Featured Articles
First Annual Committee Chair/Member of the Year
At the November luncheon, GEDA presented the First Annual Committee Member of the Year and Chair of the Year Awards. We present these as a way to say thank you to the numerous volunteers who spend so much time making GEDA the great association that it is.
 Because of his great work with the Business Recruitment Committee, specifically with doing such great work making our Brokers' Event a huge success, Elbert Rivers with Rooker was awarded the Committee Member of the Year Award.
Joy Wilkins, chair of the Professional Development Committee, was honored as our Committee Chair of the Year for her tireless efforts in promoting GEDA's professional development scholarships, as well as leading the effort to create the new CEcD Exam Prep Class.
Congratulations to both Elbert and Joy!
For 2015 and 2016 ...
 GEDA is very happy to announce the dates and locations of the 2015-2016 GEDA Spring Workshops! Based on feedback from you, we solicited bids from properties all over the state and selected two that you said were your favorites. Here are the dates and location of the next four Spring Workshops:
- May 15-17, 2013 - Jekyll Island
- May 14-16, 2014 - Brasstown Valley
- May 20-22, 2015 - Callaway Gardens
- May 18-20, 2016 - Sea Palms @ St. Simons
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One More Look at Our 2012 Scholarship Recipients
GEDA has awarded over $100,000 in scholarships to our members in the last 15 years. 2012 was no different with the following 15 individuals receiving professional development assistance:
- Georgia Tech Basic Course: Dawn Malin (Okefenokee Chamber of Commerce), Charles Lee (Development Authority of Washington County) and Laura Hale (Development Authority of Butts County)
- Economic Development Institute: Roger Harrison (Covington-Newton County Chamber of Commerce)
- GEDA Spring Workshop: Dorie Bacon (Screven County Development Authority), Paige Gilchrist (Mitchell County Development Authority) and Samantha Ovsak (Cobb Chamber of Commerce)
- IEDC: Wally Orrel (McIntosh County Industrial Development Authority) and Terry Schwindler (Macon Economic Development Commission)
- GEDA Annual Conference: Paula Herrington (Jenkins County Development Authority), Heath Tippens (Cherokee Office of Economic Development), Linda Moore (Barrow Economic Development Council) and Andrew Carnes (Dalton-Whitfield County Joint Development Authority)
- International Missions: Cal Wray (Dublin-Laurens County Development Authority)
- Penn Worden Grant: Meghan Duke (Valdosta-Lowndes Industrial Authority)
We will again award as much as $15,000 in scholarships in 2013. Our application deadlines will be February 1, March 30 and August 2. Look for more information and applications very soon!
New Stuff Added
End of the year means it's a GREAT time to update your GEDA membership profile! Have you changed jobs? Changed email address or cell phone? Have you lost 15 pounds and want a new profile picture? Married and need to add a spouse name? All of that fun stuff is still right where it's always been. But wait, there's more!
We have added a few new fields for you in an attempt to create a more interactive membership experience for you. If you are involved with Facebook, LinkedIn or Twitter, we have a place for you to add a link to your page/profile/handle/moniker. Just copy the link from your page and paste it into the fields provided. Click save and your done!
But wait, there's STILL more! GEDA has recently adopted a new media/PR strategy and we will be much more proactive about communicating the value of what you do every day. To that end, we have a "local media contact" section on the profile now too. This is just a place to let us know who to contact when you win an award, a giant project or something else that is newsworthy.
And there may even be a prize drawing for those people who completely fill out their profiles. Just maybe.
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2013 Events Calendar
December. NO MEETING. Happy Holidays!
January 30. Legislative Luncheon. Invite your legislators today!
2013 Calendar is available now too!
New Members in November!
Brittany Romig, Jackson EMC
Roy Beeson, MBP Construction
App of the Month
 The new year is almost upon us. And what January is complete without New Years resolutions? And what February is complete without regret about not following through on one or more of those resolutions? LIFT is a new app that helps track your progress toward any goal you set: read more, drink more water, floss, exercise, etc. You set the goal and then the app helps you record progress along the way! Free, for iPhone and iPad. Learn more or download today!
Have an app to recommend to us? Fill out this simple form.
Interest in Becoming a CEcD?
As you know, Georgia is the second most successful state in the country for professionals gaining their Certified Economic Developer (CEcD) status. Georgia is noted by the International Economic Development Council (IEDC) as a leader in offering professional development assistance to the membership. In addition to all of our scholarship offerings, the Professional Development Committee also brought a CEcD Training Course to Atlanta in April of this year. In our first year, we had 15 participants from around the country come in for a day and a half of training on the exam. Feedback was extremely positive. Without yet even deciding if we will repeat the class in 2013, we have received several unsolicited inquiries about the class from outside Georgia. If demand is there, we will definitely offer it again. So, are you interested in the CEcD status? Are you close to being able to sit for the exam and need a study guide? Let us know! We have several things you might be interested in:
- CEcD Study Group
- One-on-one mentoring from a GEDA member who has been through the exam process
- The exam itself. Yes - GEDA is very close to announcing that we will host the exam here in Atlanta in late 2013. Dates, details, location etc are all still to be determined.
If you're interested at all, let us know!
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