A $1.5 million dollar grant for access road improvements has been approved near the

Hickory Regional Airport. The Appalachian Regional Commission's grant will be used

to widen and improve about a mile of roadway on 9th Avenue Drive NW to Goat Farm

Road, adjacent to the Airport. The grant is a joint award for Burke County and the

City of Hickory. Burke Development Incorporated and the City of Hickory are

working to attract other industrial users into the proposed industrial park located in

the City of Hickory, where the road improvements will lead.

The Hickory-Lenoir-Morganton area ranks 11^th nationally in a Best Places to Work in

Manufacturing report. smartaccess.com’s 4^th annual study finds that the South and

Midwest rank well. The study considered the percent of the workforce in manufacturing,

one-year job growth, one-year income growth and housing costs as a percent of income.

Spartanburg placed fourth while the Greenville-Anderson-Mauldin area ranked seventh. The

manufacturing industry accounts for 8% of the U.S.workforce, according to the report

which was released last week.

Lincoln Sheriff’s detectives have charged a Belmont woman with felony identity theft..

35-year-old Elizabeth Brown Barnette was arrested last week and faces eight charges of identity

theft. A Lincolnton woman filed a report on September 30^th, of unauthorized transactions of

more than $1,400 on her Pay Pal account. Barnette was released after posting a $50,000 secured

bond.

The State Highway Patrol is putting safe driving at the top of its Christmas wish list.

Troopers are focusing this holiday season on driver behavior in an attempt to ensure

everyone arrives safely to their intended destination. This year, troopers hope to

decrease the number of collisons during the December 24th through January 2nd

time period, by focusing on violations such as excessive speeding, reckless driving,

following too close and impaired driving.