NAV's new Miss. office

LAKE HORN, Miss.--In early May, North American Video opened the doors to its fourth regional office here, not far from where Arkansas, Tennessee and Mississippi meet on the banks of the Mississippi River. But it is another body of water, that of the Gulf of Mexico, that has accelerated efforts here, as the Mississippi gaming industry works to rebuild operations nearly totally wiped out by Hurricane Katrina last year. Director of NAV's southeast region Michael Stark is overseeing a staff of more than 25 working from the office on jobs like the Beau Rivage Casino, in Biloxi, Miss., which plans to hold a grand reopening on the first anniversary of Katrina's landfall, this year. "We surveyed the damage early on in the Gulf Coast region and were deeply saddened by the devastation," Ron Freschi, director of large systems sales for NAV, wrote in an email interview. "As a result, we feel we have a responsibility to help restore some form of normalcy to the area ... North American Video is involved with several large security installations in the Gulf region--some of which are taking place in a very aggressive time frame like the Beau Rivage system rebuild we are presently working on 24/7 ... Our work with companies like Edwards Electric on the Beau Rivage project is a massive effort that will result in thousands of jobs over time and will draw tourism back." The gaming industry represents a significant portion of NAV's business, Freschi noted, and the Mississippi expansion is also due to a nearly 50 percent increase of revenues in 2005, helped in large part by gaming business.