Welcome—Terence Roberts, TATT Chairman

    Sean Dogan, Interim CEO of the Urban League of the Upstate

    Guest Presentation—Sean Dogan, Interim CEO of the Urban League of the Upstate

    • Mission: advance equity by empowering black and other underserved communities through advocacy, education and economic stability
    • Organizational assessments with Stan Davis, helped map out where we were and next steps for where we’re going.
    • One of 90 affiliates of the national Urban League, HQ in NYC.
    • Represents Greenville, Spartanburg, Union, and Greenwood Counties
    • 6 programs:
      • Right Step Juvenile Diversion—98% success rate
      • Project Ready—high school program to get students ready for college, work, and life
      • Level Up (foster care students)
      • 21st Century Learning Center
      • Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program
      • affordable housing—financial education
    • We need more about law enforcement doing more – creating friendships and participating. Community policing. Also brought someone to them they would not have met otherwise. Click here for a video of a great example of community policing, with some help from basketball legend Shaquille O’Neal

    Click here for Sean’s presentation

    TATT Updates

    Dean Hybl, TATT Executive Director

    • Busy week: Upstate Entrepreneur Ecosystem met Wednesday, Senior Issues group met earlier Thursday, Upstate Mobility Alliance will meet Friday
    • Next TATT Chat with Jim Shew, Vice President—Employee Benefits, Marsh & McLennan Agency, September 10th—register here
    • Networking time 20 minutes prior to the meeting on upcoming TATT Chats! Sign on early to network with friends and colleagues.

    County Updates

    Anderson (Blake Sanders, Mayor of West Pelzer):

    • giving away masks
    • Pelzer/West Pelzer continue to more forward with economic development
    • Pelzer going through branding/marketing/web strategy
    • Powdersville—Dolly Cooper Park, going through master plan
    • 2500 feet of trail, new kayak launch, etc. A regional draw for this part of the county, spurs outdoor recreation
    • More people out walking. More students walking to school. People are asking for more sidewalks.

    Greenville (Shawn Bell, City of Fountain Inn):

    • new residential construction going strong
    • new businesses opened in the last few months
    • class A industrial park construction moving along
    • several restaurants in city limits have had best grossing sales in May or June—very encouraging to see
    • city of Fountain Inn has seen challenges with 16 staff testing positive for COVID, hope to reopen to the public soon
    • events canceled, but still doing virtual city council meetings

    Laurens (Alesia Carter, United Way of Laurens County):

    • mask giveaways because people didn’t seem to have them
    • food drives every week with a lot of participation, much needed—400K pounds of food
    • youth box giveaways in 4 different locations
    • food bank still drive through, still seeing a lot of need
    • trying to get people to complete the census
    • school supplies drive

    Oconee (Libby Imbody, Main Street Walhalla):

    • started March 1st, has been in survival mode.
    • what makes us unique has helped us be resilient
    • slow but steady stream of tourists because of outdoor assets
    • small events that get people on the street
    • some merchants have had record June/July
    • working on 5 historic properties
    • grant received for a walkway around the perimeter of the commercial districts, which will connect to Stumphouse Mountain

    Pickens (Allison Fowler, Pickens County Parks, Recreation and Tourism):

    • new marketing and branding plan just released a few weeks ago, eager to get started rolling it out
    • people flocking to the outdoors, so parks have been very busy
    • hired a couple of new positions
    • new announcements about old mills being bought for development