineer at Xerox research group in Palo Alto who takes part in his company's health risk assessment program Firms try to get jump on illnesses lead to sharply higher medical INSIDE claims.

At Pitney Bowes, which like Inter- Wisconsin resi- national Truck has an older work dents Nina force with a higher incidence of Weeks and her chronic disease, the company found husband, Leon, it wasn't only a diagnosis that pre- talk regularly with dieted cost spikes, but whether em- a "health coach" ployees filled all their prescriptions. who works for So the company cut the cost of co- their health plan, payments on drugs for diabetics and Humana Inc. DATA, Page D4 Page D4 Analysis, predictions of employee health raise ethical issues. By Barbara Rose CHICAGO TRIBUNE CHICAGO Navistar's International Truck and Engine Corp. uncovered a surprising finding two years ago after analyzing employee medical claims.

worse. Armed with these findings, the company's medical staff developed a voluntary testing and prevention program. Big companies have seen per-worker health care costs rise by more than 80 percent since 2000, according to benefits consultant Hewitt Associates. Struggling to get ahead of this curve, firms such as International Truck are turning to an emerging science called predictive modeling that promises to help them control spending by intervening before workers get seriously ill. They're analyzing claims data and information collected from employees about their lifestyles for clues to why some workers rack up average medical costs one year only to go off the charts the next.

Using artificial intelligence, the companies are searching for combinations of factors that are likely to The truck maker's workers were nearly twice as likely as the public to suffer from diabetes, a chronic condition that can lead to serious health problems. One reason was the workers' average age a relatively high 48 years coupled, for some, with being overweight. Employees with diabetes accounted for a hefty 24 percent of the company's health care spending. Left alone, the trend would only get BOB SHALLIT KVIE production editor Karen Jewell, left, and senior reporterproducer Pat McConahay go over one of the 20 shows they are preparing for next season. James Mastran-drea edits an edition of "America's Heartland" at KVIE, which previously produced "California Heartland." The new show covers other states' agriculture.

Farm show goes national Film life beckons ex-Money Store boss There's a nice local angle to last week's release of "The Honeymooners." One of the new film's lead producers is Marc Turtletaub, former president of the Money Store, which was headquartered here in the 1990s before its sale to First Union Corp. The company's most notable local legacy is the gold-burnished, ziggurat-shaped building it built in West Sac. Now Turtletaub is building a celluloid legacy. After selling the Money Store, he formed an L.A. company, Deep River Productions, to back mainstream films and a Gotham firm, Big Beach, for independent flicks.

His first effort was "Laws of Attraction," the 2004 film about a romance between two sparring divorce lawyers. He actually has a small role in that one, as a judge. "Duane Hopwood," starring David Schwimmer, followed. Now he's got the remake of the 1950s Jackie Gleason TV series. He's also backing a more serious movie, "Everything Is Illuminated," starring Elijah Wood, due out in September.

Those who knew Turtletaub in his Sacramento days aren't surprised by his move into the film world. He always was interested in the arts. His taste was considered avant-garde. Proof of that is plain by looking at "The Zig." Deep pockets: Speaking of Turtletaub, some of his money is still here, backing an investment company, Deep River Ventures, he formed five years ago. The firm isn't making any new investments, says Roy Mall, who runs the local operation.

But it's managing investments made earlier to Customer Link Systems of Roseville and a couple of startups outside the area. Mall says one of Deep River's portfolio companies an e-com-merce software firm called Kurant with employees in Folsom recently was sold to eBay. The local operation will stay in place. It's the first cash-out for the Turtletaub VC company fittingly, a "liquidity event" for Deep River. Comeback trail: For years companies avoided the area around Meadowview Road and Freeport Boulevard, a spot with so much crime it was dubbed "Danger Island." Then, after community activists started tackling the problems, Home Depot opened at the northeast corner.

