Maria Saporta, executive editor, is a longtime Atlanta business, civic and urban affairs journalist with a deep knowledge of our city, our region and state. From 2008 to 2020, she wrote weekly columns and news stories for the Atlanta Business Chronicle. Prior to that, she spent 27 years with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, becoming its business columnist in 1991. Maria received her Master’s degree in urban studies from Georgia State and her Bachelor’s degree in journalism from Boston University. Maria was born in Atlanta to European parents and has two young adult children. She launched SaportaReport in February 2009.
By Maria Saporta
The business relationship between the Gwinnett Chamber of Commerce and the Metro Atlanta Chamber began a healing process Thursday when Hala Moddelmog was invited to speak at the 1818 Club on Satellite Boulevard.
The healing is being made possible because there is now new leadership in place at both organizations, leadership that does not have a history of competition and a struggle for power.
By Maria Saporta
Dazzling the crowd. That was what the designers of the new Atlanta Falcons stadium hoped would happen when fans came to the “iconic” attraction when it opens in 2017.
Well if the ground-breaking is any indication, they are off to a good start.
PHILADELPHIA – Working as a region is as much an art as it as a science.
After 18 annual LINK trips to other cities in the United States and one to Vancouver, B.C., metro Atlanta’s attempts to create regional relationships across 10 counties is still a work in progress.
Perhaps one of the significant lessons that Atlantans have learned from other metro areas is that they struggle with many of the same issues as we do, and that includes being able to work together as a region.
By Maria Saporta
U.S. Senator Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.) made a passionate case for American involvement in foreign affairs — particularly in Africa — at the opening of Monday’s 3rd Annual Atlanta Summit: Health in Africa – the Unfinished Agenda.
Isakson has attended every one of the summits that bring together Atlanta’s multiple global health organizations and the nonprofit and for-profit sectors.
They include CARE, the World Affairs Council, GSU, CDC Foundation, Coca-Cola, UPS, AGCO and GE working with the Washington, D.C.-based Center for Strategic & International Studies.
By Maria Saporta
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on May 16, 2014
PHILADELPHIA – A delegation of 111 metro Atlanta leaders, who just returned from a study mission to Philadelphia, learned how Drexel University hopes to bridge its campus with its surrounding community by building over rail yards near the 30th Street Amtrak train station.
By Maria Saporta
Rome-based Berry College celebrated the public launch of an ambitious $100 million fundraising campaign Saturday night at a special dinner in Atlanta.
At the dinner held at the St. Regis, Berry College President Steve Briggs announced that $70 million in commitments already have been made towards the “LifeReady: The Berry College Campaign for Opportunity.”
One of the campaign’s co-chairs is Barry Griswell, a winner of the Horatio Alger award, who grew up poor with a single mom. Griswell’s inspiring story of how he is now co-chairing his alma mater’s $100 million campaign is an example of the impact that Berry College can have.
By Maria Saporta
Three years, three summits.
On Monday, Atlanta will hold the third annual global health summit — this year focusing on: “Health in Africa: the Unfinished Agenda.”
For the third year in a row, U.S. Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.) will be a keynote speaker at the summit — which will bring together many of the global health partners in philanthropy, government and business to focus on issues where mainly Atlanta-based organizations can work together to address some of the world’s most pressing problems.
“Each year I think they’ve gotten stronger and stronger as more people inside and outside of Atlanta hear about it,” said Helene Gayle, president and CEO of Atlanta-based CARE. “For me it’s been really gratifying to see how it’s brought different sectors in Atlanta together.”
By Maria Saporta
The prestigious 2014 Ivan Allen Jr. Prize for Social Courage will go to Beatrice Mtetwa, a human rights attorney from Zimbabwe, Georgia Tech President Bud Peterson announced Thursday.
Mtetwa is the first woman and the first non-Georgian to receive the Ivan Allen Jr. Prize – named in honor of the city’s enlightened mayor during the 1960s – which comes with a $100,000 cash award.
She will receive the prize and be honored during a ceremony at the Ivan Allen College of Liberal Arts scheduled for Nov. 13.
Mtetwa has fought against injustice and defended press freedom for more than 20 years. She has endured harassment and arrest as she has advocated for human rights, social justice and women’s equality and advancement.
By Maria Saporta
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on May 9, 2014
The Council for Quality Growth has tapped real estate businessman Steve Selig as the recipient of the 2014 Four Pillar Award.
The award is one of the most prestigious annual recognitions given to leaders who have had a major impact on the Atlanta region – from Tom Cousins to Arthur Blank to Shirley Franklin to Johnny Isakson to John Portman.
“It reads like a Who’s Who. These are all people I’ve looked up to and learned from,” Selig said in an interview from his company’s offices on Spring Street. “It’s overwhelming.”
By Maria Saporta
The Atlanta Chamber Players performed to a sold-out audience Tuesday evening at the New American Shakespeare Tavern — people turning out because they knew it was going to be an extraordinary night.
“What a special night it is,” said Paula Peace as she took the stage before dedicating the night’s concert to Douglas Sommer, a bass player with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra who had been scheduled to play that night with the ensemble but lost his battle to cancer on Feb. 27 at the young age of 54.
And while the concert was dedicated to Sommer, the night belonged to Paula Peace — the founding pianist and artistic director of the Atlanta Chambers — who was performing at her last concert in that role.
PHILADELPHIA – At the Bistro St Tropez restaurant overlooking the Schuylkill River and the 30th Street train station, Amtrak’s headquarters and multiple modes of public transportation, about 30 regional leaders from Atlanta gathered at an invitation-only dinner with Keith Parker, MARTA’s general manager and CEO.
They had been invited by Brad Alexander, a senior vice president of McGuire Woods Consulting, who wanted to bring together members of the 18th annual LINK delegation from Atlanta who were interested in regional transit and MARTA.
