http://www.blueridgecos.com/news/index.php en-us CuteNews http://www.blueridgecos.com/news/index.php?subaction=showfull&id=1283264412&archive= Wall Street Journal - August 21, 2010
By M.P. MCQUEEN
Looking to snap up some investment properties on the cheap? You may want to consider Durham, N.C., Indianapolis and Huntsville, Ala. They are among the best places to invest now, according to a new report that ranks the best and worst markets for conservative residential-real-estate investors. Hard-hit Las Vegas and Orlando, Fla., are among the riskiest.]]> 1283264412 Tue, 31 Aug 2010 07:20:12 -0700 http://www.blueridgecos.com/news/index.php?subaction=showfull&id=1280154668&archive=
The burger chain will open a location in the retail and office development, Brookview Town Centre, with hopes of being ready to serve folks sometime in September.

"Certainly, the Bearden area is a great location because of the traffic and the people who live there," said Sean Whitacre, Knoxville area franchise manager, who runs the day-to-day operations.

This will be the area's sixth location with two more planned down the road. The local franchise is owned by Gibby and Tina Lepsig.

Other Five Guys are in Turkey Creek, Emory Road in Powell, Hamilton Crossing in Alcoa, Lenoir City, and most recently, Pigeon Forge.

Five Guys, founded in 1986 in Washington D.C., has found a loyal following as one of the fastest growing franchises across the country.

According to its website, more than 200 Five Guys will open in 2010.

By Josh Flory, Knoxville News Sentinel - Property Scope]]> 1280154668 Mon, 26 Jul 2010 07:31:08 -0700 http://www.blueridgecos.com/news/index.php?subaction=showfull&id=1275582005&archive=
Anderson Management Services, Inc. took 8,000 SF, while TrustFirst, Inc. took 2,650 SF. According to Frazier, Anderson was represented by Bill Bullock, of Knox Office Realty, and TrustFirst was represented by Kathleen Archer, of Keller Williams.

Frazier said the building is now 62 percent occupied.

Posted by Josh Flory on June 2, 2010 at 12:45 PM]]> 1275582005 Thu, 03 Jun 2010 09:20:05 -0700 http://www.blueridgecos.com/news/index.php?subaction=showfull&id=1265901937&archive=
South College will take almost 85,000 square feet of the one-time corporate offices off Parkside Drive and has an option to lease the remaining 50,000 square feet. The former Goody's distribution warehouse, which covers 350,000 square feet on the site, is not part of the South College expansion.

Terms of the lease agreement were not disclosed, but as part of the 10-year lease South College reached with property owner SJW Land Co. of San Jose, Calif., the school can renew the lease for a second 10-year period. As part of the expansion, the school will vacate its classroom space on Hayfield Road at Parkside Drive when its lease expires in late summer.

The growth is expected to create about 50 jobs within three years, according to the school, which now employs more than 160. The Parkside Drive learning center will be about 30,000 square feet larger than South College's Lonas Drive building.

Steve South said he signed the lease last week, almost 20 years to the day after he acquired Knoxville Business College and Cooper Institute to form South College.

"We want to expand, and if we want to expand, we need to add space," South said, adding that work will begin within a month to renovate the former corporate offices into classroom and lab space. "In the last two years we've grown 21 percent year over year."

Johnson Architecture of Knoxville is doing design work on the project. A general contractor has not yet been named.

South noted that the school has grown from 600 students to more than 1,000 in five years and has seen a sizeable increase in course offerings.

As an example, the school's physician assistant program admits 50 students a year but now has 700 applicants for those seats, according to Kimberely B. Hall, South College executive vice president.

And a major reason for the growth is the addition of a degree program in pharmacy.

South College has received approval for the program from the Tennessee Higher Education Commission and the Commission on Colleges of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools. Last month it submitted an application for pre-candidate status to the Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education. The council will conduct an 18-month review of South College's new program. If approved by the ACPE, the school will begin pharmacy classes at the Parkside Centre Learning Site in August 2011. Accreditation by ACPE allows South College pharmacy graduates to take their Tennessee board exams to become licensed pharmacists.

