Two Eastern Shore men among most influential leaders

By Linda Cicoira

    Two Eastern Shore men were chosen by Virginia Business Magazine to be among the 2021 top 500 most powerful and influential leaders in business, government, politics and education, in the state, for a second consecutive year.

   The magazine has been around for 35 years and has made the list for the last two years. It includes Gov. Ralph Northam, a native of Onancock, and Chad Ballard III, president of Ballard Fish & Oyster Co. Inc., in Cape Charles.

     Ballard left his job as an investment banking analyst, in 2008, to focus on selling Misty Points, Chincoteague Salts and Littlenecks, oysters and clams that have been his family’s livelihood for five generations going back more than 125 years. The company employs more than 150 people and is the. Parent company of Cherrystone Aqua-Farms and Chincoteague Shellfish Farms.

     Virginia leads the East Coast in hard clam and Eastern oyster production, according to a report from the Virginia Institute of Marine Science. The multimillion-dollar industry faced hardships in 2020, with restaurants closed due to the pandemic. Ballard is an associate board member on the Virginia Marine Resources Commission and serves on the East Coast Shellfish Growers Association board.

     Last year, Northam appointed Ballard to the states COVID-19 Business Task Force. In March, Ballard announced the sale of Cherrystone Family Camping Resort to Sun RV Resorts for $9.8 million. His first job was a retail associate at Wild River Outfitters, in Virginia Beach.

     Northam is a pediatric neurologist, who served as an Army surgeon during the first Gulf War. In 2007, he won the first of his two terms as state senator, then won the 2013 lieutenant governor’s race. In 2018, he became Virginia’s 73rd governor.