Building a network Contractors gather at the Quay Members of the Southwest Washington Contractors Association network during a breakfast meeting today at the Red Lion Hotel at the Quay in Vancouver. Pictured from left, are: Paul Dye, general manager and vice president of Precision Rebar and Accessories Inc.; Mark Jackson, association president and project manager for Schlecht Construction; and John Miller, a project manager and senior estimator with PME Excavation and Underground Utilities. The event featured a presentation on the $17 million Undergraduate Classroom Building planned for Washington State University Vancouver, with keynote speaker, Dave Smith, the university's director of capital planning and development.

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Friday, Sept. 7

WSUV gears up for new building
Construction is set to start in December on a $28 million classroom facility at Washington State University Vancouver. The four-story Undergraduate Classroom Building will house classes for sophomores and freshmen, admitted to the branch campus for the first time last year, said Dave Smith, director of capital planning and development for the Vancouver campus, located northeast of the Interstate 5-205 intersection.
"We are interested in seeing local contractors involved with this project," Smith said. The university will begin accepting bids next month from general contractors and sub-contractors interested in building the project, expected to open in the summer of 2009. Read more in Monday's Columbian.

Health workers rarely lose licenses
Chiropractors with convictions for violent crimes, practitioners who have slept with their patients, and other health care workers are still practicing in Clark County and across the state. The Columbian reviewed 223 disciplinary cases the Washington Department of Health handled between 2000 and April 2007. Officials revoked 41 licenses during that span. All but one of those professionals were allowed to seek reinstatement once they completed a state-mandated suspension that ranged from a year to as many as 20 years without a license. Read more in Sunday's paper.

People
NAI Norris, Beggs & Simpson has hired Kevin Putney to work in Vancouver as a broker in its capital asset group specializing in investment sales of retail properties.

If you missed it
Visitors center sets record at new location
More than 600 people visited the Southwest Washington Visitor Information Center in August, a record for its new downtown location. The visitors center opened at 101 E. Eighth St. in January. It had attracted 4,800 people in 2006 at its previous location in the O.O. Howard House on Officers Row.

Boring but important
Two employees join development council
Southwest Washington's long-under staffed economic development council announced on Thursday that it has brought on two new staff, bringing total employment to six. Jeanie L. Ashe is the Columbia River Economic Development Council's director of business recruitment. Pat Mobley is the manager of investor relations.