News report: State to bid on auto plant
Arkansas has an interest in landing an auto manufacturing plant proposed by Toyota and Mazda, but officials can't comment this early in the process, Jeff Moore, a spokesman for the Arkansas Economic Development Commission, said Friday.
"Like most Southeastern states, we're certainly interested in the project," Moore said. "But because of confidentiality and the impact to the company as well as to the state, we can't confirm or deny that we're actually working on this project."
Moore said it didn't know at what point in the process that the state could confirm what it is, or is not, doing.
USA Today reported Friday that at least a dozen states, including Arkansas, are vying to land the plant.
Marion came close to landing two automotive plants a few years ago. One plant, for Toyota to manufacture trucks, went to San Antonio in 2003. In 2007, Marion was a finalist for another Toyota plant that went to a site near Tupelo, Miss.
-- Stephen Steed
Tyson unit liable for $13M, jury says
A California family has been awarded almost $13 million in damages after a jury ruled that Hillshire Brands Co. -- owned by Tyson Foods Inc. -- was liable for the death of Mark Lopez, who died in 2015 from mesothelioma.
"Our sympathies are with the Lopez family but we do not believe the death of Mark Lopez was caused by anything that may have occurred at the Union Sugar plant in the 1960s or 70s," Tyson spokesman Caroline Ahn said in an email.
Tyson Foods plans to seek reversal on appeal of the trial court's verdict, according to a company statement.
The wrongful death suit, filed in October 2015, claimed that Lopez, 61, contracted mesothelioma as a result of asbestos exposure from the Betteravia, Calif., sugar refinery.
The Alameda County jury on Wednesday found Hillshire Brands acted negligently while operating the plant, and that Lopez's death was directly related.
-- Nathan Owens
10 stocks advance as index gains 0.50
The Arkansas Index, a price-weighted index that tracks the largest public companies based in the state, rose 0.50 to 330.40 on Friday.
Ten stocks advanced and eight declined.
Arkansas Car-Mart climbed 3.7 percent on three times its average volume.
USA Truck jumped 17.5 percent for the week.
Murphy Oil fell 6 percent for the week.
The index was developed by Bloomberg News and the Democrat-Gazette with a base value of 100 as of Dec. 30, 1997.
Business on 08/19/2017