Buchanan County expands industrial park
Economic development is booming inside the Southern Gap Industrial Park in Buchanan County, where the county industrial development authority is spending $4 million to develop a new shell building and a 20-acre industrial site. With support from the Virginia Coalfield Economic Development Authority, the park has become a hub for[...]
JBG Smith pledges 1,000 affordable housing units if arena passes
Developer JBG Smith pledged Friday to preserve 1,000 workforce-affordable housing units in Alexandria near the proposed sports arena and entertainment district, up from its previous promise of 500 units — upping the ante on the controversial project, which has one more chance to succeed this year. The $2 billion public-private[...]
Va. Beach economic developer to lead Va. Beach Vision
Laura Hayes Chalk is leaving Virginia Beach’s economic development department to become the executive director of Virginia Beach Vision, a business advocacy group in Virginia Beach, Virginia Beach Vision announced Tuesday. Chalk, who will start July 10, succeeds Martha McClees, who announced her retirement in November 2023[...]
Tucker Door & Trim enters Va. with $10M Henrico plant
Tucker Door & Trim, a Georgia-based distributor and manufacturer of doors, windows and specialty millwork for the construction industry, will soon open its first facility in Virginia, creating 50 jobs, Gov. Glenn Youngkin announced Wednesday. Tucker Door & Trim will invest $10 million in a Henrico County manufacturing an[...]
Food storage company to invest $77.5M in Suffolk facility
New Jersey-based cold and dry storage services provider FreezPak Logistics will invest $77.5 million to build a Suffolk facility, a project expected to create 80 jobs, Gov. Glenn Youngkin announced Thursday. FreezPak will build a 245,000-square-foot cold storage facility in Suffolk to serve the mid-Atlantic region. The 80 new jobs will be in warehouse operations […]
Alliance for Building Better Medicine receives $1M award
The Alliance for Building Better Medicine — a group of public and private pharmaceutical manufacturers and research organizations in Richmond and Petersburg — will receive a $1 million award from the U.S. National Science Foundation. Richmond-based innovation incubator Activation Capital, which convened the alliance four yea[...]
Modine will invest $18.1M in Rockbridge County expansion
Modine Manufacturing, a manufacturer of cooling equipment for data centers, will invest $18.1 million to expand its Rockbridge County operation, creating an estimated 211 jobs, Gov. Glenn Youngkin announced Tuesday. Wisconsin-based Modine, which builds thermal management systems and components, saw $2.3 billion in net sales in fiscal year 2023, a 12% increase over the previous […]
Old Dominion, new data
As available land for data centers in Loudoun County — home to Data Center Alley, the world’s largest concentration of data centers — has become scarcer and more expensive, the industry has expanded into other Northern Virginia localities and beyond. In Virginia, Prince William County has become the other heat map for the [...]
Va.’s Largest Companies: Emergency landing
As the U.S. economy showed signs of unexpected strength and inflation slowed throughout 2023, most of Virginia’s largest publicly traded companies held their own, with some riding high. Reston-based General Dynamics saw its highest-ever quarterly revenue, while Performance Food Group, headquartered in Goochland County, made th[...]
Economic Development: Keep on keeping on
In 2023, Virginia racked up another year of economic development wins in the manufacturing sector. Meanwhile, Gov. Glenn Youngkin continued his push toward producing more shovel-ready industrial sites in the state, one of his key priorities since taking office in January 2022. In November 2023, the U.S. Department of Energy anno[...]
United Way of SWVA spins off workforce programs
The United Way of Southwest Virginia is spinning off its workforce development programs by establishing a new nonprofit, EO, to oversee them, UWSWVA announced Feb. 20. EO, which stands for Endless Opportunity, is also Latin for “go.” The new nonprofit will manage what has been the UWSWVA’s $10 million portfolio of [...]