‘Never, never, never give up’

By Tom Sabulis

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Cheerleader, strategist, man in the middle. As president of the Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce, an organization of 4,000 member companies that employ more than 700,000 workers, Sam Williams knows North Georgia’s assets and problems as well as anyone.

He spoke recently about chamber issues and the buzz from this year’s session of the general assembly:

Q: After years of inaction, the Legislature finally passed a transportation bill to fund relief for traffic problems. You must have thought that day would never come.

A: Well, we certainly have been working on it a long, long time, and I was taught by a lot of my mentors in the past to never, never, never give up. I think that this time the governor, lieutenant governor and the speaker had a similar point of view as to a statewide versus a regional tax, and the compromise was good — a regional tax in each of the regions of the state.

Q: Why do you think it took so long? Was it a failure of political leadership?

A: We have had a problem in our state of keeping pace with our economic success. This [transportation problem] is a byproduct of our success. If we had not had so many jobs come here and people move here, we wouldn’t have the problem. And the natural inclination of elected officials is to avoid huge capital expenditure outlays, whether it’s to do with water or transportation. But I think that the business community — not just in metro Atlanta but statewide — convinced all of them that we can’t delay this any more.

Q: How big is this for the metro area?

A: If the referendum passes [to support a sales-tax increase], the estimates are that it will garner about $8 billion over a 10-year period. Our local transportation leaders are going to seek federal funds, which could leverage that to as much as 
$13 billion.

Q: What projects might be tackled first if the referendum passes?

A: I think you can expect they are going to relieve the bottlenecks that we hear about on TV news every morning. I know that Cobb County leaders are expecting a light rail system from Kennesaw to Galleria and to Perimeter Center. And I think Gwinnett leaders may expect some type of light rail.

Q: It looks like MARTA will get a little bit of help, too?

A: The extensions of transit will have some relation to 
MARTA. It’s just hard to predict right now. The bottom line is, we’re not going to have enough money to fix the problem, but this is going to be a good start.

Q: How have businesses reacted to this news?

A: They’re relieved now that we at least have a plan under way to address congestion. And I would say that includes companies that have recently moved here, like NCR.

Q: It’s nice to be able to sell hope again, isn’t it?

A: Yes. And I would say that the same optimism applies to the water resolution in this session of the general assembly. That [a judge’s decision to restrict Lake Lanier water usage] was a draconian threat to metro Atlanta.

Q: Speaking of the water dispute with Alabama and Florida, it was pointed out recently that the leaders of the three states are leaving office soon and may not have the political power, or will, to get something done. Does that worry you?

A: It worries us, certainly. At the same time, the governor’s water contingency task force gave recommendations of what to do even if we don’t get relief from the judge’s order — certainly aggressive conservation, and the authority for emergency water transfers from counties surrounding metro Atlanta so that places like Gwinnett County wouldn’t suffer 90 percent of their water loss.

Q: Financially troubled Grady hospital just announced that it has turned a profit. Does it surprise you that it happened so fast?

A: I’m ecstatic. I would say the board of directors at Grady, led by Pete Correll, have picked the right management team and pushed for turnaround. And Mike Young showed that he was the right CEO, and the continued support of Fulton and DeKalb County are critical. They’ve shown that they’re up to the task of financial support of Grady.

Q: You just returned from Phoenix, where metro businessmen checked out how they solve problems. What’s so great about Phoenix?

A: Arizona State University. It was incredibly impressive to me. That university has partnered with the business community and the civic community and made a huge impact on the transformation of Phoenix. They tackled regional transportation problems with a half-penny sales tax referendum years ago. They’ve tackled water. In the west, those kinds strategies have gone on for 60-70 years. They have a water supply that’s cheaper per household than ours. At the same time, they have an awful lot that they admire about metro Atlanta.

Q: What does Arizona admire about us?

A: This economy. They are hugely envious of it. They have a great dependence on tourism, which is volatile in economic downturns. They admire the high-tech and bioscience industry that’s here. They wish they had Emory Medical School. They wish they had Georgia Tech.

Q: How are they handling the pushback on their new immigration law?

A: We heard speakers from both sides of the argument. I would say that, in terms of leadership, there is a division of opinion as to how aggressive this ought to be handled. As to the citizens themselves, all the opinion polls we saw, we were surprised that they favored the aggressiveness [of the law]. But the business community, the tourism and the economic-development leaders, were concerned about the backlash.

Q: What do you take away most from Phoenix?

A: How can we partner better with our universities. People have solved water problems in the west for 75 years, so we have a lot to learn, and we’re very late in the game. They look at us and say, gosh, you get 50 inches of rain every year, we get 7 inches a year, how can you have a water shortage? It shows that we’ve got a lot to learn in managing and storing our water.