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AROUND THE BLUEGRASS
- January '99 ASHLAND
- Ashland Inc. has pledged to continue its
support of area charities through 2001 and perhaps beyond. The annual gifts will begin in
'99 at a level near to what the groups have been receiving. The company's move to
Covington's RiverCenter I office tower becomes official this month, with 110 of the
company's top executives and other managers moving into the new offices.
BELFRY
- The Kentucky Cabinet for Families and Children
has opened a satellite office in Belfry in an effort to improve access to services for
residents of the northeastern part of Pike County. Prior to opening the satellite office,
some CFC clients were forced to drive up to 45 minutes or more over mountainous terrain to
reach the county seat of Pikeville.
CAMPBELLSVILLE
- Campbellsville University has received
approval for a $2 million federal grant for a Technology Center for Occupational Training
that will focus on training for business and industry, entrepreneurship/small business
ownership, and advanced computer operations.
CENTRAL CITY
- Construction is expected to begin this month on The
Courtyard, a $4 million assisted living project to be located in downtown
Central City. The three-story structure, which will include 38 one- and two-bedroom
apartments, should be complete by the end of the year. City officials are hoping that the
new project will serve to revitalize a downtown area that has been lackluster since the
area's economy soured with the depletion of its coal industry.
CORBIN
- A new $4 million facility in Corbin is one of only four in
the nation that will produce tamper-resistant alien registration cards (green cards) for
the Immigration and Naturalization Service. The 18,000-square-foot
facility, located in the Corbin Tri-County Industrial Park, will employ approximately 70
people.
COVINGTON
- Grand opening ceremonies for the $30.5 million Northern
Kentucky Convention Center are scheduled for next month. The center, which
features 50,000 square feet of exhibit hall space, is aimed at attracting mid-sized groups
and has already booked 150 events through the next four years.
- Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corporation
is investing $350,000 for the development of two specially-dedicated smoking lounges in
the main terminal of the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport. Airport
officials have approved 10 smoking lounges in all, to be built in each of the airport's
terminals. Construction on the new lounges, which will incorporate the latest in
ventilation technology, is expected to begin this month.
HEBRON
- Pomeroy Computer Resources, Inc.
(Nasdaq:PMRY) has acquired Access Technologies, Inc., a Memphis, Tennessee-based
telecommunications and computer networking provider with 1997 revenues of approximately
$18 million.
- COMAIR Inc. will introduce nonstop jet
service between Bangor, Maine and the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport
effective March 2.
HIGHLAND HEIGHTS
- Northern Kentucky University and Fidelity
Investments have partnered to create a 401(k) Customer Service Phone Center on
NKU's campus that will employ 180 students. The center is the first of its kind for
Fidelity.
HOPKINSVILLE
- Amfine Chemical Corporation, a Japanese
joint venture established between Asahi Denka Kohyo K.K., Mitsubishi International
Corporation and Mitsubishi Corporation, has announced that it will locate in Hopkinsville.
LEXINGTON
- An anonymous $100,000 gift to the Lexington
Theological Seminary will be used to establish the Franklin B. Moosnick Visiting
Professorship in Judaic Studies.
- Keeneland's November Breeding Stock Sale
totaled $264,657,700, the greatest dollar volume in Thoroughbred auction history.
- The University of Kentucky College of Allied Health
Professions has been ranked among the top 22 allied health research programs to
be funded by the National Institute of Health. UK officials expect the national
recognition to help recruit additional faculty members already known for their research
expertise.
- Saint Joseph Hospital has finalized its
purchase of Jewish Hospital Lexington, which will now be known as Saint Joseph East.
- Caudill's Climatemaster has received
Trane's National Distinguished Dealer Award for an unprecedented second year in a row and
is one of only 10 percent of Trane dealers in the nation to be selected for the award.
LOUISVILLE
- The Physicians Inc. of Louisville has
partnered with UniPhy Healthcare Inc. of Nashville to create a new
company known as UniPhy Healthcare of Louisville Inc. which will operate TPI Health
Systems. The Physicians Inc. is a network of 1,800 doctors serving a 27-county region of
Kentucky and Southern Indiana.
- Century 21 Joe Guy Hagan Realtors and Rainey,
Jones & Associates have merged their real estate firms. With a 390-member
sales staff, the new firm will be the largest Century 21 franchise in the region.
- Res-Care Inc. has acquired Texas Living
Centers of Garland, Texas, an organization with annual revenues of $1.4 million that
provides services to approximately 25 people with developmental disabilities.
- Dayton Freight Lines, Inc. has purchased
approximately 10 acres in southwestern Louisville to construct a new $1.5 million
transportation center. The Dayton, Ohio-based company is currently leasing space in the
area and anticipates moving to its new facility by May.
- Universal Coach Parts, Inc. (UCP) has
announced plans to open a 350,000-square-foot warehouse facility by July of this year.
Officials at UCP, the country's largest distributor of after-market parts of motor coaches
and buses, said Louisville's status as a hub city for the nation's two largest air and
freight carriers will enable their company to enhance its customer deliveries. The company
expects to hire some 225 people (average wage $31,500) at the new facility.
- The Bourbon Stock Yard has been purchased for $3.4 million
by The Home of the Innocents, which plans build a new village for abused
and neglected children. The Home of the Innocents plans to spend up to $11 million to
transform the 20-acre property.
- Paul Schultz Advertising has been named the
agency of record for The Louisville and Jefferson County Convention and Visitors Bureau,
Shelby County Trust Bank and Louisville Bedding.
