ROANOKE TIMES 

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, February 6, 1991                   TAG: 9102060074
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: B7   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: GEORGE KEGLEY BUSINESS EDITOR
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

ROANOKE'S INDEX TURNS NEGATIVE

Roanoke slipped into a negative column of business indicators both for December and for all of last year, according to a new economic survey.

The Virginia Business Report, a monthly newsletter published by the College of William and Mary, said its index of eight indicators monitoring the Roanoke area registered a 4.6 percent decline in December and fell 0.4 percent for the year.

However, Roanoke showed stronger employment and real income growth for the year than Lynchburg and Danville, two other slow-growth areas, said David Garraty, a Virginia Wesleyan College economics professor who wrote the monthly report.

Roanoke outperformed the nation in per capita income growth after inflation with a rate of 2.2 percent, he said. The national average was 1.4 percent. Yet Roanoke had zero population growth, trailing the state's 1.2 percent increase. Per capita income was up 3.7 percent in the state.

For the year, Roanoke had growth in three areas, according to the index: bank checking transactions, up 2.3 percent; building permits, up 39.3 percent, and electricity consumption, up 1.4 percent. In the first 11 months, employment was up 1.2 percent and retail sales rose 5.2 percent.

On the down side, the region's newspaper advertising linage was 3.1 percent below a year earlier, and new-car registrations dropped 11.7 percent.

The December figures were led by a 563 percent jump in the value of building permits, as a result of the $7.9 million expansion at First Baptist Church and Elizabeth Arden's $5.2 million distribution center. Bank checking transactions were up 13.7 percent, a sampling of retail sales rose 1.5 percent and newspaper advertising linage was up .1 percent.

Employment was up 1.4 percent in November. New-car registrations declined 40.1 percent; electricity consumption was down 5.8 percent and water consumption was down 6.6 percent.

In 1991, continued uncertainty and a preoccupation with the Persian Gulf war are dominating household actions, leaving demand very much on hold throughout the state, said Roy Pearson, director of the Bureau of Business Research at the College of William and Mary. 


 by CNB