Resume
ROANOKE CITY ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR – 1979-1995,
Downtown Projects
1. Anthem – then Blue Cross offices recruited to downtown Roanoke
2. Center in the Square & Garage – creation of Center in the Square and adjacent parking garage
3. City Market Building – conversation to a food court
4. Commonwealth Building – conversion of former federal building to a central home in downtown for State Offices
5. Hotel Roanoke & Conference Center – renovation and reopening of historic hotel, first tangible recruitment of VA Tech into the business affairs of Roanoke, one of the only publicly-owned conference centers in US that operates in the black
6. IBM/111 Franklin Road Building – recruited IBM to downtown Roanoke that resulted in this building at Franklin & Williamson Road being built
7. Inter-modal Transit Center – secured federal funding for the development of this project along Campbell Ave.
8. Norfolk Southern Office Building & Church Ave. Garage – helped keep NS presence in Roanoke and downtown with development of building and parking garage at Church and Franklin Roads
9. Wachovia Tower & Garage – recruited the developer & tenants to downtown for this project which included knocking down viaduct
10. Williamson Rd. Parking Garage – involved 3 phases of project
Non-Downtown Projects
11. Airport Runway and Terminal – commercial planes could not leave Roanoke Airport with airplanes full of passengers in hot-weather. Devastating impact to economic development. Able to work with officials in Reagan administration on reversing FAA staff recommendation against funding runway extension to solve problem. Tunnel on Airport Rd a result. Also, worked on new Airport Terminal for economic development purposes
12. Continuing Education – recognized negative impact of a lack of access to higher education to business recruitment, got State to fund initial higher education center at VWCC campus.
13. Deanwood Business Park – created a business park along Orange Ave. and Plantation Rd., and recruited initial set of companies that resulted in all sites being sold
14. Kimball Business Park – recruited companies that resulted in selling-out sites for this business park across from regional Post Office
15. Roanoke Centre for Industry & Technology – conceived and assembled initial 300-acre+ business-industral park on Orange Ave. Recruited initial companies that resulted in the park being sold-out and additional land purchased for expansion. Annually 1,000’s of “good-jobs” and millions of local tax dollars generated
16. UPS – recruited major regional UPS hub to Thirlane Road.
17. Valley View Mall – involved with initial development of Mall which has turned out to be largest taxpayer in City
CONSULTING PROJECTS – 1995-2008
18. Advance Auto – as their Consultant was able to convince them to locate a major part of office employees in City at Valley View Mall and Crossroads Mall
19. Art Museum – as their Consultant, recommended moving to site in the City Market, at the end of consulting engagement project still included an IMAX Theater.
20. Burrell Hospital Conversion
21. Carilion Biomedical Institute (CBI) & Park – negotiated 3-way agreement between Carilion, VA Tech & UVA on creation of CBI. Against tremendous odds and initial, multiple rejections of idea, was able to convince CBI Board to locate along Jefferson Street and the north side of Reserve Ave. over a 150 acre site along I-81 owned by Hollins University
22. Grandin Theater – involved with creation of idea, and subsequent work to renovate and reopen a closed Grandin Theater
23. Higher Education Center – conceived and sold initial idea of locating a higher education center in downtown Roanoke, involved with every aspect of development of the Center along N. Jefferson St. including securing $9 million from the State, recruiting the initial 16 higher education center tenants
24. Jefferson Center/Shaftman Hall – involved with the conversion of former Jefferson H.S. auditorium into current Shaftman Hall
25. Johnson & Johnson (J&J) Facility – as J&J’s site consultant was able to convince them to locate facility along 1-581 against stiff completion around the Country, this was last major company recruited to City of Roanoke
26. Roanoke Electric Steel – involved with development of new road
27. Shenandoah Hotel – involved with redevelopment of former hotel at Williamson Rd. & Campbell into mix-use project for Mill Mt. Theater
28. Smart Road – based on a nationwide competition of Department of Transportation helped convince then Governor Allen to build initial part of Smart Road in Montgomery County
29. Valley View Mall II – as Consultant to developer, worked to create expansion of mall to include area where stores like Target and Movie Theater are today, which generates millions of dollars of taxes for the City of Roanoke
30. Warehouse Row – as Consultant, moved Warehouse Row buildings owned by City from a stagnant project to a renovated and fully leased project
31. Winston Link Museum and Visitors Center – worked on the conversation of former train passenger station into a Visitors Center and Winston Link Museum
ROANOKE CITY SCHOOL BOARD 1995-2000,
32. Blue Ridge Technical Academy – first Charter School in Virginia, this school located in Higher Education Center was wildly successful in working with middle school and high school aged students that everyone else had given-up on