South College is planning to admit 50 students in its first-year pharmacy program and eventually increase that to 75. The school is offering an accelerated program, where students can get their doctor's degree in pharmacy in three years instead of the standard four years, Hall said. If the pharmacy program is approved, South College would join East Tennessee State University, Belmont College, Lipscomb University, Union University and the University of Tennessee as schools in the state with pharmacy programs.

The Knoxville-based school also is offering advanced degrees for teachers and education students.

When the renovation is complete in time for fall semester, students in the nursing, physician assistant and education programs will report to the new Parkside Centre Learning Site, which will have new labs and library and have access to an auditorium built when Goody's occupied the facility. Goody's vacated the site when it went out of business in early 2009.

Remaining at South College's Lonas campus will be business, legal, criminal justice, medical assisting, radiography, physical therapist assistant, science and general studies programs and courses.

Hall said 600 to 700 students will study at the Parkside campus and about 600 at the Lonas campus.

South said he was actively looking to build another education facility in West Knoxville and had eyed the Goody's building when he was approached by local real estate brokers Louise Fogarty and Jay Cobble of Blue Ridge Cos. and Don Brewer of Realty Investment Services.

"I thought I had enough space here," South said, referring to the Lonas Drive campus that fronts the junction of Interstates 640 and 40.

But student enrollment and study programs that were full and growing forced South to quickly reassess his situation.

The Goody's site also has a high-profile position along busy I-40 between Cedar Bluff and Lovell Road.

"It had everything we were going to build, including an auditorium," South said. "We can now add programs we couldn't have three years ago."

South is considering adding a culinary arts study program and distance-learning courses, where students from outside the area could take courses via the Internet.

Hall said South College continually reviews education growth areas 10 and 15 years out and works with Knoxville-area employers to fill needs, such as offering more health-care fields. She said projected growth areas for the next 10 years are physician assistants, physical therapy assistants, medical assistants, imaging professionals, business programs, and elementary education teachers.

"While we've grown, we're still a small-school environment," Hall said, adding that the class sizes range from 20 to 50 students and the student-teacher ratio is 15-1. "We're still in a small-school category." She noted that employment has been growing, too, doubling in five years.

Cobble said the brokers were hired last spring by SJW to market the Goody's property, which sits on 55 acres near the intersection of Parkside Drive and Lovell Road. Negotiations with South College began some time after that.

Cobble said local interest in leasing or buying the property has been stronger than outside interest, although several parties outside Knoxville have inquired.

"Given the market conditions, to find such a large user to expand into that space is ideal. It's great news to help a company grow and find a good use for the space. It helps the Knoxville office market to stabilize the space," Cobble said.

He described the Goody's space as Class A in a premiere location with "excellent demographics and incredible visibility to promote the business."

Cobble said Class A office space in Knoxville typically leases for $18 to $24 per square foot, with new construction of Class A space going for $20 to $24 per square foot.

"We have had a lot of interest in that property and have been negotiating with more than one user. And there's still interest in the remaining space," Cobble said.

Business editor Bill Brewer may be reached at 865-342-6319.]]> 1265901937 Thu, 11 Feb 2010 08:25:37 -0700 http://www.blueridgecos.com/news/index.php?subaction=showfull&id=1265900557&archive=
EdisonLearning, an education management company with ties to the former Edison Project, has signed on for nearly 17,000 square feet of leased space in Riverview Tower.

Arlene Dove, senior vice president for site services at Edison, said the company has grown from around 23 local employees last summer to around 50 currently, an expansion in which some of the company's functions were moved from New York to Knoxville.

The company currently leases 10,600 square feet of space in the next-door tower, First Tennessee Plaza, but is hoping to move by mid-March. Dove said the configuration of the Riverview space allows for a more dense arrangement than their current location.

EdisonLearning's web site traces the company's roots to the Edison Project, which was launched in the early '90's by Whittle Communications. EdisonLearning was unveiled in 2008.

Dove said that when part of the company's finance department was moved to Knoxville, it brought on former Goody's CFO David Peek and several Goody's employees.

Edison was represented by Russ Westlake, of Jones Lang LaSalle in Memphis. Jay Cobble, of Blue Ridge Realty, was also involved in the deal.

