New school: The Federal Emergency Management Agency announced Wednesday it is awarding $6.1 million in funding to help the Ascension Parish School Board with campuswide repairs at St. Amant High School. The school was among tens of thousands of structures damaged or destroyed in the flooding in 2016. FEMA has reimbursed Louisiana schools more than $185 million for disaster-related projects through its public assistance program to help with recovery following the floods. Read the full story.
Expansion in Clinton: PacTec Inc. is expanding its Clinton manufacturing site, adding 15 jobs by building a new 40,000-square-foot manufacturing center and modernizing an existing facility, Gov. John Bel Edwards announced Wednesday. PacTec President Mike Shilling says the company will spend $2.5 million on the project, which will retain 95 existing jobs at the site. The new jobs will pay an average annual salary of $48,600. PacTec manufactures spill containment products, filtration liners for waste minimization and certified bulk packaging for waste solids and demolition debris. Louisiana Economic Development offered PacTec an incentive package that includes the state’s Quality Jobs and Industrial Tax Exemption programs. Read the full announcement.
Quarterly gains: Royal Dutch Shell says it plans to repurchase $25 billion of its stock over the next two years after announcing that second-quarter earnings rose 30% as energy prices surged. Earnings excluding one-time items and fluctuations in the value of inventories—the industry’s favored measure of performance—rose to $4.69 billion from $3.60 billion in the same period last year. Net income jumped to $6.02 billion from $1.54 billion. CEO Ben van Beurden says Shell now has “confidence to start our share buyback program.” Read the full story.
