By David Pendered
Time is running out for Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed’s administration to present the City Council with a list of proposed winners for 152 pending food, beverage and retail contracts at Atlanta’s airport.
The recommendations must be delivered this week if the council is to mull them over the winter holiday. The council begins its annual two-week vacation at the close of business on Friday, Dec. 16.
According to Jean-Luc Godard, “The cinema is truth 24 frames per second.”
According to Martin Scorsese and his wondrous new film “Hugo,” the cinema is dreams 24 frames per second.
Not, perhaps, what you’d expect from the man famous for such down-and-dirty pictures as “Taxi Driver,” “Mean Streets” and “Goodfellas.”
But it is absolutely true of “Hugo,” Scorsese’s astonishing valentine to cinema that’s also the best Film 101 you could ever imagine (or dream of…?)
By Maria Saporta
Elected leaders in the Atlanta region are becoming increasingly concerned in the direction of a Regional Transit Governance Task Force established by Gov. Nathan Deal.
“There’s no question that the state is still struggling with wanting to control everything,” said Mike Bodker, mayor of Johns Creek, adding that “you have every right to control what you pay for.”
The Atlanta City Council and Atlanta Board of Education have agreed to meet Dec. 12 to discuss the future of the city’s public school system and its facilities.
The upcoming meeting, the second in two months, is further indication of concern among city leaders for the city’s school system as it seeks to recover from the CRCT cheating scandal and an enrollment far below the system’s capacity.
By Maria Saporta
Friday, December 2, 2011
The high-profile boutique law firm of Dillard & Galloway is dissolving as real estate attorney Doug Dillard and two other partners are joining the firm of Weissman, Nowack, Curry & Wilco.
At the same time, Dillard’s law partner for 28 years — Woody Galloway — is forming the Galloway Law Group, which
By David Pendered
The tipping point for some Riverkeepers was the death in May of 33,000 fish in the Ogeechee River, a shallow waterway that drains more than 5,500 square miles of sand hills and coastal plain into Ossabaw Sound, south of Savannah.
That incident propelled the Riverkeepers to call Tuesday on the appointed board members who oversee the Department of Natural Resources to provide the political backbone to protect the state’s rivers, creeks and wetlands. That includes securing adequate funding from the Legislature to enforce environmental rules and laws.
When I was an editor of my weekly paper in college, I was invited by Staige Blackford, the editor of the Virginia Quarterly Review, to join a lively morning coffee group. You never knew what the gathered professors or writers were going to discuss each morning, but you knew the conversation was going to be interesting.
When SaportaReport launches our Thought Leadership pages in January, readers of this website will be able to join a lively discussion on a wide variety of subjects over the course of 2012.
Next year’s transportation sales tax referendum appears to be the only hope for addressing any of the challenges facing Georgia’s economic development.
The sales tax would raise a projected $18.6 billion over a decade if voters in each of the state’s 12 transportation districts approve the tax in July. To put that in perspective, the state’s current budget is about $16 billion and Gov. Nathan Deal has asked his agency heads for 2 percent cuts for FY 2013, in light of economic forecasts.
By Maria Saporta
It’s time for Atlanta to lead again.
That was the message that Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed delivered Monday at a Commerce Club speech. The mayor thanked the audience of mostly Commerce Club members for their support of the city, but he clearly was trying to re-energize Atlantans to believe in the city once again.
The numbers are sobering.
Georgia’s boom days are becoming a distant memory. For decades, Georgia’s growth had far outpaced the nation’s growth rate. But that changed in the past decade, and economic forecasters predict this downward trend to continue in the coming decade.
Those numbers bring us to the hard truth.
Atlantans are known for volunteering, but be careful when you help others.
You may instead end up helping change your own heart and mind. That’s what happened to a pair of volunteers who pitched in for the AIDS epidemic in the early 1990s.
The epidemic provoked an epidemic of fear, prejudice and isolation, and profound change in volunteers as well.
By Maria Saporta
Friday, December 2, 2011
After 100 days in Atlanta as the new president of CredAbility, Phil Baldwin is a study in contrasts — rural versus urban, rich versus poor, local versus national and international.
Baldwin is welcoming his new role of leading the Atlanta-based national nonprofit credit counseling organization as a way to help change the economic equation for Americans living on the financial edge.
By Guest Columnist VERNON JONES, former CEO of DeKalb County
As a young state representative in the Georgia General Assembly, I predicted white Democrats would become an endangered species in the South.
In 1991 when re-apportionment occurred in Georgia and other Southern states, there was a major push to have more seats created for African-Americans in local, state and congressional districts.
MARTA GM/CEO Beverly Scott plans to talk up the benefits of solar power at a Wednesday luncheon amidst rising political debate over the future of federal solar energy subsidies.
MARTA benefitted from such a program. Two weeks ago, the transit system unveiled its $10.8 million solar canopy at the Laredo Bus Facility near Decatur.
By Maria Saporta
Transit is in the spotlight as metro Atlanta marches toward the July 31, 2012 referendum on a one-cent regional transportation sales tax.
The Urban Land Institute is bring a national forum to Atlanta Dec. 6 to Dec. 7 — to be held at the Renaissance Atlanta Waverly Hotel in Cobb County — a place that has been debating the merit of transit investment over roads.
Everyone wanted a piece of Marilyn Monroe.
The Kennedy brothers, who used her like frat boys.
Arthur Miller, who married her, divorced her, then shredded her in several of his works.
By Maria Saporta
The founding headmaster of the Atlanta International School lived just long enough to see his beloved school break ground on a building that will be named in his honor.
Miles “Alex” Horsley died Dec. 1 at his home after a “spirited” battle with cancer, according to an email that the school sent out on Friday. A memorial service in Horsley’s honor is planned for Jan. 14, 2012.
By Maria Saporta
The Atlanta History Center has selected the architectural team for its “Re-Shape History” redesign — Pfeiffer Partners of New York City.
The history center’s Properties & Capital Projects Committee made the selection, according to Jackson McQuigg, vice president of properties for the center.
“We’re all very excited by the decision,” McQuigg said about the Dec. 1 announcement of the architectural team.
By Maria Saporta
The City of Atlanta has a new sustainability director — Denise Quarles — formerly vice president of environmental affairs and director of business development in the energy division of Southwire, a Carrollton-based manufacturer of electric wiring.
In a release, Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed said:
“Denise comes to the city from the private sector with an outstanding track record of leading successful sustainability initiatives. I am pleased that
By Maria Saporta
A new organization — Better Georgia — is launching a statewide campaign beginning today, Dec. 1, to organize voters across the state who are disappointed with the current direction at the capitol.
Better Georgia specifically is focusing on Gov. Nathan Deal and leaders of the General Assembly and urging them to work on schools and jobs instead of political wedge issues, like immigration, which divide the state and make it unattractive to business investment and
