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I’ve been yammering endlessly about how Waynesboro needs to get ahead of the green-collar-job curve. The folks at Vector Industries have been doing more than yammering endlessly. “At the beginning of the year, when I was doing my yearly budget, I realized that I was spending more and more on utilities, and I was trying…
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Some bad news in the short term for Staunton came out of the governor’s budget message to the Virginia General Assembly today. And then there was the good news. “The construction of the new Western State Hospital and development of the existing hospital property come as great news for Staunton,” said city manager Steve Owen,…
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A proposed increase in the cigarette tax and $400 million in cuts to K-12 education are among the strategies being proposed by Gov. Tim Kaine for dealing with the state’s $2.9 billion budget shortfall.
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The chicken, or the egg? The debate over Waynesboro’s economic future is akin to the timeless yarn over which came first, with a twist. Which should we do first in Waynesboro – build up the downtown, or rebuild our industry base?
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It’s looking like 500 workers at the Invista plant are going to be out of jobs between now and February, give or take. Let’s look at that number, 500. What does it mean to the Waynesboro economy? Because at first glance, OK, 500, that’s a lot of people, but the Waynesboro economy supports roughly 11,000…
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Nobody was pushing for gay marriage, either, but that didn’t stop Republicans from pushing for a constitutional amendment to ban it. Ditto now for the latest from Staunton Republican Del. Chris Saxman, who is conjuring up the idea that Virginia’s right-to-work status is under attack and promising to solve the nonissue by proposing a constitutional…
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In short, everything. Invista, and its predecessor, DuPont, is the last significant vestige of the city’s once-glittering manufacturing economy. According to figures from the Virginia Employment Commission, Waynesboro began 2008 with around 2,100 manufacturing jobs, with roughly 1,100 of those being at the Invista plant, either directly employed by Invista or by a contractor providing…
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Has trickle-down economics been good for Waynesboro? At first glance, definitely. According to figures from the Virginia Department of Taxation, taxable sales in Waynesboro – the best way I can approximate for the local economy what we call gross domestic product or gross national product for the national economy – have nearly doubled since Waynesboro…
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In 2003, the Blue Dog first met Congressman Virgil Goode at the Greene County Strawberry Festival. While shaking hands and passing-out Sisson for Senate campaign literature, I heard a high-pitched shrilled voice calling-out … “Steeeveee Sissssson … anti-tax Democrat fer State Senate!” Even though I had never met him, I knew the distinct voice of…
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Thanksgiving 2008 could not come at a better time. With the hubbub of the elections subsiding, one and all are taking new stock of what enormous problems incoming officials face: Rising unemployment. Citibank laying off 50,000 people — that’s lots more than everyone in our entire Lex/Rockbridge/BV region, including students who haven’t even been employed…
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