Pam Osgood, airport manager, said she was surprised by the move. She said Northwest officials had been saying that lower prices would come at the end of the year, but higher fuel costs forced the company to raise fees.

Joni Dunn, chairwoman of the Mason City Airport Commission, said the surcharge may decrease ticket sales and prevent the airport from qualifying for federal aid. The airport needs at least 10,000 passengers each year to get $1 million in federal funding.

The jobs will be phased out over the first nine months of 2006, said officials with CUNA Mutual Life Insurance. The jobs that will be affected include document storage, maintenance, interior design and printing services.

Merger proposed: ShopKo Stores Inc. said Friday that its shareholders will vote Dec. 23 on a proposed merger with an affiliate of Sun Capital Partners Inc. An affiliate of Boca Raton, Fla.-based Sun Capital is buying ShopKo for $29 a share, plus an annual 6 percent over the share price prorated for each day starting Dec. 15 until the deal closes. ShopKo, which has operated stores in Iowa, runs 137 ShopKo retail stores and 219 Pamida stores in 23 states and competes with Wal-Mart Stores Inc., Kmart Holding Corp. and Target Corp.

Massachusetts' attorney general is launching an investigation into several supermarkets that opened on Thanksgiving in defiance of the state's Puritan-era blue laws.

The laws were passed in the 1600s to keep colonists at home or in church on Sundays. Parts of the laws, such as the ban on Sunday liquor sales, have been repealed, but a prohibition on most stores doing business on Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year's Day, has not.

Crude oil futures fell in trading Friday in London amid speculation that U.S. and European heating-fuel stockpiles are large enough to meet demand when it peaks this winter. Brent crude oil for January settlement fell 29 cents to $55.01 a barrel.

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