33. Buildings Maintenance – was a priority such that no school ever had to be closed because of too many rats
34. Competition with other Valley Schools – kept standards and programs to such a high level City Schools were not losing students in great numbers
35. Student Achievement Scores on SOL’s– highly ranked on many SOL tests among urban school system peers around the State
36. Teachers Salaries – for the first time, salaries for Roanoke City teachers was at or greater than National-Average. Teachers salaries took precedent over capital expenditures
ROANOKE CITY COUNCIL – SUCCESSES – 2004-2008
37. Building Department – led the way against stiff Council and Administration objections to bringing new leadership to the Building Department which as viewed as an obstacle to development in the City
38. Deer Slaughter – lead way to eliminate $80,000 from City budget that went towards killing Deer in City
39. Economic Development Department Move – against still Council and Administration objections was able to get economic development department moved out of Planning and reporting to the City Manager
40. Henry Street Kept Open – opposed efforts of Council and Administration to close Henry Street to vehicular traffic, aided by move of Social Security Building to Jefferson Street, plan was temporarily abandoned
41. Oliver Hill House – initially outvoted on effort to buy the boyhood home of Oliver Hill, Council reversed positions because of national embarrassment of celebrating Hill’ 100th birthday with no visible City assistance to the project
42. School Superintendent Leaves – lead 2-3 year effort to remove School Superintendent Thompson
43. Ukrops Development – not sure Ukrops development on Franklin Road would have occurred in the City without my active involvement to overcome continual Administration objections
44. Zoo Accreditation – actively involved with support to help the Zoo on Mill Mt. become accredited
ROANOKE CITY COUNCIL – UNSUCCESSFUL EFFORTS 2004-2008
45. Advance Auto – unsuccessful in getting the City to make a serious offer to bring the Advance Auto headquarters in downtown Roanoke
46. Amphitheater Location – unable to locate downtown
47. Amphitheater Operation – unable to prevent complete financial fleecing of the City by Operator from outside City
48. Blue Ridge Technical Academy Closed – unable to prevent highly successful Academy from closing, current Superintendent is working to get an equivalent school/program reopened
49. Business Friendly City Government – unable to create a “business-friendly” City Government
50. City Offices Leaving Downtown – unable to prevent over 400 City social service workers from leaving downtown to go to the Civic Mall
51. Civic Center Addition – unable to prevent the construction of the new $20 million building at Civic Center – Civic Center operating subsidy grown from $500,000 to over $2.5 million
52. Countryside Cloak of Secrecy – unable to get City to bring the Countryside neighborhood into its efforts to develop Countryside Golf Course, which created tremendous mistrust
53. Economic Development Offices – unable to get City Economic Development Offices to move from Franklin Rd to City Hall
54. Hancock Subsidy – unable to prevent City from making an $880,000 grant to the Hancock Building project on Campbell Ave.
55. Hotel Downtown – unable to get the City to move the new Civic Center building to a site adjacent to the Hotel Roanoke which could have lead to the Hotel’s desperately needed room shortage
56. J&J Building Sits Empty – the J&J building has sat empty for almost 4-years now which is a testament to the City’s poor efforts at economic development
57. Market Building Mishandled – unable to keep out of town operator from managing City Market Building, this was a disaster for the building, unable to prevent harassment of current, small tenants in the Market Building and the City’s poor maintenance
58. Parking Rates – unable to keep parking rates from being raised so high that they become a deterrent to keeping and attracting office tenants downtown.
59. School Size – unable to convince School Board of developing three, 800-student size high schools, despite overwhelming research of the positive impact it has on student recruitment and performance compared to zero evidence that a stadium at a school has any impact on student performance
60. Social Security Site – unable to prevent development of former Jefferson Street lodge site from being developed as new location for the Social Security offices, despite the building being 1/3rd-1/2 smaller than the last 3-office buildings built on the east side of Jefferson Street
61. Student Performance – unable to prevent dramatic drop in City’s ranking on student performance among its peer urban school system’s in the State
62. Teachers Pay – unable to keep teacher’s from dropping far below National Average because of emphasis on debt service instead of salaries
63. Victory Stadium – unable to prevent 22,000 seat plus economic development opportunity being replaced by a 3,500 seat facility on the campus of a high school
64. West End Center – unable to secure desperately needed City funding for the Center despite its years of success
