News in brief

Boat-maker unveils plans in Mississippi

AMORY, Miss. -- A new company plans to make boats in northeast Mississippi and hire 75 people.

Avid Boats in Amory said it's investing $1.6 million to make aluminum bass boats and center console bay boats. Avid plans to make 750 boats next year and 1,500 annually by 2022.

President Phillip Faulkner previously founded Amory boat-maker NauticStar.

Mississippi Development Authority spokeswoman Tammy Craft said the state is giving Avid $218,000 for building improvements and $75,000 for worker training. Amory and Monroe County are giving property-tax breaks estimated at $400,000 over 10 years.

Avid will be eligible for a state worker income-tax rebate because the average worker will earn more than $43,300 a year. Avid could collect $1.3 million over 10 years.

Amory is about 30 miles southeast of Tupelo.

-- The Associated Press

Filing aims to settle faulty-drywall case

NEW ORLEANS -- A proposed $248 million settlement has been filed in a decade-old federal court case over defective Chinese drywall blamed for damaging home appliances and sickening residents.

The proposed settlement between property owners and Taishan Gypsum Co. was filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in New Orleans. It comes nearly eight years after a major settlement in another case involving a different Chinese company, Knauf Plasterboard Tianjin Co., and in the wake of other settlements with various homebuilders, equipment suppliers and installers who used the material.

All of the litigation arose from the use of defective drywall in thousands of homes between about 2005 and 2008. The product was alleged to have given off sulfur fumes that corroded metal in appliances, air-conditioning equipment, wiring and plumbing fixtures. In some cases, the fumes were blamed for illnesses.

Most of the residences involved were in Florida, Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi and Virginia.

Attorneys have asked U.S. District Judge Eldon Fallon for preliminary court approval of the settlement, pending further reviews, public notice and a subsequent "fairness hearing" expected later this year.

-- The Associated Press

State index closes with a gain of 2.64

The Arkansas Index, a price-weighted index that tracks the largest public companies based in the state, closed at 415.50 Wednesday, up 2.64.

"Equities held gains following release of the Federal Open Market Committee minutes for July," said Leon Lants, managing director at Stephens Inc. in Little Rock. "Attention shifts to Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell's scheduled speech on Friday for signs of continued monetary easing."

The index was developed by Bloomberg News and the Democrat-Gazette with a base value of 100 as of Dec. 30, 1997.

Business on 08/22/2019

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