Equity in Atlanta #1 | All Eyes on ATL

What’s the buzz with Atlanta? What is driving economic development in this city, and why should we be paying attention?

Atlanta is the third fastest growing metro region in the nation, now weighing in at almost 5 million people. Jump started by a reinvestment in downtown Atlanta for the 1996 Summer Olympics, the growth we see today has made the city home to startups and Fortune 500 companies including Mailchimp, Home Depot, UPS, and Delta. Atlanta boasts the world’s busiest airport, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, which contributes to the city’s business-friendly character. The city is an important enclave for black business owners and entrepreneurs: 31% of metro area businesses are black-owned. Flagship initiatives like the Aerotropolis and the Atlanta BeltLine are bringing new life and economic vigor through creative new partnerships, business models, and comprehensive master plans designed to support the vitality of Atlanta’s residents and industries.

In thinking about inclusive economic development, however, we have to ask: who is missing from this picture and who is at the table? How are Atlanta's leading organizations working together to impact change? A closer look at Georgia Tech’s massively successful engineering programs shows, for example, that of approximately 30,000 students, only 42 graduated from Atlanta public high schools -- a concern the university is taking active steps towards addressing. Throughout the conference, Karp Strategies was blown away by the examples of partnerships and deep, cross-sector collaboration. From Delta connecting with middle schoolers to the dozens of organizations working together to assess access issues around workforce development challenges, Atlantans demonstrated that MANY parties need to be at the table to ensure equity, and in many cases, we need to make the table bigger to ensure we all fit.

Call to Action | Launching the Equity in Atlanta Series

Following almost a week in Atlanta, GA, visiting with local organizations, companies, and at the Annual International Economic Development Conference, two things are certain:

locally-produced tomato jam is a culinary marvel, and we absolutely need to be paying attention to Atlanta as a city driving catalytic economic development projects that embed equity into their models.

Karp Strategies presented a conference session on creative engagement strategies at IEDC with James Rojas, founder of Place It!, and Julian Kiganda, CEO of JBK Designs to an unsuspecting crowd of practitioners who within minutes were using everyday objects to bring their ideal inclusive economies to life - and learning hands-on solutions to bring back to their thorniest challenges.

This year’s conference theme, inclusive economic development - fulfilling dreams, offered an immersive look at some of Atlanta’s flagship projects such as the BeltLine and Aerotropolis, deep conversations with practitioners from around the globe, and surfaced questions of how equity shows up in community economic development and real estate projects.

Both the conversation and practice of economic development is changing nationwide and to keep pace, we’re going to have to ask the hard questions.

Barely off the plane, we’re excited to report back to our closest partners and colleagues in real-time to share what we learned and its very real implications on our collective everyday work. We hope this update is useful to you in your daily practice.

Some of the big questions that surfaced last week are outlined below. Click on a question to read our take and as always, please don’t hesitate to reach out to continue the conversation! We would be happy to connect you to those we met in Atlanta, or talk with you about how we can support your work. 

Equity in Atlanta #1 | What’s the buzz with Atlanta? What is driving economic development in this city, and why should we be paying attention?

Equity in Atlanta #2 | What is equitable economic development anyway - new buzzword or can I take real action to bring it to my project?

Equity in Atlanta #3 | How can we advance seemingly impossible equitable development initiatives without being tied to political cycles?

Equity in Atlanta #4 | From railroad to public park, from an airforce base to a region’s leading film studio- what role do adaptive reuse projects play in the economic vitality of a region?

Equity in Atlanta #5 | How are we paying for these catalytic economic development projects?

Equity in Atlanta #6 | How do we build a skilled workforce to match our economic development initiatives and meet future demand?

To learn more about any of these topics or ideas that we brought back from IEDC, email us or give a call. We’re happy to share ideas, learn how we can support YOUR initiative, and connect you to anyone we met during our travels.

Short Sea Shipping with the Experts

Consultant Joseph Sutkowi at Karp Strategies joined our partners at Hatch, and other industry and agency leaders at SUNY Maritime’s Marine Highway Conference to discuss short sea shipping. The term refers to the movement of goods by water along coastal or inland waterways. In New York, this equates largely to barge shipments in and around New York Harbor, the Hudson River, and the Long Island Sound. Shifting more goods movement to waterways could reduce truck traffic around ports and on city streets and reduce shipping industry’s carbon footprint.

Here’s what the discussion has us thinking about:

• How can government and the private sector partner to both test the business model and build critical and necessary system infrastructure? And how do we begin to act on the Freight NYC plan?

• How can we engage other critical stakeholders in the conversation about short sea shipping, namely the longshoremen’s union, freight companies, and companies whose goods would utilize the service?

• How do build a system that would compete with trucking and rail on the critical dimensions of cost, time, and reliability?

Thank you NYCEDC, Kyle Conti Construction, McAllister Towing, and BrenCo for sponsoring today’s event!