Port of Virginia Blog

VPA/VIT Staff Donate Time to Foodbank of Southeast Virginia

 

Norfolk – Volunteers from the Virginia Port Authority and its operating company, Virginia International Terminals Inc., were among many who donated their Saturday morning (Nov. 20) to help pack boxes for the Foodbank of Southeastern Virginia.

In all some 700 volunteers from across Hampton Roads gathered at Virginia Wesleyan College for the 12th annual Family Volunteer Day and gave their morning to pack some 600 "meal" boxes that will be distributed by the Foodbank to needy families during the holidays. The event was coordinated by Volunteer Hampton Roads.

The VPA/VIT team included Greg Edwards and his sons, Kyle and Nathan, Kristen Cooney, Patty Wilson and her son, Chris, Joe Harris, Janet McGraw and David James, his wife, Deborah, and their daughter, Grace. In addition to the time donated Saturday morning, the VPA as a whole collected 300 cans of chicken noodle soup for the effort.

Above: The boxes were packed in large assembly-lines; Greg Edwards and Janet McGraw add canned corn.

VPA Participates in Career Day

VPA Community Relations Coordinator Jodie Love discusses maritime careers with local students. 

Norfolk -- The Virginia Port Authority hosted a booth at the Shipbuilding, Repair and Maritime Career Day Event at the Ted Constant Convocation Center at Old Dominion University on March 30. Approximately 600 public school students in grades 6-12 attended the event. 

VPA Helps Sponsor Youth of the Year Dinner

Norfolk – The Virginia Port Authority was a sponsor of the Boys & Girls Club of Southeast Virginia's Youth of the Year Awards Dinner at Harrison Opera house March 23.

The keynote speaker was Frank Beamer, Virginia Tech's head football coach. Jeff Keever, senior deputy executive director of the VPA, and Jodie Love, the VPA's community relations coordinator, were among the attendees.

The Youth of the Year Award was established in 1947 and remains the premier youth recognition program for academic performance, moral character, life goals, poise, and public speaking ability. The program also fosters character, personal growth and leadership qualities.

Local clubs from Norfolk, Portsmouth, Chesapeake, Virginia Beach, Suffolk and the Eastern Shore recognize members ages 14-18 and select a Youth of the Year, who then participates in a state competition.

This year's Youth of the Year award went to LaMarr R. Coles, a Lakeland High School Senior who will use the $2,500 scholarship to pursue an education in physical therapy.

Pictured left to right are: Keever, Tyrell Johnson, Darrion Marsh and D'Angelo Bowie -- all members of the Rosemont Unit of Virginia Beach -- and Love.

 

CrossGlobe Group, Salvation Army, Tidewater Area Soccer, VPA and Others Pitch-In for Haiti

 

Above: CrossGlobe's Newport News Director of Operations Rich Rekowski (left) and driver Bob McNamera.

Norfolk -- The Haiti relief drive held in February by The Salvation Army and Tidewater Area Soccer Clubs is moving into the next phase of the relief effort: getting the donated goods into the hands of the people in Haiti who need them.

The relief drive (held Feb. 20) collected enough medical supplies, clothing and soccer equipment to fill 21 pallets. Those pallets were then loaded into a 28-foot-long trailer donated to the local relief drive by UPS Freight; the donation will be delivered to The Salvation Army's Haiti Command Warehouse in Miami courtesy of CrossGlobe Group.  

"It's been a very anxious and exciting couple of weeks," said Major Lewis Reckline of The Salvation Army. "We're proud to have had the opportunity to work with the area soccer clubs on this drive and we're very grateful to CrossGlobe Group for offering to ship these items to Miami at no cost to us." 




Local television station WVEC TV13 provided media support in the week leading up to the drive and on the collection day. The collected items were packed in boxes donated by MANCON Inc., Richmond Corrugated Box, and Atlantic Corrugated and then loaded onto the UPS Freight trailer.     


"We're a global company," said Bill Franks, president and CEO of CrossGlobe Group, who was introduced to the effort by Greg Edwards, Virginia Port Authority director of external affairs. "We preach to our company that regardless of the situation, regardless of the cost we need to do the right thing and this is the right thing. We're glad we are able to help."

CHROME Club Gets Lesson on Port, Bouyancy

 
Chesapeake – Jodie Love, the Virginia Port Authority's community relations coordinator, on Nov. 18 presented to the Western Branch Middle School CHROME Club, (Cooperating Hampton Roads Organization for Minorities in Engineering, Inc.). Her presentation included a brief interactive presentation on the port and Craney Island, followed by a question-and-answer session, some games and prizes and a science experiment based on the Archimedes principle of buoyancy. 

For the experiment the students separated into groups and were given modeling clay, marbles, a bucket of water and a five-inch diameter bowl. They were asked to put the mass of clay into the water, watch it sink and then measure the water displacement created by the mass of clay. They then shaped a vessel out of the clay to represent a cargo ship and placed it in a bucket of water to see that it floated, again measuring the water displacement.

The students then loaded the clay cargo ship with containers (marbles) to see how many it would hold before sinking. The students then "re-engineered" their vessels to see if they could come up with ideas to hold more containers and boy did they ever: The winning team was able to load 31 marbles into their vessel before it sank.

Maritime Industry Volunteers Rid Shoreline of Seven Tons of Debris

More than 65 volunteers cleaned up seven tons of trash, metal and wood debris along a three-quarter mile stretch of shoreline at Portsmouth Marine Terminal along the Elizabeth River during the 21st annual Clean the Bay Day event. Organized by the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, Clean the Bay Day is statewide event to remove shoreline debris from the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries; the event was held June 6. The total Hampton Roads participation for the event was: 5,520 total volunteers (1,458 from the military), 336.15 miles of shoreline cleaned, 86 volunteer boats and 157,810 lbs. of trash collected.

Bill Burkett Receives Recognition from Coast Guard

 

Bill Burkett, (Second from left) head of the Port of Virginia's Maritime Incident Response Team (MIRT) recently received recognition from the Coast Guard for his outstanding support to the Coast Guard. The award is one of the highest awards given by the Coast Guard to citizens in recognition of their public service.

Click HERE to read the full commendation from the Coast Guard.