Columbus leaders tout the city at Georgia Capitol

A group of political and business leaders from Columbus made it to the Georgia Capitol on Wednesday to sell the city, Greater Columbus Chamber of Commerce President Brian Anderson said.

Led by Anderson and Mayor Teresa Tomlinson, the group from the chamber and city made its way to Gov. Nathan Deal’s office and the House of Representatives and Senate chambers.

The group grew to about 100 for an after-hours reception for General Assembly members and state officials at The Depot adjacent to the Capitol.

“We are not talking about any specific piece of legislation,” Anderson said prior to the photo opportunity with the governor. “We want to make sure they know how critical CSU and Columbus Tech are to our economic development. We want to make sure they know that economic development, which has been good for the state, is also good for Columbus. It is very generic.”

Anderson called it an “awareness effort” and not a lobbying effort.

Tomlinson briefly addressed both chambers on the third floor of the Capitol. She talked about the city’s larger public corporate entities — Aflac, TSYS and Synovus — and Fort Benning.

She called the day of meeting and greeting an opportunity to put the city’s best foot forward in the halls where major decisions are made and state funding is determined.

“First, it’s an opportunity to build relationships, which is critically important when we need state access or action on behalf of Muscogee County,” Tomlinson said. “And, it’s a chance to push a particular issue or two that’s important to us, such as laying the ground work for a high-speed passenger rail system in Georgia. A lot of work has been done on that. We can’t have Columbus left out of the effort.”

Tomlinson has been an advocate of high-speed rail most of her six years as the city’s mayor.

The group, which included, Chamber Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Joseph Brannan, Chamber Chairman Billy Blanchard, Jason Cuevas of Georgia Power and City Manager Isaiah Hugley had lunch with Gretchen Corbin, commissioner of the state Technical College System. They were joined by Columbus Tech President Lorette Hoover and other chamber executives.

Hoover said one of items discussed was a College and Career Academy. Last year, $3 million was awarded to Chattahoochee County to start one in its high school. The funding comes from a grant through the Technical College System.

“It is a great program, and the employer board of each academy makes sure the students have jobs,” Hover said. “There was discussion about one in Muscogee County. The school district in interested, and all of the options are still open.”

The one in Chattahoochee County will include industry, health care and media job training.

Prior to the reception, the group also met with new University System of Georgia Chancellor Steve Wrigley. Columbus State President Chris Markwood and members of his leadership team joined that meeting.

The reception was sponsored by the Greater Columbus Chamber of Commerce and Columbus State University.

This story was originally published February 1, 2017 at 5:35 PM with the headline "Columbus leaders tout the city at Georgia Capitol."