By Guest Columnist CAROLYN BOURDEAUX, director of the Center for State and Local Finance at Georgia State University
As a city of Atlanta taxpayer, I have a “love-worry” relationship with tax allocation districts (TADs): I love some of the projects that Atlanta has used TADs to finance, but I worry about whether we are keeping a close eye on the cumulative impact of this and other economic development finance tools.
A coalition of state and federal agencies, power companies and the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians have joined an effort to protect a freshwater fish that’s being considered for the federal endangered species list.
The mixed use development planned at MARTA’s Brookhaven Station has been put on hold by Brookhaven city officials, who want to have a broader discussion about the area’s infrastructure before homes, shops and a hotel are built at the site.
By Maria Saporta
As published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on February 19, 2016
Zoo Atlanta has been hard at work raising money – announcing another $7 million in new gifts — toward its “A Grand New View: Elephants, Events and Expansion” campaign.
The coming days could tell a lot about the potential of the Palmetto Pipeline being built across sections of Georgia and South Carolina.
Fulton County Commission Chairman John Eaves has been working for months to build consensus among all the mayors in his county on how to move forward with transportation funding.
At Tuesday’s meeting of Fulton’s mayors and county commissioners, the various political leaders moved a step closer to consensus – with the exception of Alpharetta Mayor David Belle Isle.
By Guest Columnist CHRIS MANGANIELLO, policy director for Georgia River Network
More than 150 conservation advocates from the mountains to the coast are making sure their voices are heard at the Capitol – urging legislators to cast votes for clean water. In the wake of the Flint, Mich. drinking water crisis, nothing could be more important than securing clean water for all Georgians.
Georgia added about 285 solar jobs in 2015, moving the state to 15th place in the nation in terms of the number of solar jobs, according to the 2015 jobs census by The Solar Foundation.
Georgia is among the 25 states that prevailed in their effort to have the U.S. Supreme Court delay the centerpiece of President Obama’s environmental agenda.
Georgia has created a position, paid with public/private funds, to recruit and retain hunters and shooters. The purpose is to maintain and grow the level of funding for conservation and law enforcement on state land, according to the state Department of Natural Resources.
For decades, Georgia has had several road-building initiatives geared to attracting new companies to the state.
They’ve been called developmental highways or the Governor’s Road Improvement Program (GRIP) – and they’ve all involved spending hundreds of millions of dollars of state money to build four-lane roads to almost every corner of the state.
SunTrust has purchased a TV ad during Super Bowl 50 to launch a consumer education campaign. It intends to help people ease their financial stress by helping them improve their skills managing money.
The board that oversees the Georgia Ports Authority on Wednesday announced the appointment of a new executive director, just a week after announcing that 2015 was the ports’ busiest year ever.
The state port in Savannah handled a significant increase in freight in 2015, compared to 2014, and is purchasing four new cranes to expand its ability to move cargo. State transportation officials are working to respond to a demand for mobility to and from the port.
A new analysis shows Georgia ranks 20th in the nation in terms of its desirability as a place to retire. Meanwhile, Census figures show the region is graying and the fastest growing age group is aged 45 years to 64 years.
Here we go again. Another year. Another transportation debate.
This time, Fulton County wants a five-year penny sales tax for transportation.
The idea is gaining steam among the mayors of the various Fulton cities who want new funding — primarily for roads.
The transportation funding bill enacted by the Georgia Legislature this year has helped the state draw down additional federal funding in the transportation bill now being negotiated in Congress, according to the Georgia Chamber of Commerce.
In the end, an Athens-based company didn’t win a big award for its intelligent lighting system to grow plants indoors. But the company did make it to the Top 10, which introduced it to thought leaders from around the world who gathered in Savannah for the international Ocean Exchange competition.
Georgia’s ports are on a roll, and the Georgia Ports Authority has drawn up a $1.4 billion plan to expand port facilities over the next decade in order to cement Georgia ports as the primary ones to serve the entire Southeast U.S., the authority’s executive director, Curtis Foltz, said Thursday.
The Atlanta Regional Commission recruited some of the sharpest millennial minds in metro Atlanta to come up with their best solutions to the region’s thorniest problems. The overarching response is that no challenge is too great if folks are willing to try new things and work together.
