Northwest Florida Business Briefs - March 2007

BAGDAD --
? J&J Snack Foods of Pennsauken, N.J., closed a multimillion deal for Hom/Ade Foods, a Santa Rosa County company founded by Howard Burris in 1983. Hom/Ade's biggest seller, Mary B's frozen buttermilk biscuits, serves up $27 million of Hom/Ade's annual $30 million sales.

CALLAWAY --
? Bridge Harbor Investment Co., managed by Worth Williams Properties of Dallas, has broken ground on Bridge Harbor, a 155-acre, Old Florida-style residential community with nearly one mile of frontage on East Bay.

DEFUNIAK SPRINGS --
? Plans of Atlanta-based Eagle Land Group ran aground after the Florida 1st District Court of Appeals allowed landowner Diane Pickett to terminate her sale contract with an Eagle Group representative. Eagle wanted to buy 1,398 acres from Pickett for $3.63 million for a 1,500-home retirement community. The court dispute hinged on a disagreement over the appropriate sales figure and earnest money payments.

ESCAMBIA COUNTY --
? Emerald Coast Utilities Authority is finalizing the math for the $302-million construction of a sewage plant at a midcounty site, replacing its Main Street Wastewater Treatment Plant in downtown Pensacola. The current waterfront plant, built in 1937, was severely damaged and overflowed during Hurricane Ivan in 2004.

FREEPORT --
? Construction on the 23-acre Alaqua Industrial Park on U.S. 331 is scheduled to begin this month. John Finch of Santa Rosa Beach is developing the project, which will include 18 retail stores and up to 24 industrial buildings.

NORTHWEST FLORIDA --
? Florida legislators passed a bill ending the Panhandle's exemption from hurricane-resistance rules that require new homes to withstand 120-mph winds. The exemption, crafted in 2000, covered inland areas of the region, from Franklin through Escambia counties. Legislators previously had argued the Northwest
was less vulnerable to storms.

? Memphis-based International Paper Co. has agreed to sell Arizona Chemical to Rhone Capital III, an international private equity firm, for $485 million. Arizona Chemical has manufacturing plants at Pensacola, Panama City and Port St. Joe and a distribution center at Marianna. Its 1,500 employees worldwide include 350 in northwest Florida and 125 at its Jacksonville headquarters.

? Freedom Communications upped its regional circulation with the purchase of four additional non-daily newspapers: Santa Rosa Press Gazette at Milton, Crestview News Bulletin, Washington County News at Chipley and Holmes County Times-Advertiser in Bonifay. Freedom, based in Irvine, Calif., also owns two regional dailies, Northwest Florida Daily News at Fort Walton Beach and the Panama City News Herald, plus the non-daily Destin Log, Walton Sun and Apalachicola & Carrabelle Times.

PENSACOLA --
? The University of West Florida's Department of Music has become an all-Steinway school, joining the University of Central Florida and some 50 others in the nation, thanks to a gift of 18 pianos from Helen Wentworth, widow of pianist and entrepreneur Warren Wentworth. Prices for the world-standard Steinways can range from $18,600 to $103,000.

? Baptist Health Care has sold Portofino Medical Spa at Gulf Breeze to the Paquin Group, based at Celebration, for an undisclosed price. Paquin specializes in health-related retail businesses for 50 client hospitals.

PENSACOLA BEACH --
? Allen Levin, a Gulf Coast condominium and resort developer, died Jan. 12 of a heart attack at age 62. Levin, brother of Pensacola attorney Fred Levin, was lead partner in a half-dozen projects at Pensacola Beach, collectively valued at more than $1 billion and including the five-tower Portofino. He underwent double-lung transplant surgery last fall for cancer.

PORT ST. JOE --
? Bayside Savings Bank, founded in 2003, is merging with Coastal Community Bank. Coastal's parent company, Coastal Community Investments in Panama City Beach, also acquired Apalachicola State Bank in 2002.

Tags: Northwest