Jack Troy stories, Page 8
Kraft Heinz to split, report says
Kraft Heinz may be headed for a breakup. The packaged food conglomerate is planning to spin off a large chunk of its grocery business, the Wall Street Journal reported Friday, effectively undoing a 2015 merger that’s now widely regarded as a strategic blunder. Anonymous sources told the newspaper the new...
VA insists veterans services remain robust in Pittsburgh despite staff departures nationwide
Pittsburgh-area veterans won’t see any interruption to their care or benefits, the Department of Veterans Affairs claims, even as thousands of its employees head for the exits nationwide. The department is on pace to lose nearly 30,000 employees, or about 6% of its workforce, by the end of September. Already,...
Allegheny County creates new way for workers to report threats to union rights
Allegheny County launched a web page Thursday for workers to report violations or threats to their union organizing rights. The move comes at a time of local labor flare-ups and gridlock at the National Labor Relations Board. This new, confidential Right to Organize Incident Report Form asks for information about...
Deluzio skewers Medicaid cuts as Dems seek winning message on Trump megabill
With cuts to Medicaid and food stamps now law, Democrats are looking to minimize their impact and punish Republicans in the upcoming midterm elections for what they frame as an attack on vulnerable people. “I’m going to do everything I can between now and 2026 to remind voters, Democrat and...
EQT buys Olympus for $1.8B, consolidates grip on Southwestern Pa. natural gas
Pittsburgh-based natural gas producer EQT Corp. has acquired local competitor Olympus Energy for $1.8 billion. The deal, which officially closed last week, consolidates EQT’s control over regional natural gas deposits at a time of rising demand. “This strategic transaction strengthens our position as the leading natural gas producer in the...
Ticky business: How Pitt researchers track the 8-legged bloodsuckers
There’s nothing fancy about tick hunting. When University of Pittsburgh professor Danielle Tufts and her team of public health students go out, they bring just a few things: A white jumpsuit, a pair of tweezers, some tiny vials to store specimens and a meter-long piece of white corduroy. The cloth...
EPA delays pollution limits, drawing jeers from environmentalists, cheers from U.S. Steel
The Trump administration is delaying mandates that would have forced steelmakers U.S. Steel and Cleveland-Cliffs to cut toxic emissions, drawing industry praise and environmentalist dismay. A July 1 order from the Environmental Protection Agency postpones until April 2027 stricter emissions standards for the country’s integrated steel mills, all of which...
Building the Valley: Spokes bike shop is back, this time in Vandergrift
Tim Carson is all about positive energy, good vibes and high vibrations — but most of all, bikes. “The glory of bicycles, for me, (is) it has always been a stress reducer,” he said, standing next to a workbench covered in tools and bike parts. “I always say: Bikes change...
Can supermarkets like Giant Eagle fill void left by ailing pharmacy industry?
As chain pharmacies decline, grocery stores are picking up the slack. Rite Aid’s descent into bankruptcy — and the dash to carve up its assets — is the latest example. Rival drugstores CVS and Walgreens have snapped up millions of potential customers by way of their prescription files, but supermarkets...
Giant Eagle to use GetGo sale funds for store upgrades, CEO says
Giant Eagle will use the $1.6 billion sale of GetGo to remodel grocery stores, add new ones, reduce prices and grow its pharmacy presence. The grocer’s CEO, Bill Artman, detailed Giant Eagle’s plans to TribLive on Monday, just hours after the company announced it officially sold about 270 GetGo convenience...
Deal struck to preserve Cigna members’ access to AHN facilities
Thousands of Cigna Healthcare insurance members will keep full, in-network access to Allegheny Health Network following a contract agreement between the organizations. The deal was reached Friday after a monthslong dispute, the second in the past two years. It ensures more than 20,000 Cigna members in the region can continue...
‘We’d love to have you here’: Pa. chamber courts NYC employers after Mamdani’s win
Progressive Zohran Mamdani’s upset win in New York City’s Democratic mayoral primary has caused a stir among some in the city’s business establishment. It’s also spurred the leader of a Pennsylvania business group to try to take a bite of the Big Apple’s outsize share of the global economy and...
David Burritt, fresh off $108 million payday, stays as head of U.S. Steel
U.S. Steel’s senior leadership under Nippon Steel is taking shape — and it looks a lot like it did before the buyout. The Japanese firm has elected to retain U.S. Steel president and CEO David Burritt as well many of the executives around him, according to filings with the Securities...
