Press Room

Atlanta Mayor Elected Chair of U.N. Affiliate's Trustees

February 2006 – Elected the 2006 chair of CIFAL Atlanta's board of trustees, Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin will lead CIFAL's programs in a way that reflects "how she wants Atlanta to be seen" as a global leader, said CIFAL Executive Director Axel Leblois.

PHOTO: CIFAL Atlanta held its first formal board of trustees meeting on Jan 31. Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin was elected chair of the organization for 2006. She is pictured here (7th from left) with CIFAL Director Axel Leblois (left of Ms. Franklin), Ambassador Andrew Young (right from Ms. Franklin), and other members of the CIFAL Board, staff and partners.
CIFAL Atlanta held its first formal board of trustees meeting on Jan 31. Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin was elected chair of the organization for 2006. She is pictured here (7th from left) with CIFAL Director Axel Leblois (left of Ms. Franklin), Ambassador Andrew Young (right from Ms. Franklin), and other members of the CIFAL Board, staff and partners.
Ms. Franklin was selected as 2006 chair during the organization's first official board meeting Jan. 31. CIFAL had been organizing training programs for city officials around the world since its inception in September 2004, but the board of trustees had not officially met until now, Mr. Leblois told GlobalAtlanta in an interview.

"I can’t think of a better person to chair CIFAL because CIFAL is about cooperation among city officials. Who better than Mayor Franklin because she has a strong reputation worldwide, she's a great leader, and she sees CIFAL as how she wants Atlanta to be seen," he said.

CIFAL benefits Atlanta by extending the city's image as a center of best practices for the rest of the world, he explained. CIFAL Atlanta is one of 11 training centers assisting the United Nations Institute for Training and Research in promoting economic and social development via municipal governments.

Some of CIFAL's programs for training local government officials are held in Atlanta, including a March 5-8 training program for Latin American municipal officials on leveraging airports for economic development.

The conference is to include 12 delegations of three local officials each representing major airports in 12 countries in Latin America. The goal is to share best practices on air cargo operations with airports just beginning such activities, Mr. Leblois said.

"This is a critical topic because 42 percent of world trade is air cargo. If an airport doesn’t have cargo facilities, it just can’t compete," he said, adding that the program aims to demonstrate how airports can facilitate international trade and support economic development in cities.

Hosting programs here is beneficial to Atlanta, Mr. Leblois noted, because it brings experts from around the world on issues important to Atlanta's future, including water quality, environmental protection, disaster preparedness, HIV/AIDS, gender equality, immigration and economic development.

CIFAL's two most important programs for 2006, according to Mr. Leblois, are its May 1-3 Mega City Water Summit and a Gender Equality and Local Government conference to be held in November, because they represent long-term economic development issues for Atlanta.

The water summit is to be a cooperative effort with the Georgia Tech Water Research Institute featuring Atlanta Watershed Management Commissioner Rob Hunter. The event is to invite representatives from 76 urban areas around the world that have more than 5 million inhabitants and have faced water shortages.

"They are where Atlanta will be in 10 years, so we need to find out what they have done," Mr. Leblois said.

The gender equality conference is an effort aimed at fulfilling the U.N.’s Millennium Goals, since one of the eight goals calls for equality among men and women in terms of life opportunities, he added. Although local governments provide the “fundamental context to make a difference” in this area, no worldwide forum has yet existed for discussing best practices on this topic, Mr. Leblois said.

The conference is to feature El Salvadoran Vice President Ana Vilma de Escobar, Jamaican Deputy Prime Minister Portia Simpson-Miller, Spelman College President Beverly Daniel Tatum and Agnes Scott College President Mary Brown Bulloch as speakers.

Atlanta’s women’s colleges and its woman mayor make the city a logical place to host the conference, which is expected to boost Atlanta’s worldwide reputation as a center for gender issues, Mr. Leblois said.

Members of CIFAL’s board of trustees are Luis A. Aguilar, partner at McKenna Long & Aldridge LLP; G. Wayne Clough, president of the Georgia Institute of Technology and chairman of the Atlanta Regional Consortium for Higher Education; Jose Ignacio Gonzalez, CEO of Hemisphere Inc.; Mr. Leblois, senior fellow at UNITAR;

Mack Reese, partner at Gateway Development Services Inc.; Ms. Simpson-Miller; Sam A. Williams, president of the Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce and Andrew Young, chairman of Goodworks International and former U.S. ambassador to the U.N.

Visit CIFALAtlanta.org for more information or contact Mr. Leblois at (404) 962-4840.

Source: Leigh Miller for GlobalAtlanta