Freehling

Eric Freehling is the new Focus editor at the Butler Eagle.

The Butler County native will oversee features and community news coverage in the paper.

A Knoch High School graduate, he has been a reporter, copy editor and editor at newspapers in Kittanning, Bloomington, Ill., Houston and Chicago.

Freehling, 54, who replaces Sandy Marwick, lives in the Valencia area.

Zelie company gets national awardZELIENOPLE — IA Construction Corp. of Zelienople has received a national award for resurfacing work on Interstate 79.It received the National Asphalt Paving Association’s 2011 Quality in Construction Award for excellence in asphalt pavement.IA Construction was recognized for the milling and overlay of 8 miles of I-79 southbound between mile markers 96 and 88 in Butler County.

First National Bank gets service awardsHERMITAGE, Mercer County — First National Bank, the largest affiliate of F.N.B. Corp., has been picked for multiple customer service awards from the 2011 Greenwich Excellence in Banking Awards from Greenwich Associates, a research-based strategy management firm.First National Bank was an award winner for small business banking and middle market banking in three categories: overall satisfaction, relationship manager performance and branch satisfaction.Finally, FNB was a regional winner of the 2011 Greenwich Excellence Awards for middle market banking in overall satisfaction in the Northeast.Pick employee of the year with formNominations are now being taken for the eighth annual Butler County Employee of the Year award, sponsored by the Butler Memorial Hospital.Nominees must be an employee of a county business. The winner will be picked by a panel of judges made up of past winners.The award will be presented at the annual Butler County Chamber of Commerce’s Employee Appreciation Day Luncheon and Mini Expo scheduled for April 18 at The Atrium on Route 422.The chamber is providing nominations forms on its website, www.butlercountychamber.com, or by calling the office at 724-283-2222.

Higher oil prices lift Exxon’s 4Q profitNEW YORK — Exxon Mobil had a simple formula for success last quarter: It sold oil at higher prices.Everything else was a struggle for the largest U.S. oil company. Production fell, its refineries suffered from high costs and falling fuel demand, and it made less money on chemicals. Even its big investment in natural gas hasn’t paid off.But oil’s a different story. Global oil demand is outstripping supply. The U.S. benchmark price for crude rose 10 percent during the final three months of 2011.As a result, Exxon was able to charge customers more for crude, 27 percent more than a year earlier.That helped the company’s fourth-quarter income rise 2 percent. Net income totaled $9.4 billion, or $1.97 per share, compared with $9.25 billion, or $1.85 per share, a year earlier. Revenue rose nearly 16 percent to $121.6 billion.

Panasonic projects record net lossTOKYO — Panasonic nearly doubled its projected net loss for the fiscal year to a record $10.2 billion amid weak TV and mobile phone sales and ongoing restructuring costs after acquiring smaller Sanyo Electronics Co.Panasonic joins Sony and Sharp as the latest major Japanese electronics maker to predict huge losses for the year through March. That reflects the battering these brand name companies have taken from the yen’s surge, a weak global economy, last year’s tsunami disaster as well as flooding in Thailand, which disrupted supply networks.

PERSONNEL FILE

Timothy Schell, a Grove City physical therapist, has been reappointed by Gov. Tom Corbett to the state Board of Physical Therapy.———

Nick Anderson, assistant administrator for the Chicora Medical Center, has passed his Pennsylvania Nursing Home Administrator licensing examination and will now be named administrator of the skilled nursing and personal care home at 160 Medical Center Road, Chicora.