Reported by Star-Bulletin staff & wire
Monday, March 31, 1997
The Service Excellence Center, which provides training and consulting to isle businesses, is now part of the Chamber of Commerce of Hawaii. Isle chamber to run
business-aid serviceThe center recently took over and consolidated the programs that had been offered by a similar group, the Pacific Region Institute for Service Excellence.
As part of the chamber, the organization will continue to offer assistance to businesses to help them improve operations, the two groups said. Chamber member companies will get those services at a 5 percent discount. Norm Baker, executive director of the Service Excellence Center, will continue to oversee the operations.
HILO -- The Hilo Main Street Association says it needs money or may not be able to continue operating. Hilo Main St. program
in danger of foldingThe group dedicated to revitalizing the downtown Hilo area said it's out of money after losing most of its state funding.
Director Alice Moon said the organization has had to cut staff, eliminate its fax machine and shut down all but one phone line. Moon said the group has been able to survive this far by using money saved from more prosperous years.
The association is the administrative branch of the Downtown Improvement Association, which said the problems with the Main Street group does not mean the end of the DIA.
RICHMOND, Calif. -- Pixar Inc. said it exited the CD-ROM interactive business to focus on its joint venture to develop films with Walt Disney Co., according to Bloomberg News. Pixar drops CD-ROMs
to focus on DisneyThe Richmond, Calif.-based computer animation company said the 62 people working on CD-ROMs will work on Pixar's second feature film, the Disney joint venture "Bugs."
Pixar said that it made the moves because the CD-ROM market hadn't grown as predicted. The company has sold less than one million copies of two CD-ROMs tied to its first feature film, "Toy Story."
Under the Disney partnership announced last month, Disney is buying about 5 percent of Pixar's shares for $15 million. The companies intend to produce five films in 10 years.
Already the two companies are working on a sequel to "Toy Story," which earned more than $350 million at the box office, making it the highest-grossing family film of 1995.
Americans' personal incomes surged 0.9 percent in February, the largest gain in eight months, the Commerce Department said. It was the largest advance in incomes since June 1996 and more than doubled January's 0.4 percent gain. Americans see jump
in personal incomesSpending growth -- 0.3 percent -- was relatively modest but came after a large 1 percent increase in January, the best in 11 months.
Economists said last month's broad-based income gain -- with advances in every category except farm income -- will help provide consumers with the wherewithal to support strong spending through midyear. About four-fifths of the advance came in wages and salaries of private-sector jobs.
"People spend that money; they don't save it," said economist Sandra Shaber of the WEFA Group in Eddystone, Pa. "More jobs and more paychecks certainly equal growth in spending in the months ahead."
TOKYO -- Dock workers across Japan began nighttime strikes today to demand better working conditions and protest U.S. pressure to open the Japanese stevedoring business to greater competition. Japanese dock workers
refuse to work at nightThe strikes were called by the 50,000-member National Council of Dockworkers' Unions of Japan, and were expected to affect the six largest ports in the country as well as half of the 96 ports nationwide.
The workers will refuse to load or unload cargo between 6 p.m. and 8 a.m. every day until their demands are met, the union said. The ports normally operate 24 hours a day.
The strike was called as part of annual labor negotiations near the end of Japan's fiscal year on March 31. The unions are demanding better working conditions and higher pay and protesting plans by the government to loosen regulations on the port industry.
The strikers also object to pressure from the United States to change the system that requires shippers to negotiate with stevedoring companies before making any changes in their operations. The United States says the system suppresses competition.