Blackstone Valley

After announcing in August that a quarter of the 1.8-million-square-foot Draper Mill in Hopedale would be demolished to make the site more amenable to new development, the owner of the historic centerpiece of the town said Tuesday the facility now will be entirely torn down.

Riverdale Mills Corp., a welded wire mesh manufacturer in Northbridge, was awarded the John McArthur Community Commerce Innovation Award from the Venly Institute in Cambridge, the company announced Nov. 24.

Two Central Mass. companies have received nearly $800,000 in grant funding from the Industrial Rail Access Program, which aims to enhance rail and freight access, the Gov. Charlie Baker administration announced on Nov 19.

A Sutton packaging company, which has four sites in Central Massachusetts and others abroad and nationally through affiliates, has paid $9.5 million for a 383-acre site straddling the Millbury and Sutton town lines.

CEO Jim Knott spoke with WBJ about the company’s relationship to shellfishing, the search for skilled workers and what brought Riverdale Mills to Northbridge.

Millbury company Midstate Sewerage will pay up to $500,000 in fines and will not seek state or municipal contracts as part of a settlement over illegal dumping, Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey’s office announced on Friday.

The owners of Koopman Lumber of Whitinsville have bought a 60,000-square-foot industrial building in the Sutton Commerce Park for just under $4 million.

Restaurants are bringing in far less money for food and drink during the coronavirus pandemic – and it’s showing both the hit the industry has taken this year as well as the financial toll declining tax revenue will have on cities and towns.

A Worcester property investor has paid $2.2 million for a portfolio of multifamily properties in Northbridge, Southbridge and Webster.

An industrial building on 7 acres next to the Quaker Industrial Park has sold for more than...