Posted by Josh Flory on February 9, 2010 at 9:45 AM]]> 1265900557 Thu, 11 Feb 2010 08:02:37 -0700 http://www.blueridgecos.com/news/index.php?subaction=showfull&id=1264020464&archive=
Mercy Surgery Center West is now open for a variety of outpatient procedures.

Located on the Baptist Hospital West campus in Turkey Creek, the new 21,500 square-foot facility has four operating rooms and two endoscopic suites equipped for procedures that do not require a hospital admission or overnight stay.

"Patients who have surgery at Mercy Surgery Center West arrive on the day of the surgery, have their procedure and then recover under the care of a specialized nursing staff until they are ready to go home," says Jeff Ashin, chief operating officer at Mercy Health Partners' Metro Division.

"The addition of Mercy Surgery Center West continues our commitment to providing outstanding healthcare to the people of Farragut and the surrounding West Knox County neighborhoods," Ashin adds.

According to Julia Hensley, R.N., executive director of Mercy Surgery Center West, physicians at the outpatient facility will be performing gastrointestinal endoscopic procedures, general surgery, gynecological procedures, orthopedic surgery, pain management, plastic surgery, ENT (ear, nose and throat) surgery and a variety of other procedures.

"All equipment in the surgery center is state-of-the-art and with high definition visual quality," Hensley says. "We have a highly qualified staff dedicated to making your experience with us a positive one with a great outcome. All the surgery center staff, policies, procedures, equipment and ancillary services are fully accredited and meet the highest safety standards."

The new facility was designed by George Armour Ewart, Architect; constructed by Johnson and Gaylon; and developed by the Devon Group.

Mercy Surgery Center West is open Monday through Friday from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. To learn more, visit www.mercy.com.]]> 1264020464 Wed, 20 Jan 2010 13:47:44 -0700 http://www.blueridgecos.com/news/index.php?subaction=showfull&id=1264019612&archive= By Carly Harrington

Mercy Health Partners has opened a $13 million outpatient surgery center and medical office building on the campus of Baptist Hospital West.

Mercy Surgery Center West, a 21,500-square-foot multispecialty ambulatory facility in the Turkey Creek retail development, began accepting patients on Monday.

The surgery center, on the first floor of the three-story building, has four operating rooms and two endoscopy/procedure rooms. Doctors will perform gastrointestinal endoscopic procedures, pain management, plastic surgery, orthopedic and other procedures.

The facility was initially to be a joint partnership with physicians, who would have had a 49 percent ownership stake, but Jeff Potter, senior vice president of planning and development for Mercy, said the surgery center's board decided otherwise.

"As we went through the planning stages and physicians expressed concern about reimbursement, it was decided by the board, led by physicians, to make it an outpatient department of the hospital," Potter said.

Meanwhile, the medical office building is starting to fill up, spokesman Craig Griffith said.

Isis Women's Services has opened on the second floor and Hope Neurology will open by early March. Additional space is still available, he said.

Mercy Health also is moving forward with a $7 million project that includes expanding the emergency department capacity at Baptist Hospital West as well as $4 million to do the same at St. Mary's Jefferson Memorial Hospital in Jefferson City.

Business writer Carly Harrington may be reached at 865-342-6317.
© 2010, Knoxville News Sentinel Co.]]> 1264019612 Wed, 20 Jan 2010 13:33:32 -0700 http://www.blueridgecos.com/news/index.php?subaction=showfull&id=1263486023&archive= Memphis Business Journal

Economic development magazine names Tennessee ‘state of the year’

Tennessee has been named 2009 State of the Year by Business Facilities magazine.

The economic development trade publication based the award on the state’s number of new jobs and capital investment made during 2009, the state Department of Economic & Community Development noted in a news release.

Tennessee won the honor “due to an aggressive and creative development effort” capped off by several multi-billion projects, according the release.

One included the landing of the $1.2 billion Hemlock Semiconductor project in Clarksville which is expected to create 500-900 new jobs. That project was also named the 2009 Silver Award winner for Economic Development Deal of the Year by Business Facilities.

DECD commissioner Matt Kisber said that in 2009 the state added 16,700 new jobs and had $3.1 billion in new capital investment.

The state has previously been recognized by Site Selection, Area Development and Southern Business & Development magazines for its accomplishments in economic development in 2009.]]> 1263486023 Thu, 14 Jan 2010 09:20:23 -0700