As far as I can tell, the elusive Douglas L. Swenson has yet to speak publicly on the disaster that has befallen his Meridian company, DBSI, which manages commercial-property investments for well-heeled investors around the country.

DBSI laid off workers last June and September amid worsening market conditions, was sued by investors in October after it stopped paying them, filed for bankruptcy in November, and was slapped with a fraud lawsuit by Idaho securities regulators this week.

Idaho legislators aren't alone in their gloomy revenue forecasts, an independent research group says. The weakening economy is creating a sharply larger drain on states’ tax collections, according to the Rockefeller Institute of Government, an Albany, N.Y. think tank.

Available data show tax collections for states declined by more than 4 percent during the opening months of the fourth quarter of 2008, when compared with the same period a year earlier, the think tank said.

Finally, we have two bits of local economic news that, while not good, are at least a little less bad than Idaho has been bludgeoned with lately.

First: Regular state unemployment benefits dropped more than $1 million last week, breaking a string of 16 consecutive weekly increases in the payout from Idaho’s Unemployment Insurance Trust Fund, according to the Idaho Labor Department.

Benefits totaled just under $9.2 million for about 34,000 jobless workers. An additional 5,800 workers received more than $1.5 million in federal extended benefits.

Were he still in Congress, Gov. Butch Otter says, he probably wouldn’t support the economic stimulus package now being prepared by the incoming Obama administration.

“Somebody would have to be more convincing than they have so far,” Otter told me Thursday at a gathering of reporters and editors with state leaders in advance of the legislative session.

But he still thinks the stimulus would boost employment. “It would help us a lot catching up in the short term,” he said.

Boise’s Peterson Super Center has been drawing national attention for its unusual sale: Buy one car, get another free.

The promotion, designed to sell full-size Cadillac or Chevy SUVs or Chevy 2500 diesel pickups, offers a free 2009 Chevy Cobalt sedan if you buy one of the bigger, costlier vehicles at full price. If you don’t want the Cobalt, you can get $11,999 in discounts toward any other vehicle in stock.

The Legislature convenes Monday, but some lawmakers who came to Boise early have just finished hearing two days’ worth of relentlessly grim reports about the Idaho economy.

Statesman reporters Brian Murphy and Brad Talbutt sat with the Joint Legislative Committee on Economic Outlook and Revenue Assessment as speakers from manufacturing, agriculture, real estate, retail and other business sectors took turns.

Not all the speakers limited themselves to economic forecasts. Some signaled their agendas for this year’s session.

Two Treasure Valley families were featured in a front-page story this week in The Wall Street Journal.

Rick and Noreen Capp of Meridian and Jessica and Alan Muir of Canyon County were cited as examples of American families becoming more frugal in response to the recession.

The Capps have reduced their credit-card debt, opened a savings account and stopped taking their two children to restaurants, the story Tuesday said. The Muirs have started buying children’s clothes at steep discounts, splitting bulk-food purchases with other families and gathering firewood instead of buying it.

If you’re still hoping Idaho will make a quick exit from the recession — say, in the first or even second quarter of 2009 — it’s time to adjust your thinking.

“Most economists suggest the national recession will have run its course by mid-to-late 2009, and Idaho should see a return to positive economic growth develop late in 2009,” Zions First National Bank says in its latest update on the Idaho economy.

The Wall Street Journal offers some context about the latest developments in world memory-chip markets in its report on Micron’s latest earnings. Deep in her story, reporter Kathy Shwiff writes, “A cash infusion that rival chip maker Qimonda AG received recently was bad news for Micron, which would have benefited from decreased capacity if Qimonda had gone out of business.”

The Union Pacific Railroad pledges to work more closely with local governments in the Treasure Valley and elsewhere in Idaho on land-use planning issues and transportation needs. Bob Turner, UP’s senior vice president for corporate relations, recently told Idaho elected officials that his company has “done a poor job” of communicating with them in years past but is changing.