Upscale Shopping Center Sought for Bowie

Longtime Prince George's real estate developer Bill Chesley has designs on building a large shopping center on Route 301 in Bowie, across from Wal-Mart .

"We want nice, upscale stores," Chesley said. "We are in competition for these stores with Anne Arundel County."

The development is being reviewed by county planning officials and is awaiting zoning and engineering approvals. Chesley said it would be about 800,000 square feet and include office, retail and hotel space.

Firm Allies With University

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Hazmed Inc ., the Lanham environmental engineering and information technology company owned by Jacqueline Sales , has formed a relationship with Bowie State University to test homeland security technologies. Hazmed, which was founded 10 years ago, provides the federal government with border surveillance and first-responder dispatch systems.

The alliance between Hazmed and Bowie State brings together a minority-owned business and one of the oldest historically black universities in the country. Hazmed's clients will see demonstrations of the company's products on campus, exposing students to a wide array of businesses.

"Through this cooperative venture, [Bowie State] and its students will support the integration and evaluation of homeland security products and technologies and, where possible, support Hazmed on homeland security projects," Sales said in a statement.

Making the List

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Vocus Inc. of Lanham has joined the Russell 2000 index because of growth in the value of the company's stock. The stock market index represents many of the nation's smallest companies that are traded publicly on Wall Street. Vocus is one of a handful of publicly traded companies headquartered in Prince George's, and its inclusion in the index should help the company improve its visibility in the investment community.

Job Cuts Announced

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Hundreds of jobs could be lost in Prince George's in the coming weeks.

In Greenbelt, Northrop Grumman is eliminating 270 positions in the company's computer reseller business. In a statement last month announcing that it would close the business, the defense company said it wants to focus on its core capabilities rather than sell technology equipment to government agencies.

"After a thorough analysis of our options, we determined it was more advantageous for the company and our shareholders to quickly and decisively shut down the business," James O'Neill , corporate vice president and president of the company's information technology sector, said in a statement. "We will continue to honor our commitments to all of our customers, suppliers and vendor partners. With a large number of job openings at the IT sector and company-wide, we will work diligently to redeploy affected employees."

Also recently, Lanham-based Science Systems and Applications Inc . put the Maryland Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation on notice that it could lay off 237 employees who have been working on a NASA contract to provide the space agency with scientific and technical support services. Science Systems and Applications provides technical services to the government and private sector.

The company's chief financial officer, Anoop Mehta , said he is working to avoid layoffs and regain the contract with NASA. Even if the company does not win the contract, the employees will probably be reassigned within the company or picked up by the selected contractor, he said.