Perking up: How the arrival of a coffee shop can get a small town buzzing
Avonmore has long chased an economic renaissance that never quite arrived. If anything, the dream of a bustling business community slipped further out of reach when the town’s rolling mill closed in 2019, taking more than 100 jobs with it. But the borough has a coffee shop among its small...
Giant Eagle buys prescription files from another 15 Rite Aid stores, completing buying spree
Giant Eagle has purchased prescription files from another 15 Rite Aid stores as part of a fourth and final wave of transfers from the bankrupt pharmacy chain to the Cranberry-based grocer. Altogether, Giant Eagle has bought files from 83 Rite Aid stores across Pennsylvania and Ohio since late May. The...
Environmental groups demand Nippon Steel work to cut emissions after buying U.S. Steel
With U.S. Steel’s $14.9 billion sale to Nippon Steel made official last week, environmental advocates say it’s time for corporate leadership to take make real strides toward limiting pollution. “U.S. Steel has gotten everything that it wished for in this deal with Nippon,” said Matt Mehalik, executive director of the...
UPMC to stop gender-affirming care for patients 18 and under by month’s end
UPMC has confirmed it will end gender-affirming care for patients 18 and younger in response to the Trump administration’s policies aimed at transgender youth. A spokesperson for UPMC, the region’s largest hospital network, said federal guidance has made it clear clinicians who provide care such as puberty blockers and hormone...
Highmark joins major insurers in prior authorization reform
Highmark was among more than 50 health insurers who pledged Monday to speed up and slim down prior authorization, the process through which patients and their doctors must seek insurance approval for certain care before it’s administered. “It’s all about decreasing the administrative burden,” said Highmark Chief Medical Officer Tim...
‘Roller coaster’: High-stakes drama marked Nippon’s winning courtship of U.S. Steel
Three Mon Valley mayors remember it well: A series of mid-December meetings with union leaders and Nippon Steel executives as Japan’s largest steelmaker aggressively courted U.S. Steel, the storied American manufacturer. Relations between the United Steelworkers union and Nippon — never friendly, exactly — had deteriorated over the course of...
U.S. Steel, Nippon finalize $14.9B merger, security agreement
Japan’s Nippon Steel has finalized its $14.9 billion takeover of U.S. Steel, the companies announced Wednesday, as they unveiled details about the deal, which amounts to a tightly monitored merger. To win government approval, the companies also have entered a national security agreement meant to mitigate worries about Nippon having...
Organizers hope Freeport’s 6th annual Pride celebration can be a low-key safe space for LGBTQ+ people
Pittsburgh’s boisterous Pride parade may soak up a lot of attention, but Freeport Pride Stroll and Festival is a chance for LGBTQ+ people in the Alle-Kiski Valley to feel supported in their own community, organizers say. “You don’t have to go to a big city to feel safe,” said Sidney...
Fire damages multiple mobile homes in Buffalo Township
A shed fire spread to two mobile homes in Buffalo Township on Thursday night, seriously damaging them. A Butler County dispatcher said crews were alerted of a fire around 9:45 p.m. in Jack’s Mobile Homes park along Shaner Drive. No injuries were reported, the dispatcher said, but the Red Cross...
Vandergrift’s Casino Theatre still a beacon of culture after 125 years
The Casino Theatre in Vandergrift could have become anything over the years — a parking lot, like the theater on Longfellow Street did, or maybe basketball courts. Yes, that almost happened. It even survived a 13-year period of neglect, between 1982 and 1995, after the company that ran it as...
Freeport’s 1st manager reflects on defining the role as he readies to resign
Zachary Filous described his 2½ years as Freeport borough manager, especially early on, like “drinking from a fire hose.” He’s done more than just send emails and direct personnel. His hiring roughly coincided with the departure of the borough’s treasurer, public works director and sewage plant operator — roles he...
Doubled steel and aluminum tariffs leave W.Pa. businesses uneasy
Christian Klanica’s gut told him President Donald Trump wasn’t done raising steel and aluminum tariffs, so he turned down long-term production contracts and stocked up on supplies throughout the spring for his tool-and-die shop in Hempfield. Already, the 25% tariffs on these metals imposed in March have inflated the cost...
