For the Record – Southwest Virginia, September 2013

Coca-Cola Consolidated has signed a long-term lease to expand its 75,000-square-foot distribution facility in Roanoke. The 36,000-square-foot expansion will boost the company’s space to 111,000 square feet. According to Poe & Cronk Real Estate Group, the investment is valued at $9 million and will result in 125 jobs being relocated to the facility. (VirginiaBusiness.com)

New Horizons Healthcare in Roanoke is getting a grant to help spread the word about how low-income residents can find assistance through the new federal health-care law. The community health center will receive $87,083 from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Statewide, 22 centers received a total of $2.5 million. The centers will be able to hire 50 workers to help people enroll in Medicaid, and a new online marketplace that will offer private insurance at subsidized rates. (The Roanoke Times) 

Norfolk Southern Corp. recently rehired 42 employees in Roanoke, bringing them back to work after layoffs in October. Thirty of the hires were in the railroad’s communications and signals system, and 12 were in the Roanoke locomotive shop, according to NS spokesman Robin Chapman. In October, the company announced about 200 job cuts in the Roanoke and Bluefield, W.Va., areas, which were attributed to falling coal shipments. About 60 of those jobs were in the Roanoke area. (The Roanoke Times)

In a plan to link highways and railways, Norfolk Southern Corp. more than five years ago proposed a $36 million intermodal freight train terminal near Elliston in eastern Montgomery County. Challenged with a county lawsuit in 2008 and approved by a court in 2011, the project has been in limbo or on hold ever since. The Roanoke Valley-Alleghany Regional Commission announced in July it will spend $200,000 for a consultant to restudy the project. (The Roanoke Times)

The Radford Chamber of Commerce voted unanimously to dissolve Main Street Radford, an economic development group dedicated to promoting downtown Radford. Main Street was one of 26 designated Virginia Main Street communities. But the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development, which operates the program, said it’s not writing off Radford just yet. It plans to meet with city officials to discuss their plan to move forward. (The Roanoke Times)

Rackspace Hosting plans to spend $5.5 million in expanding an IT hosting operation in the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center in Montgomery County. The expansion could create more than 100 jobs at the Blacksburg-area office, the company said. Rackspace is the founder of OpenStack, an open-source operating system for cloud computing. Based in San Antonio, the company has more than 200,000 business customers, from data centers on four continents. (VirginiaBusiness.com)  

Bedding company Tempur Sealy International plans to invest $13.3 million to improve its manufacturing operation in Scott County, creating 42 jobs. Tempur Sealy has a 500,000-square-foot facility in the Duffield Industrial Park that manufactures mattresses and pillows. Virginia competed against New Mexico for the project. (VirginiaBusiness.com)

Washington and Lee University in Lexington was the highest rated Virginia college on Forbes’ Top Colleges list. Washington and Lee University was No. 21 on the list of 650 colleges. Twenty one other colleges and universities in Virginia also made the list. Forbes partnered with Washington, D.C.-based Center for College Affordability and Productivity (CCAP) for The Top Colleges in the U.S. List. Five categories were used to calculate the rankings, including students’ satisfaction, debt, post-graduate success, graduation rate and national competitive awards. (VirginiaBusiness.com)