It's doing great. An International House of Pancakes and Staples went into the same center, along with smaller shops. They're busy, too. Now a Rite Aid is targeted across the street, at the south- SHALLIT, Page D3 Sacramento BeeRandall Benton Executive producer Mike Sanford, left, senior reporter Pat McConahay and production editor Karen Jewell work on a tape at the KVIE studio in Sacramento. 'California Heartland' outgrows its Golden State roots By Jim Wasserman BEE STAFF WRITER For nine years a KVIE public TV team roamed California's 27 million acres of farmland, its kitchens, farmers markets and big city restaurants to bring one of the state's leading agricultural TV shows to a largely urban audience.

But seven months ago the Sacramento-based station retired "California Heartland" after 1,000 stories of mak underlying the state's food supply, the new national "Heartland" has a two-year financial commitment, station officials said, from the powerful voice of the nation's farming establishment, the American Farm Bureau Federation, and St. Louis-based agribusiness giant Monsanto Co. Both sponsors decline, as does KVIE, to say how much they're spending. But the investment is significant. HEARTLAND, Page D5 ing ice cream, growing Golden State boysenberries and profiling celebrity food figures from TV chef Julia Child to wine mogul Robert Mondavi.

It was hardly the end. The distinctive California farm show, retooled and packing a new 20-show budget of more than $1 million a season, is going national. Sacramento's KVIE has scheduled "America's Heartland" to begin airing throughout the United States in Sep tember. The aim is to repeat the program's long run in California by roving across the nation's 2.1 million farms, "from the rolling fields of the Midwest to the rough and ready ranches of the High Plains, from the citrus groves of the Deep South to the fishing fleets of the Far West," as its promotional video to 305 U.S. public TV licensees attests.

Having built its California audience with a typically cheerful tone and general avoidance of controversies Net's 'dot-xxx' domain may help clean up porn Boeing flying high with long-range jet By Anick Jesdanun ASSOCIATED PRESS NEW YORK A red-light district tentatively cleared for construction on the Internet the domain is being billed by backers as giving the $12 billion online porn industry a great opportunity to clean up its act. A distinct online sector for the salacious, one with rules aimed at forbidding trickery, will reduce the chances of Internet users accidentally stumbling on porn sites, they argue. If only it were so simple: Zoning in cyberspace has always been a daunting proposition, and participation in the porn domain Fuel-saving 787 helps spur strong growth in orders. By Elizabeth M. Gillespie ASSOCIATED PRESS SEATTLE After two years of trailing its chief rival, Boeing Co.

is fighting to reclaim the lead from Airbus SAS in the commercial jet market, backed by a hot new plane and a revamped sales team that has been freed to offer big price discounts. The Chicago-based aerospace company had one of its strongest sales runs ever in the first five months of the year, booking orders for almost 280 planes as many as in all of 2004 and four times the order total at this point last year. Many of those are for the fuel-efficient 787, a long-range wide-body jet that is scheduled to enter service in 2008. Airbus has reported 196 orders from January through the end of May, but it could surge ahead at this week's Paris Air Show. John Leahy, chief salesman of the European airplane maker, said he expects up to 100 orders to be placed by several airlines for the new twin-engine A350, a BOEING, Page D3 will be voluntary.

Critics wonder why got the OK at all when so many other proposals sit unaddressed, some for years. Nearly five years after rejecting a similar proposal, the Internet's key oversight body, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, voted 6-3 this month to proceed with ICANN staff will now craft a contract with ICM Registry the Jupiter, company that made the bid. If the board and ultimately the U.S. Commerce Department approve it, names could appear in use by the year's end. PORN, Page D2 Associated PressTed S.Warren Boeing employee Darold Lund works under a 737 at the company's Renton, Wash, assembly plant.

The narrow-body 737 continues to be Boeing's top-selling commercial jet. OUTPUT: 061205 18:33 USER: ABUCHMANN BEEBR0AD MASTER 06-26-02.