- Work has begun on the final phase of the $6 million effort
to make Louisville's Riverfront Plaza more inviting. The project includes
a landscaped garden and lawn that will accommodate up to 2,000 people for outdoor concerts
and presentations.
- The Combined Health Appeal of Kentucky, Inc.
and the Kentucky National Voluntary Health Agencies, Inc. have merged to
form the state's largest charitable health federation.
- Liqui-Dri Foods, Inc., a Louisville company
that makes biscuit and pancake mixes for commercial food use, has been sold by owner
Quaker Oats, which plans to focus on its consumer goods. The new owner is Wind Point
Partners, a private equity company based in Michigan. Company officials with Wind Point
say no staffing changes are expected for the staff of 350.
- ThermoView Industries, Inc. continues its
aggressive expansion efforts with the acquisition of Precision Window Manufacturing, Inc.,
a St. Louis company with annual sales of approximately $7.4 million. Since becoming a
publicly-traded company last April, ThermoView has completed 10 mergers or acquisitions.
Terms of the agreement were not disclosed.
- Strategia Corp., which specializes in
computer disaster recovery, has announced that it will be reducing its workforce by 15-20.
Company officials say that work on the Year 2000 computer problems is turning out to be
less than anticipated due to both lack of awareness among many managers of the potential
of the Y2K problem and the fact that some companies are opting to handle the situation
from within rather than hiring a consulting firm.
MIDWAY
- The Midway City Council has approved issuing $2.2 million in
bonds to help finance a $5.5 million University of Kentucky Basketball Museum
in nearby Lexington. In return, the UK museum will donate $20,000 to Midway to begin a
community museum that city officials hope will help rejuvenate the community's downtown
area.
OWENSBORO
- Hausner Hard-Chrome Inc. has announced that
it plans to relocate its corporate headquarters from the Chicago area to Owensboro, where
the company operates a 40,000-square-foot chrome plating plant that employs approximately
80. The company plans to build a 5,000-square-foot administrative building adjacent to the
plant and is expected to move in by late spring. The relocation will result in about 15
new jobs over the next several years.
- Kentucky Wesleyan College has received a
gift of $2 million from John W. Jones, Leland C. Jones and James E. Jones, three brothers
who are all alumni of the college. The majority of the donation, the largest ever made to
KWC by a living donor, will be used to support the school's campus master plan. The plan
features a new science building, a campus community center and a new fine arts center,
among other improvements.
PADUCAH
- LYNX Services, which processes automotive
replacement glass claims and first-notice-of-loss for insurance and fleet companies, has
selected Paducah's Information Age Park as the site of a new insurance claims service
center. Construction on the 35,000-square-foot facility is expected to be complete by
August and the company anticipates hiring up to 150 people by the end of the year, with
average pay running $8-8.50 per hour plus benefits. Employment figures are expected to
rise to 300 within the next two years.
PARIS
- American Commercial Window, a subsidiary of
Ohio-based American Architectural Products Corp., has announced plans to invest some $12
million in locating its operations in the former Millennium Chemical plant in Paris. The
company expects to employ up to 300 people within two years of full operation and more
than 500 within the next five years.
PIKEVILLE
- Pike County has received $12.5 million in state funding for
the construction of a new civic center for the Pikeville area. The
proposed 108,000-square-foot facility, which will seat up to 10,700 is expected to create
some 100 new jobs and generate more than $10 million annually.
- A new organization known as the Pikeville-Pike
County Economic Development Council Inc. has been formed to serve as an umbrella
agency for the Pike County Chamber of Commerce, Pikeville Main Street Program and the
Pikeville-Pike County Tourism Commission. In addition to the leaders of the aforementioned
groups, the new agency will also include the mayor of Pikeville, the Pike County
judge-executive and local business people.
- Walter May, president of East Kentucky Broadcasting, has
been named as interim chief executive officer of Pikeville Methodist Hospital.
Former CEO Martha O'Regan Chill resigned in September.
- Community Trust Bancorp, Inc. has announced
a stock repurchase program involving the purchase of up to 500,000 shares of its
outstanding common stock. The $2.25 billion asset bank holding company has 69 branches in
central and eastern Kentucky and West Virginia.
RICHWOOD
- Messier-Bugatti, a French manufacturing
company, is investing more than $30 million in the development of a new plant to
manufacture carbon disks for Airbus and Boeing aircraft brakes. The plant will be run by
A-Carb, Messier-Bugatti's first American subsidiary, and is expected to be completed by
the end of this year.
SHELBYVILLE
- Jewish Hospital has begun construction on a
$5.5 million addition that will add a three-story, 20,000-square-foot clinical services
wing to the 76-bed hospital. Jewish also plans to renovate 10,000 square feet of existing
hospital space.
SOMERSET
- Toledo, Ohio-based Carstone Industries,
which manufactures chairs for industrial and commercial clients and a line of
ergonomically-correct garden tools among other things, has announced that it plans to move
its operations to Somerset. The company will move into the 36,000-square-foot building
once occupied by Quality Woodworks, creating approximately 30 new jobs for the area that
will pay up to around $12 per hour.
VANCEBURG
- Nine West Group Inc. has announced that it
will lay off approximately 200 workers this month as part of a companywide reduction that
will eliminate 700 jobs. Last year, the company cut 300 jobs at the Vanceburg facility and
closed a plant in nearby Fleming County, taking 400 jobs.
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