Thanks to a unanimous vote by a city authority, the National Center for Civil and Human Rights is moving forward.
Invest Atlanta, the new name of the Atlanta Development Authority, voted Friday morning to give the attraction flexibility in how $28.5 million of Tax Allocation District (TAD) dollars could be spent by the developers of the Center.
Doug Shipman, president and CEO of the Center, said that the authority basically was supporting the decision to build the attraction in phases. The first phase will be at least 30,000 square feet — about half the size that is ultimately planned to be built on the same block as the Georgia Aquarium and the World of Coca-Cola.
“Phase 1 is fully funded,” Shipman said. “Invest Atlanta’s action gives us flexibility in the disbursement of funds. It allows us to manage the cash flow a little bit easier.”
Several years ago, the authority had approved providing $40 million to help pay for the development of the Center. Of that, $11.5 million went to repay the loan so the community could buy a treasured collection of Martin Luther King Jr.’s papers. The papers, which are housed at Morehouse College, will be prominently displayed when the Center is completed.
http://saportareport.com/blog/2012/01/a-green-light-for-the-center-for-civil-and-human-rights/
