"Great incentives. Low taxes. A receptive economic development department."

Site Selection Magazine used that string of phrases to describe the state with the best business climate.

Washington?

No. North Carolina – the No. 1 state for the fourth year in a row.
Washington didn't make the Top 25. And since Site Selection ranks only the Top 25, Washington could fall anywhere from No. 26 to last, Mark Arend, editor in chief, told me.

"There's no way to know beyond 25th place," Arend said. "The point of the article is really to showcase where corporate investors would likely want to invest – or more importantly, where they HAVE invested in recent years – not where they have not invested in recent years."

I get it. The magazine bases its rankings in part on where corporations expand. For whatever reason, they don't pick Washington as much as these states that made the list:

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The State Economic and Revenue Forecast Council is out with its preliminary forecast for November.

Were this a weather report, the prediction would call for rain.

Based on a modified version offered by Global Insight, the council’s prediction calls for a 0.8 percent decline in national GDP during the third quarter. Real sales were weaker for the period, down by 0.8 percent. Real consumer spending nationwide fell by 3.1 percent – the first such decline since 1992 and the largest since 1980.

On the sunnier side, foreign trade added a 1.1 percent gain to GDP, and government spending rose by 5.8 percent, due in great part to an 18.1 percent jump in defense spending.

The national recession – and yes, the council proclaims we are in a recession – “is expected to last four quarters with a peak-to-trough decline in real GDP of 1.2 percent.”

Inflation in Seattle, which trailed the national numbers in 2002, 2003 and 2004, averaged 4.5 percent over the first eight months of the year, compared to a 5.1 percent rise nationwide.

“Recently available employment, wage, and housing data all indicate the state’s economy is weaker than assumed in September,” the council’s prediction says.

Housing starts and single-family building permits were down for the quarter, and the "forecast assumes that the housing sector will not show any significant improvement until the second half of 2009.”

The council says “aerospace employment is expected to continue to rise through the end of 2008, reaching 86,000 in December which is 900 lower than assumed in September.”

The Governor’s Council of Economic Advisors will review the forecast on Friday in Olympia.

Bernardo Tuma, the entrepreneur who launched one of the earliest coffee roasteries in downtown Tacoma, resurfaced today with his cafe and coffee shop in his newest location on the ground floor of Wells Fargo Plaza.

Previously, Tuma's Aroma Coffee operated at South Ninth Street and Court A from 1993 to 2002. He tried to simultaneously operate in a second location in the Columbia Bank Center for nearly a year in 2001. When that didn't work, he closed both locations and opened Aroma Cafe & Coffee at South 10th Street in 2002. He closed that storefront in August.

Tuma intended to quit the retail coffee business and instead open a roastery in the Tideflats where he could wholesale various roasts to regional retailers.

Coincidentally, the Wells Fargo space came open at the same time.

"I've been eyeing this opportunity, in this space, for quite a long time," Tuma said.

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