THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, July 11, 1994 TAG: 9407090140
SECTION: BUSINESS WEEKLY PAGE: 18 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: LAST WEEK
SOURCE: BUSINESS WEEKLY STAFF
LENGTH: Medium: 75 lines
Newport News Shipbuilding was awarded an $83.6 million contract to deactivate the Navy guided-missile cruiser Long Beach. The work-hungry shipyard navigated the fighting ship to its dry dock last week.
The Long Beach contract signal's Newport News Shipbuilding's scramble to diversify. In the 1980s, the company focused largely on naval ship construction.
Newport News Shipbuilding has seen its workload slacken since the Cold War ended and Navy shipbuilding work fell off. Employment at the yard has fallen from a peak of about 30,000 in the mid-1980s to 21,800 at the end of 1993.
FINE'S MEN'S SHOPS Inc., a Norfolk-based retailer founded in 1933, has sought protection from its creditors in U.S. Bankruptcy Court, blaming the cost of financing a management-led buyout in 1989.
Fine's, which started with a single store on Granby Street in downtown Norfolk, said its assets totaled $6.9 million but it owed $20.1 million, mostly to two lenders.
For several months, Fine's has been trying to restructure the terms of long-term loans that the management used five years ago to buy the company, said Mitchell Fine, president and CEO.
THE VIRGINIA DEPARTMENT of Motor Vehicles says it is continuing its probe into 19 Hampton Roads auto dealers charged in a raid last month. Because of that, the agency declines to identify those involved.
DMV investigators are briefing the commonwealth's attorneys of Norfolk and Virginia Beach on the charges, said spokeswoman Jeanne Chenault. Those offices in turn must file the charges against the dealerships in the criminal division of each city's general district court.
The alleged violations include a failure to maintain proper business records and failing to deliver vehicle titles within 30 days.
CIRCUIT CITY STORES INC. wants to build a giant used-car lot on Kempsville Road near Leigh Memorial Hospital in Norfolk.
The consumer electronics giant has asked the city to rezone 12 acres to accommodate a CarMax: The Auto Superstore.
CarMax is a new retail concept for the Richmond-based company. The retailer hopes to put its experience selling infrequently purchased big-ticket, such as televisions and washing machines, to work selling used cars and trucks.
Circuit City has an option to buy the 12 acres, a city planning division official said.
DOMINION RESOURCES INC., whose board of directors has been split over the management of Dominion's Virginia Power subsidiary, contended that state regulators have no right to involve themselves in the dispute.
Dominion, a Richmond-based utility holding company, also described in detail the evolution of a bitter power struggle involving Thomas E. Capps, its chairman, president and chief executive officer, and Virginia Power president and CEO James T. Rhodes.
In a lengthy response to the State Corporation Commission, Dominion provided a chronology of the struggle between two factions on its board of directors.
AN INSURANCE-INDUSTRY GROUP, citing the impact of rising health care costs, asked the state regulators to raise the base rate for Worker's Compensation coverage in Virginia by an average of 7 percent.
The National Council of Compensation Insurance, which gathers data for companies writing Worker's Compensation coverage, also filed with the Virginia State Corporation Commission for a 22 percent increase in rates for coverage in the assigned-risk market.
The assigned risk market is often the last resort for higher-risk employers who cannot find coverage in the regular Worker's Compensation market. by CNB