Passing through rural towns and countryside, drivers come across unmistakable beacons of another time. They represent glad tidings, plain beauty, and sacred space. They are the ground of memory, where words once uttered inside their walls hang like invisible curtains. They are spiritual mountains, despite their modest presentation — aging, mostly one-room structures graced by the simple lines of clapboard siding, shingles, pitched tin roofs, colored glass, and modest bell towers.
Posts
Posted inAccounting, Thought Leader, Uncategorized
Women and Money: Taking Control of Your Finances
As a woman, you have financial needs that are unique to your situation in life. With a financial plan in place, you’ll be better able to focus on your financial goals and understand what it will take to reach them.
Posted inLatest News
Senators Isakson and Shaheen show bipartisan support of two-year budget
By Maria Saporta
In an all-too-rare spirit of bipartisan cooperation, U.S. Senators Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.) and Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) appeared jointly at the Rotary Club of Atlanta urging for the federal government to convert to a two-year budget cycle.
“We have to change the way we do business in Washington,” said Shaheen, a former governor of New Hampshire who was elected to the U.S. Senate in 2008.
Posted inMaria's Metro
Snow Jam 2014 reveals to the world that metro Atlanta is a divided region
Snow jam 2014 opened a window for us see ourselves through the eyes of how the rest of nation and the world sees us.
And what they saw was an Atlanta that did not have its act together.
What they could not see or understand was why. From the images of cars and trucks on highways that had turned into parking lots they did not see political dividing lines separating the multitude of counties and cities in our region.
Posted inATL Business Chronicle, Maria's Metro
Squeeze play? Braves face ‘Herculean effort’ on new stadium
By Maria Saporta
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on January 31, 2014
For the Atlanta Braves to break ground on a new stadium in Cobb County by Jan. 1, 2015, a “Herculean effort” will be required to get all the legal and financial agreements in place.
The Braves, in fact, will have to accomplish in less than a year what is taking the Atlanta Falcons, the Georgia World Congress Center Authority and the city of Atlanta more than two years to put together. And the new Braves stadium is supposed to open ahead of the new Atlanta Falcons stadium in time for the 2017 baseball season.
Posted inGuest Column
Revenues rise, but Georgia’s policies remain stuck in recession mode
By Guest Columnist ALAN ESSIG, executive director of the non-profit, non-partisan Georgia Budget and Policy Institute
The good news for Georgia is the state’s economy continues to recover from the recent recession and state revenues are heading in a positive direction.
The not-so-good news is that our state’s leaders are putting a strong economy and job-growth at risk through spending decisions and policy priorities that are counterproductive in a post-recession environment.
Posted inDavid Pendered
Rent a bike just like a Zipcar: Atlanta to close deal on bike-share program
The centerpiece of Atlanta’s plan to start its first bike-share program is slated to be approved Monday by the Atlanta City Council. Bikes are to be rolling within a year.
The plan is for a private vendor to provide at least 500 rental bikes for use during a five-year contract. The two start-up areas are in Buckhead and Midtown/Downtown Atlanta, according to the legislation. Rental prices have not been released.
Atlanta is requiring each bike to be equipped with an array of comfort and safety features: At least seven gears, fenders, chain guards, luggage basket or rack, and a self-generating headlight. Bikes reservations will be handled via the Internet.
Posted inTom Baxter
Snow Jam ’14: The George Washington Bridge of Dumb
What happened last week was a watershed event in the transportation history of the Atlanta metro region, and very likely in the careers of a couple of politicians as well. But it’s important to remember how small a thing it was that touched it all off — small enough to make us the laughingstock of the country, sure, but small enough also to make us worry about how we’d deal with something worse.
The snow and ice that touched off the debacle was comparatively mild compared to the 2011 ice storm. It was more comparable to the 1982 Snow Jam, and that hysterical incident commenced much later in the working day with, if memory serves, much worse conditions.
Posted inLatest News
Atlanta Press Club unveils ‘Forward at Fifty’ initiative for 50th anniversary
By Maria Saporta
The Atlanta Press Club is celebrating its 50th anniversary in 2014 by looking forward rather than focusing on the past.
The APC’s “Forward at Fifty” initiative will seek to leverage the anniversary year as a way of strengthening the role of journalism in serving the public interest. The year-long series of events will unfold under three themes — “Celebrate, Educate and Engage.” The Cox Media Group will sponsor the APC’s “Forward at Fifty” initiative.
Posted inATL Business Chronicle, Maria's Metro
Column: New Livable Communities group to shape metro development
By Maria Saporta
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on January 24, 2014
Under the leadership of developer Mark Toro, the Livable Communities Council has selected an all-star group of 50 real estate professionals as members.
Posted inDavid Pendered
New life for talks about transportation funding, but no quick fixes in sight
The air in Atlanta and Washington suddenly seems filled with talk about creative methods of financing to pay for repairs to roads, bridges, sidewalks and other so-called transportation infrastructure.
At the state Capitol this week, a new consortium announced it was backing a revision of the TSPLOST approach to upgrading transportation. Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed, in his inaugural address this month, cited his plans to ask voters in 2015 to approve borrowing up to $250 million for infrastructure improvements.
President Obama, during his State of the Union address on Tuesday, called on Congress to approve new funding for roads and ports by this summer. On Jan. 16, a bill to create an infrastructure bank was submitted in the Senate by a bipartisan group. A similar proposal was filed in November in the Senate.
