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Virginia Bankers Association elects new board officers
The Virginia Bankers Association (VBA) announced Tuesday the newly elected officers for its 2020-21 board of directors: Chairman John C. Asbury and Chairman-Elect Leton L. Harding Jr. Asbury has been the president and CEO of Richmond-based Atlantic Union Bankshares Corp. since October 2016, and has served as CEO of its holding company since January 2017. […]
Pulaski company prepares to launch pollutant filter system
Updated June 29 A Pulaski-based company is poised to go commercial with technology that removes coal ash and other chemical pollutants from the air — extracting chemicals that can be recycled and sold for industrial use. A team of scientists at Virginia Tech has released a preliminary report confirming proof of concept, MOVA [...]
SW Va. businesses, officials urge Northam to reopen region
Southwest Virginia elected officials and business owners are ready to reopen for business, noting that the number of COVID-19 cases in their region is considerably lower than those found in the more populated regions of the state such as Northern Virginia and Central Virginia. “The [economic] effects of the COVID-19 pandem[...]
Ballad Health furloughs 200 Virginia workers
Not even health care systems are immune from the effects of COVID-19. Tennessee-based Ballad Health announced in early April it had furloughed between 200 and 250 Southwest Virginia employees to cut administrative costs and ensure it can keep critical frontline medical workers employed during the crisis. Other health systems op[...]
GO Virginia earmarks funding for SW Va. tech talent program
The GO Virginia Region 1 Council, which covers Southwest Virginia, announced Thursday it has recommended $1.38 million in funding for the United Way of Southwest Virginia to create a technology talent development program. As more tech companies enter the Virginia market during the next decade, it’s estimated that more than 2[...]
Wise annual pop-up clinic is canceled till 2021, organizers say
Wise County’s free, three-day clinic held annually in July has been canceled, organizers announced Monday. Previously known as the Wise Remote Area Medical clinic, the Health Wagon’s Move Mountains Medical Mission, offering free vision and medical treatment, was set to take place July 10-12 at the Wise County Fairgro[...]
Va. Tech gears up to produce PPE for Carilion
Although the Roanoke and New River Valley health districts are seeing fewer confirmed COVID-19 cases than health districts in Northern, Eastern and Central Virginia, the Roanoke-based Carilion Clinic health care system has asked Virginia Tech to help it stockpile personal protective equipment (PPE) in the event of a surge in cas[...]
The show must not go on
Abingdon’s Barter Theatre – the nation’s oldest Actors’ Equity Union theater – has closed the curtain on its spring season. The theater, which opened in 1933 during the Great Depression, announced March 19 it would furlough 87 of its employees, then days later furloughed six more. This left a skeleton crew of 11 to fun[...]
Contura Energy temporarily closing several Va. mines
The Virginia Department of Mines, Minerals and Energy (DMME) was notified Friday morning that Tennessee-based Contura Energy is temporarily closing nearly all of its coal mines in Virginia in response to coronavirus, DMME spokesperson Tarah Kesterson says. Contura has affiliate mining operations in Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia. Its Virginia facilities including 88 Strip, Long […][...]
Va. coal mines closing due to COVID-19 concerns
Five Virginia coal mines announced Monday they they shutting down operations to stop the spread of coronavirus, but continuing to fulfill weekly orders from current stockpiles. The Buchanan Mine No.1, which employs 543 workers in Southwest Virginia, has closed as of Monday, Department of Mines, Minerals and Energy spokesperson Tarah Kesterson says. The mine is […]
Hometown college
On the town of Wise’s website, information about the University of Virginia’s College at Wise sits behind an appropriately labeled tab: “Our College.” When U.Va. Wise was founded in 1954, it was called Clinch Valley College of the University of Virginia, and it was the commonwealth’s first public college west of Radfor[...]
Crossing the line
A city famous for birthing country music and straddling the Virginia-Tennessee state line, Bristol, Virginia, has spent the last decade struggling to recover from the Great Recession and the coal industry’s steep decline. However, a new surge of economic life is reenergizing Bristol as it enters the 2020s. More visitors are fl[...]
