A groundbreaking will take place next week at the site of a $35 million dollar electronics recycling plant in Osceola. Blue Oak Resources of Burlingame, California will break ground on the site, which will be called Blue Oak Arkansas, which is expected to employ up to 50 people. The ceremony will take place Tuesday, and will feature Arkansas Governor Mike Beebe and former United States Vice President Al Gore. Gore is a partner in a California capital firm, which is a partial investor in the plant. The Arkansas Democrat Gazette reports the Arkansas Teacher Retirement System is investing up to 18 million dollars in Blue Oak, Arkansas and Blue Oak Resources will have a 35 percent share of the facility. Chairman of Blue Oak Resources is John Correnti, whom is also the chairman of Big River Steel, which is a one-point-one billion dollar steel plant that is coming to Osceola. Groundbreaking for Big River Steel could take place later this month of next month.
Johnathan Reaves is the News Director for KASU Public Radio. As part of an Air Force Family, he moved to Arkansas from Minot, North Dakota in 1986. He was first bitten by the radio bug after he graduated from Gosnell High School in 1992. While working on his undergraduate degree, he worked at KOSE, a small 1,000 watt AM commercial station in Osceola, Arkansas. Upon graduation from Arkansas State University in 1996 with a degree in Radio-Television Broadcast News, he decided that he wanted to stay in radio news. He moved to Stuttgart, Arkansas and worked for East Arkansas Broadcasters as news director and was there for 16 years.