CHESAPEAKE Dollar Tree Inc. is testing an expanded grocery store concept called Dollar Tree Market, opening today in Chesapeake.

CURRITUCK COUNTY, N.C. Currituck County’s unemployment rate hit 10.4 percent in January, the highest in 27 years, according to statistics released Friday.

The last time Currituck’s unemployment rate was this high was 11.4 percent in February 1983, said Larry Parker, spokesman for the North Carolina Employment Security Commission.

The average number of jobs in Hampton Roads plunged by 27,000 last year, the Virginia Employment Commission said Friday, indicating that the recession's impact on the region may have been more severe than previously thought.

NEW ORLEANS Congressional members are asking the top U.S. fire official to declare defective Chinese drywall a fire hazard.

In letters to U.S. Fire Administrator Kelvin Cochran, congressional members from Florida, Virginia and Louisiana said homeowners should be warned about the fire risk associated with the Chinese-made product.

VIRGINIA BEACH Regulating wetlands is hardly an easy task in marshy Hampton Roads. Take, for example, the case against developer Glenwood South LLC, which involves the city, the state and the construction of 19 homes near Stumpy Lake.

Smithfield Foods' stock rose in heavy trading Thursday amid talk that the company might be bought. MSN.com reported that rumors flew through the market that the Chinese company COFCO "could be interested" in Smithfield. COFCO owns about 4 percent of Smithfield's shares, according to MSN.

NORFOLK Hampton Roads Bankshares Inc., hobbled last year by sour loans and an erosion of capital, said it expects to report a net loss of $143 million for 2009 largely because of a large provision for loan losses.

NEWPORT NEWS The Navy has awarded Northrop Grumman Newport News shipyard a nearly $81 million contract to prepare for a major overhaul of the carrier Abraham Lincoln.

VIRGINIA BEACH Car rental company Avis Budget Group and insurance giant Geico plan to hire or relocate a total of 210 workers here in the coming months, Mayor Will Sessoms announced today in his State of the City address.

Thomas Rutherfoord Inc., a Roanoke-based insurance agency with an office in Virginia Beach, has been acquired by the Marsh & McLennan Agency unit of insurance broker Marsh Inc. The terms of the transaction weren't disclosed.