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
Athens — The third annual GeorgiaForward forum provided a spotlight on what victory looks like.
Three of the 12 regions in Georgia voted to pass a regional transportation sales tax during the primary vote on July 31.
One of those regions was the River Valley District — also known as the Greater Columbus region. In fact, voters in the Columbus region passed the tax with the highest margin of the three — 54.3 percent in favor versus 45.7 percent against.
By Maria Saporta
Conversations between Republicans and Democrats, conservatives and liberals, can be civil.
That was demonstrated at Monday’s meeting of the Rotary Club of Atlanta when right-leaning Ralph Reed had a political conversation with left-leaning Cynthia Tucker with Alec Fraser serving as moderator.
This was the third time the two have appeared together in a similar Rotary forum.
Fraser’s first question about the recent Republican and Democratic conventions.
By Maria Saporta
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on Friday, September 7, 2012
An out-of-date business model is at the core of the stalled negotiations between the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and its musicians.
ASO President Stanley Romanstein, in an interview on Sept. 5, put the Atlanta situation into a national context.
By Maria Saporta
Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed unveiled a preliminary plan of how to start paying for the city’s infrastructure backlog,
He met Monday morning with members of the Atlanta Committee for Progress — a blue ribbon business panel that helps advise the mayor on key issues facing the city.
The plan likely includes the city putting together a bond package for about $250 million to start paying for a $900 million to $1 billion infrastructure backlog — in the fixing of roads, bridges, sidewalks, parks, bike paths, traffic signals and other quality of life amenities.
Waffle House, founded on Labor Day, 1955, celebrated another chapter in its history on Saturday, Sept. 8 with the unveiling of a new historic marker at its very first restaurant — located in Avondale.
On Saturday, Sept. 15, another historical marker will be unveiled at the site of the Second Atlanta International Pop Festival, which took place in 1970 in a musical extravaganza that was Georgia’s version of Woodstock.
What do these two events have in common? Both signs represent an expanded approach to the historical marker program now being run by the Georgia Historical Society.
By Maria Saporta
The search for a new MARTA general manager has been narrowed to four candidates — an internal one and three from outside the state.
MARTA’s current general manager, Beverly Scott, will be leaving by the end of the year when her five-year term runs out.
Scott has been heading the state’s largest transit system through a tumultuous period of declining revenues, polarizing political forces and diminishing prospects of a reinvestment in an improved and expanded regional transit system.
By Maria Saporta
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on Friday, August 31, 2012
Back in 1956, Anne Berg joined Atlanta’s legendary Rich’s Department Store, eventually becoming vice president of public and community relations.
As Rich’s has faded from the retail landscape, Berg has been the human link between the former retail giant and the Atlanta community.
By Maria Saporta
Despite the failed regional transportation referendum, the region can not give up when it comes to improving metro Atlanta’s transportation system.
That was the bottom line message that Doug Hooker, executive director of the Atlanta Regional Commission, shared at the Atlanta Regional Housing Forum Wednesday morning.
Hooker acknowledged that the referendum failed because of a general distrust of government and the struggling economy.
By Maria Saporta
What a boneheaded decision.
Atlanta-based Cumulus Media has killed what little was left of 99X — one of the best known brands broadcast on the city’s radio waves for the past two decades.
On Saturday at noon, in the dead of day, Cumulus changed the 99X (which it had placed on the weak 98.9 signal) to 98.9/The Bone — a hard rock format that will try to grab listeners of the former Project 9-6-1 (which switched to a top 40 format last Wednesday).
In what has become a disorienting musical chairs among Atlanta’s radio stations, the losers will be those who love alternative rock sounds.
The Olympia building — a historic gem in the heart of downtown Atlanta — is for sale.
The two-story triangular building currently is owned by the State of Georgia — as a result of a $3.6 million gift from the Robert W. Woodruff Foundation in January, 1995 right before the 1996 Summer Olympic Games.
“There’s a significant amount of renovation that needs to be done to the building,” said Paul Melvin, communications director for the State Property Office. “Given our budget restrictions at this time, we thought it was best to sell it.”
By Douglas Sams and Maria Saporta
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on Friday, August 31, 2012
Prominent Atlanta developer and civic leader Egbert Perry is leading a team that could acquire and redevelop the former General Motors Co. plant in Doraville — almost two years after a similar effort collapsed.