Posted inHome Mortgages, Thought Leader
The Digital House Hunt Increasing in Popularity
This week we are reflecting back on one of our most popular columns. The digital house hunt is growing bigger than ever. Learning about consumer behavior is critical for growth for Realtors, MLOs and home sellers. As consumers scan the Internet for best deals on products, informative how-to videos and advice columns, it should come […]
Posted inDavid Pendered
Good news for icy metro roads: Savannah port closed, reducing number of trucks in Atlanta area
The Savannah port was closed Wednesday, which provided one saving grace for metro Atlanta’s weather-clogged roads.
“Any truck traffic that would have been moving from the port to the city of Atlanta was eliminated or reduced significantly,” said ports authority spokesman Robert Morris.
Gov. Nathan Deal said Wednesday that jack-knifed tractor-trailer rigs on metro Atlanta roads had contributed to the region’s paralysis after wintry weather shut many roads Tuesday afternoon. A significant proportion of trucks in the region are headed to or from the Savannah port.
Posted inDavid Pendered
Atlanta council slows plan to reroute MLK for reported VIP parking lot at south side of Falcons stadium
A committee of the Atlanta City Council tapped the brakes Tuesday on what had been a fast-moving proposal to allow Martin Luther King Jr. Drive to be rerouted in a way that’s said to provide for VIP parking at the new Falcons stadium.
Instead of fast-tracking the proposal, Utilities Committee Chairperson Natalyn Mosby Archibong won support for her suggestion that the committee convene a work session on topics involving the MLK Drive corridor. The impact of such a delay on the stadium project is unclear, but some reports suggest the stadium design is not so far along that it couldn’t be changed if MLK Drive is to be left intact.
Hans Utz, Mayor Kasim Reed’s deputy COO, told the committee that concerns about the proposal are premature until after Atlanta has agreed to abandon land to facilitate the stadium. Meanwhile, the city’s control over six parcels of land is said to be the last bit of leverage Atlanta has over the stadium project.
Posted inLatest News
New strategy, tax for transportation supported by former adversaries in 2012 TSPLOST referendum
By Tom Baxter
A coalition of groups from both sides of the 2012 battle over the regional transportation referendum has agreed on a set of points, which they say could break the current logjam over transportation planning.
The former opponents said they all could back a transportation strategy that allows flexibility in letting counties and municipalities to band together, under the mantra of “one project at a time,” to identify needed transportation projects and local SPLOSTs to fund them.
Supporting the new approach at a Tuesday press conference were Michael Sullivan and Seth Millican of the Georgia Transportation Alliance, which supported the 2012 TSPLOST; Debbie Dooley of the Atlanta TEA Party, and Neill Herring and Colleen Kiernan of the Sierra Club, two organizations that had opposed the measure.
Posted inLive Healthy, Atlanta!, Thought Leader
Don’t Get Jittery Over Studies: Our Favorite Beverage is Good for Us
By David Martin, President and CEO of VeinInnovations Americans love coffee. We’re the world’s largest consumers of java – 83 percent of adults drink it. Our national average is three cups a day, per person. The history of coffee in America is a long one. The first coffee trader opened shop in Boston in 1670 […]
Posted inSaba Long
National Republican Party seeking consensus as 2016 election nears
A few days ago, Arizona’s GOP leadership formally censored the state’s senior U.S. Sen. John McCain for what they deem to be a liberal voting record.
U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell, who infamously stated that the single most important thing the Republican Party could achieve was for President Barack Obama to be a one-term president, is facing primary opposition for not being a conservative Republican.
Posted inLatest News
National Arab Orchestra holds its concert premier in Atlanta
By Maria Saporta
A sold out audience attended the world premier concert of the National Arab Orchestra at Atlanta’s Symphony Hall Friday night — living up to its billing — “Building Bridges through Music.”
Even Gov. Nathan Deal wrote a letter of welcome to the National Arab Orchestra and the concert attendees that was printed in the evening’s program. “On behalf of the State of Georgia, it is a pleasure to be a part of this special performance,” Deal wrote.
The host of the Atlanta concert was Nue Medical Consulting, a health information technology company based in Lawrenceville. The event helped the National Arab Orchestra in its quest to meet a $100,000 challenge grant from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation Arts Challenge for an inaugural innovative music program to benefit Detroit’s students.
Posted inDavid Pendered
VIP parking at Falcons stadium to require big changes in MLK Drive
A planned VIP parking lot at the future Falcons stadium will require a virtual dead end of Martin Luther King Jr. Drive at the stadium, and will affect the road’s ability to become the grand boulevard envisioned by Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed.
[Scroll down the story to see a gallery of photos of the Martin Luther King Jr. Drive corridor.]
The first public discussion of this proposal is scheduled Tuesday morning during the Atlanta City Council’s Utilities Committee.
The Falcons contend fans will benefit from VIP parking and related traffic management plan that will enhance their game-day experience. Others disagree.
Posted inEleanor Ringel Cater
‘Jack Ryan: Shadow Agent’ – a throwback to good spy movies of old
You know how the same word can have a different meaning?
Like pot and a pot. Or grass and some grass. Or dope and a dope.
I have no idea why all my examples are marijuana-related. A vote for Georgia to go medicinal perhaps?
Anyway, when you winter-ize your home, it’s a good thing. It means you’re thinking ahead. Less draft; less money spent on your gas/electric bill.
But when Hollywood “winter-izes” a movie, it’s usually not a good thing.
