Back in 2000, then Georgia Tech President Wayne Clough felt like an orphan in Atlanta.
The boundaries of Central Atlanta Progress, the downtown business organization, ended at North Avenue and did not include the Georgia Tech campus.
And the western boundary of the Midtown Alliance ended at the Downtown Connector.
In a videotaped message at a recent Technology Square 10th Anniversary Symposium — “A Decade of Innovation,” Clough said he thought at the time: “Nobody wants to claim Georgia Tech.”
By Maria Saporta
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on October 18, 2013
Responding to speculation that he will retire by early next year, Atlanta airport chief Louis Miller says he has made no plans on when he will step down.
Miller, who will turn 66 next April, was named aviation general manager of Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport in September 2010 after a nationwide search to find a successor to Benjamin DeCosta, who ran the Atlanta airport for 12 years.
By Maria Saporta
It was an old-fashion civil rights rally to honor civil rights leader Rev. C.T. Vivian.
In the atrium of Atlanta’s City Hall on Saturday afternoon, a couple of hundred Atlantans came to give Vivian a “Congratulatory Send-off in Celebration of the Presidential Medal of Freedom” that he will receive at a ceremony in Washington, D.C. on Nov. 20.
After numerous friends and dignitaries spoke of the role that Vivian played in the civil rights movement for more than six decades, the lanky leader of justice clapped his hands with a great smile on his face — repeatedly saying: “Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.”
By Maria Saporta
Revamping Underground Atlanta and improving Five Points MARTA station are two top priorities that emerged at the final official meeting of the Downtown Development Technical Advisory Group (DDTAG) Thursday evening.
The task force, established by the Atlanta City Council, has included about 25 civic and community representatives who have spent the last five months taking an in-depth look at how to best stimulate new development, improved urban design and a better quality of life in the heart of the city.
A.J. Robinson, president of Central Atlanta Progress, said the major goal of DDTAG was to leverage $2.5 billion worth of planned investment into $5 billion worth of actual investment as long as it was consistent with the community’s plans and visions.
By Maria Saporta
It’s not often that one hears from an environmentalist who has a hopeful view of the world.
After all, with climate change, income inequality, overpopulation, limited natural resources and political conflicts, most environmentalists would have you believe we’re headed to that point of no return — an earth that we have damaged so much that it could become uninhabitable to human beings in the foreseeable future.
And yet Sir Jonathon Porritt refuses to take such a gloomy view of the future. Porritt was in Atlanta on Oct. 9 to participate on a program with Laura Turner Seydel of the Turner Foundation, Howard Connell of Georgia Tech’s Scheller College of Business and John Gardner of Novelis at the Academy Medicine.
By Maria Saporta
Atlanta Falcons owner Arthur Blank is pleased with the recent progress for the new stadium development and the work that his foundation will be doing in the community.
“We are in a really good place,” Blank said in a brief conversation at the Four Pillar Award dinner in honor of Atlanta architect and developer John Portman on Thursday night. “We are really excited about the south site. It feels good to get the site solidified.”
Then looking to his dinner table neighbor Tommy Holder, one of the contractors of the new stadium project, Blank said with a smile: “We can finally put him to work. He’s been sitting on his (bottom).”
By Maria Saporta
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on October 11, 2013
It’s Atlanta, again.
Atlanta has won the 2015 gathering of the Nobel Peace Laureates — only the second time that the summit of international superstars will have been held in the United States.
By Maria Saporta
A “humbled” John Portman accepted the Council for Quality Growth’s Four Pillar Award Thursday night in the first hotel he ever designed — the ground-breaking Hyatt Regency Atlanta.
Portman, overcome with emotion several time during his acceptance talk, spoke about how his family has always been there for him — “especially Jan, my wife of 69 years.”
After thanking his professional family and friends, he thanked every one for showing up at the dinner, attended by nearly 1,000 people.
By Maria Saporta
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on October 4, 2013,
The Woodruff Arts Center has tapped Steve Cahillane, president of Coca-Cola Americas, to head its 2014-2015 annual campaign. He will succeed William H. Rogers Jr., president and CEO of SunTrust Banks, who is the current chair of the campaign.
By Maria Saporta
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on October 4, 2013
Atlanta can be one of the premier leaders in mobile technology, according to leaders in the industry meeting at the first Mobility Live! summit at the Woodruff Arts Center on Oct. 1.
By Maria Saporta
If Georgia State University were human, it probably would identify with Rodney Dangerfield.
For those younger than 30, Dangerfield was the comedian (1921-2004) who coined the catchphrase: “I don’t get no respect!”
But it may be time for Georgia State to be viewed as being in the same league as the much more revered University of Georgia and Georgia Tech.
GSU President Mark Becker was the keynote speaker at the Rotary Club of Atlanta Monday tracing the university’s roots back 100 years to 1913 when it was the Evening College of Commerce with 48 white men as students.
By Maria Saporta and Doug Sams
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on October 4, 2013
A year after first showing interest, developer Egbert Perry is the frontrunner to acquire the former General Motors Co. plant in Doraville, Ga.
By Maria Saporta
One of Atlanta’s best-kept secrets continues to be the Morehouse School of Medicine and its sister colleges at the Atlanta University Center.
Case in point was when six former U.S. Surgeons General convened at the Morehouse School of Medicine Thursday morning with a common theme — that serving as the nation’s top doctor transcends politics.
By Maria Saporta
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on September 27, 2013,
Holy Innocents’ Episcopal School on Sept. 24 had the public phase kickoff of the largest building campaign in its 54-year history.
By Maria Saporta
After a 10-year absence, Bill Nigut is returning to television.
Nigut, who had been WSB-TV’s chief political reporter and a presence on Atlanta television for more than two decades, will be joining Georgia Public Broadcasting on Nov. 20 as senior executive producer for a new television program that will launch in January.
The new half-hour program — “On the Story” — will air Monday through Thursday at 7 pm. on GPB’s nine-station statewide television network.
Nigut said he will not be an on-air talent but a behind-the-camera producer.
By Maria Saporta
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on September 27, 2013
As business leaders develop a growing appreciation for the value of early education, one metro Atlanta company is becoming a national force in the field.
By Maria Saporta
The south site is now the official site for the new $1 billion Atlanta Falcons football stadium.
In a letter dated Sept. 30, Richard McKay, president of the Atlanta Falcons, notified Frank Poe, executive director of the Georgia World Congress Center Authority, that the team has reversed its decision and that the south site is now “feasible” for construction of the new Atlanta stadium.
The decision follows the favorable votes of the congregations of two black churches in the past 10 days to seel their land so that the new stadium could be built on the site south of the existing Georgia Dome.
By Maria Saporta
The Atlanta Ronald McDonald House Charities announced Friday that it has named Beth Howell as its new president and CEO.
Howell currently is vice president of academic administration at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta. She succeeds former CEO Linda Morris who passed away in April 2013 after leading the organization for two decades.
According to a release from the Ronald McDonald House Charities, Howell will be responsible for growing the organization as it seeks to increase temporary housing and support services to families of ill and injured children being treated at local hospitals.
By Maria Saporta
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on September 20, 2013,
The United Way of Greater Atlanta decided to go virtual this year when kicking off its annual fundraising campaign on Sept. 18.
It also is making another major change — it is revising its annual campaign goal to include only workplace giving and not government and philanthropic grants.
By Maria Saporta
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on September 20, 2013
The National Center for Civil and Human Rights is building its leadership team with the hiring of Terrie Rouse, a seasoned museum and nonprofit executive, as its new chief operating officer.