Perry is among several developers that have considered the project, including Houston-based Hines, St. Petersburg, Fla.-based The Sembler Co. and Orlando, Fla.-based New Broad Street Cos.
By Maria Saporta
After more than 20 years of developing multi-use trails, Ed McBrayer is being honored by the Atlanta chapter of the Urban Land Institute.
McBrayer, co-founder and executive director of the PATH Foundation, will be honored with the Dan & Tally Sweat Community Leadership Award at ULI Atlanta’s 18th annual Awards for Excellence Dinner, which will be held on the evening of Thursday, Sept. 20 at the Atlanta History Center.
After nearly 21 years in existence, the PATH Foundation now has 3,500 members, and it has raised more than $420 million from public and private sources.
By Maria Saporta
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on Friday, August 24, 2012
As Margaret DeFrancisco, president and CEO of the Georgia Lottery, prepares for her upcoming retirement, she and her husband, Joseph, plan to stay in Atlanta.
“Honestly, I could not get my husband out of here with a crane,” DeFrancisco said in a telephone interview on Aug. 21.
Imagine it’s 2032. Georgia has become a national model of a prosperous economy where growth is enjoyed in every corner of the state.
In fact, Fortune Magazine is writing a cover story with the headline: “Georgia’s Deep and Wide Economy: How Prosperity Came to Every Part of the State.”
What does Georgia need to do in the next 20 years to make that vision a reality?
That is the question that the 2012 GeorgiaForward forum will seek to answer when it convenes 250 leaders from among the space at the Classic Center in Athens from Sept. 12 to 13.
By Maria Saporta
Update: The memorial service for L. Neil Williams Jr. will be held on Thursday, Aug. 30 at Trinity Presbyterian Church located at 3003 Howell Mill Road at 11 a.m. The service will be followed by a Williams family reception at the church.
L. Neil Williams Jr., a leading Atlanta attorney and civic leader, passed away Sunday evening from a massive heart attack.
Williams, 76, was in Winston-Salem, N.C. attending a Duke University function, according to bulletin that was sent out Monday morning by Trinity Presbyterian Church.
By Maria Saporta and Amy Wenk
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on Friday, August 24, 2012
As the Atlanta Falcons and the Georgia World Congress Center Authority get closer to sealing a business deal for a new stadium, they also are getting closer to deciding where the new stadium will be located.
The GWCCA has commissioned consulting firm Populous to do a thorough analysis of the two possible sites — a northern site near the truck marshalling yard at Northside Drive and Ivan Allen Jr. Boulevard and a second site south of the Georgia Dome along Martin Luther King Jr. Drive and Northside Drive.
By Maria Saporta
After years of having an all-male board, Aaron’s Inc. has added a second woman to its board of directors — Kathy Betty, an Atlanta business woman who is the former owner of the WNBA Atlanta Dream.
She joins Cynthia Day, the CEO of Citizens Trust Bank, on the Aaron’s board. Day joined the board in 2011.
“Kathy’s deep knowledge of business management and entrepreneurism will be a tremendous asset to our board,” said Ronald W. Allen, CEO and president of Aaron’s Inc.
By Maria Saporta
Contrary to public perception, Atlanta really is a robust sports town.
That’s the message that Rich McCay, president and CEO of the Atlanta Falcons, gave to luncheon attendees at the Commerce Club Thursday.
“Atlanta as a sports market is just fantastic,” McKay said. “This is an incredible market.”
By Maria Saporta
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on Friday, August 17, 2012
Atlanta’s 1996 Paralympic Games lives on through BlazeSports America — a national nonprofit organization that provides training and best practices to athletes with physical disabilities.
BlazeSports America is described as the “legacy organization” of the 1996 Paralympic Games in Atlanta — the first Paralympics to be held on American soil in the same host city as the Olympic Games.
By Maria Saporta
The mood was somber at Wednesday’s board meeting of the Atlanta Regional Commission.
Three weeks earlier, the 10-county region resoundingly defeated a regional transportation sales tax that the ARC had worked on for the better part of two years.
And on Tuesday night, two of its county commission chairs lost their run-off elections — possibly in part to their support of the transportation sales tax referendum.