The energy in the room was contagious. As different people spoke, a prevalent theme emerged — transit is at a real tipping point in the Atlanta region.
By Maria Saporta
PHILADELPHIA – A ball of energy known as Jane Golden captivated the metro Atlanta LINK delegation during its three-day trip to the Pennsylvania city.
Golden’s underlying message was to show how the arts can help address an urban area’s most intractable problems and bring creative energy to a city’s streets, its walls and its heart.
In 1984, Golden went to work for Philadelphia’s newly launched Anti-Graffiti Network. Like many anti-graffiti efforts, the city would paint over the graffit, and within a few days, new graffiti would appear.
By Maria Saporta
PHILADELPHIA – The City of Philadelphia’s population peaked in the 1950s when it hit 2 million people, but as the suburbs developed and the central city deteriorated, the city’s population dropped to below 1.5 million people.
“Then in 2007-2008, we started to see that the population loss had sort of stopped and had moved back up,” Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter told the metro Atlanta LINK delegation of about 110 leaders visiting in his city for three days this week. “The millennial population was our largest percentage increase.”
Much of Philadelphia’s growth today, incremental as it may be, is directly tied to its 101 colleges and universities, including its five medical schools. Repeatedly, leaders in Philadelphia spoke about how its economy was being driven by “eds and meds” — education and the medical industry.
PHILADELPHIA – Former Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell told members of the metro Atlanta LINK delegation Wednesday night that “first and foremost you have to act as a region.”
Rendell went on to say: “If they are going to hear you at the state capitol, the city and the suburbs have to act as one; you have to care as one.”
Before serving as governor, Rendell was mayor of the City of Philadelphia, which has a population of 1.6 million people in a region of 6 million.
But what the LINK delegation had heard earlier in the day is that Philadelphia – much like Atlanta – often has problems thinking and acting like a region.
The greater Philadelphia area actually includes three states (meaning having to work with three governors and three state legislatures) as well as 350 local governments, according to Barry Seymour, executive director of the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission – the equivalent of the Atlanta Regional Commission.
By Maria Saporta
Pope & Land Enterprises confirmed Wednesday that it also has submitted a proposal to buy the 37 acres of land owned by Morris Brown College just west of the new Atlanta Falcons stadium.
“The bid was contingent upon working out an agreement to keep Morris Brown operating on a portion of the property,” said Mason Zimmerman, a senior vice president of Pope & Land Enterprises, while on the metro Atlanta LINK delegation trip to Philadelphia.
Pope & Land’s offer is the second known team bidding for the property. Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed disclosed last week that the City of Atlanta and Friendship Baptist Church had team up to make a $12.6 million offer to buy most of the property. Reed said the city-Friendship team’s offer was for the 37 acres “exclusive of the four or five academic buildings where Morris Brown could continue to operate.”
By Maria Saporta
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on May 2, 2014
United Way of Greater Atlanta enjoyed its second consecutive increase in its fundraising campaign, announcing April 29 that its 2013 campaign raised $74.15 million.
Milton Little, United Way’s president and CEO, said it also was the third increase in four years, which was an indicator that the Atlanta economy had stabilized.
“We celebrate our success but we don’t take it for granted,” Little said. “The reality for all of us in this fundraising world is that the challenges still persist. But the worst direct impact of the recession is behind us.”
It takes 50 years for a structure to be eligible to get designated as an historic building.
At this rate we will have little to nothing left to designate to memorialize our Olympic history.
That point really hit home last week when Atlanta welcomed planners from around the country and the world at the American Planning Association convention.
A panel of people who had worked and observed Atlanta’s Olympics effort
(Randy Roark – Corporation for Olympic Development in Atlanta; Tina Arbes – Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games; Sian Llewellyn – Metropolitan Atlanta Olympic Games Authority; and yours truly) spoke of the legacy that remains.
Without a doubt, Centennial Olympic Park – which Llewellyn described as “an afterthought” – is Atlanta’s crowning Olympic jewel. The park has done more to transform downtown than any initiative in the past 30 years.
By Douglas Sams and Maria Saporta
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on May 2, 2014
Developer Egbert Perry wants to transform the idle Doraville, Ga., General Motors Corp. plant into a thriving transit destination.
Perry, chairman and CEO of Atlanta-based The Integral Group LLC, confirmed the company could complete the acquisition of the 162-acre site by August.
Perry, one of the Atlanta’s best-known developers and chairman of Fannie Mae, is also teaming with Roswell, Ga.-based Macauley + Schmit on the project. The Integral-Macauley development group has the property under contract.
The site has been one of metro Atlanta’s most intriguing, since GM closed its plant in 2008 as part of a major restructuring.
By Maria Saporta
MedShare, a humanitarian aid organization that recycles and distributes medical supplies around the world, has a new CEO and president – Charles Redding.
Redding has been serving as chief operating officer of the organization since 2012. His new role is effective immediately.
He succeeds Meridith Rentz, who served as the organization’s president and CEO for the past three years. “Meridith resigned in early April to spend more time with her family,” MedShare spokeswoman Andrea Berry said in an email.
By Maria Saporta
Despite the results on the scoreboard, the Atlanta Braves actually won this weekend.
They held their second-ever Heritage Weekend event these past several days as a way to honor Atlanta’s Civil Rights legacy. The Atlanta Braves got the idea to create a Heritage Weekend after hosting the Civil Rights Game in 2011 and 2012.
When that game moved on to another city, the Atlanta Braves believed Atlanta should have an annual tribute to recognize its own Civil Rights heritage.
The highlight of the weekend was on Friday when the National Center for Civil and Human Rights and the Atlanta Braves held a luncheon when four living legends received Hank Aaron Champion for Justice Awards.
