Georgia Trend Daily – Sept. 16, 2025
Sept. 16, 2025 Capitol Beat News
Georgia maintains momentum with company expansions
Ty Tagami reports, it was another boom year for Georgia, as businesses continued flocking to the state, burnishing its record as the No. 1 place to do business. A record-breaking $26.3 billion flowed into the Peach State for the fiscal year that ended June 30, as companies expanded or established new locations.
Sept. 16, 2025 Georgia Trend – Exclusive!
Georgia Trend’s 40th Anniversary
Susana Hills reports, Georgia Trend celebrates its 40th Anniversary in September of 2025. We caught up with influential leaders who have grown alongside the magazine and the state and asked them to contribute their thoughts on the magazine’s influence.
Sept. 16, 2025 Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Rivian to hold groundbreaking ceremony today for $5B Georgia factory
Zachary Hansen reports that electric vehicle startup Rivian will hold a ceremony Tuesday to christen the start of construction of its long-delayed $5 billion factory an hour east of Atlanta. Company executives on Tuesday morning will join government officials, including Gov. Brian Kemp, at the roughly 2,000-acre project site in southern Morgan and Walton counties.
Sept. 16, 2025 GlobalAtlanta.com
Foreign firms’ share of Georgia investment falls in record year overall
Trevor Williams reports, as Georgia marks a record year with $26.3 billion in pledged investment, the share of the total coming from international companies has decreased in comparison to recent years. Of the 23,200 new private-sector jobs announced by companies in the state in the year ended June 30, some 6,500 (about 28 percent) came from companies headquartered in places like Canada, South Korea and Japan, the top three, according to a news release from Gov. Brian Kemp‘s office.
Sept. 16, 2025 Valdosta Daily Times
SGBC and VSU partner to open contracting doors for local businesses
Staff reports that the Southern Georgia Black Chambers (SGBC) hosted a Small Business Academy session last Tuesday evening, providing local entrepreneurs with a direct roadmap on how to do business with Valdosta State University. The event, held at the McMullen Southside Library, featured VSU Procurement Manager Heather Craft, who demystified the university’s procurement process for area business owners.
Sept. 16, 2025 The Brunswick News
Public safety communications improvements coming
Gordon Jackson reports that communications for public safety agencies in Glynn County are getting an upgrade, and the more than $3.6 million purchase won’t cost local taxpayers a penny. Glynn County commissioners will be asked to approve the issuance of the purchase order for mobile and portable radios with funding provided by the Grant Radio Fund.
Sept. 16, 2025 Gainesville Times
The latest on $1.2 billion data center proposed in southeast Hall County
Jeff Gill reports that a $1.2 billion, 119-acre data center fueled by its power substation is proposed off Candler Road in southeast Hall County. A vote on the proposal was tabled to the Hall County Planning Commission’s Oct. 6 meeting.
Sept. 16, 2025 AccessWDUN
Hospital in Lavonia to end labor and delivery services, Ossoff blames Medicaid cuts
Caleb Hutchins reports that a hospital in Franklin County has announced it is ending its labor and delivery services. St. Mary’s Health Care System announced last week that it will no longer offer labor and delivery services at St. Mary’s Sacred Heart Hopsital in Lavonia.
Sept. 16, 2025 The Current
Chatham County Commission dealt another setback in CAT dispute
Craig Nelson reports that the Chatham County Commission has suffered another legal setback in its attempts to reinstate the disbanded board of directors of the region’s transit authority. Superior Court Judge Timothy R. Walmsley on Friday ordered the commission and its chairman, Chester Ellis, to immediately stop any attempts to restore Chatham Area Transit’s former, nine-member board, which was replaced July 1 by an expanded panel with broader regional representation.
Sept. 16, 2025 GPB
Georgia lawmakers join diplomatic trip to Israel
Donna Lowry reports that five Georgia state lawmakers are traveling to Israel this week as part of a bipartisan delegation organized by the Israeli Foreign Ministry. The group includes Rep. Brent Cox (R-Dawsonville, Sen. Russ Goodman (R-Cogdell), Sen. Steve Gooch (R-Dahlonega), Rep. Esther Panitch (D-Sandy Springs), and Rep. Yasmin Neal (D-Jonesboro).
Sept. 16, 2025 Augusta Chronicle
Senate candidate Derek Dooley wants to calm choppy bureaucratic waters in D.C.
Joe Hotchkiss reports that edgy political discourse amid high-profile gun violence would be less venomous if tempered with a healthier locker room mentality, U.S. Senate candidate Derek Dooley said Monday. Accompanied by Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, the son of University of Georgia football coaching legend Vince Dooley visited Fat Man’s Cafe in Augusta on Monday in a scheduled stop on his campaign to unseat Democratic incumbent U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff.
Sept. 16, 2025 Georgia Recorder
NIH grant cuts throw science into a ‘downward spiral,’ researchers and advocates say
Alander Rocha reports, when Geza Kogler, a former professor at Kennesaw State University, lost his National Institutes of Health grant, he didn’t just lose funding; he lost a program he believed in and, quite possibly, his career in academia. Kogler recently retired from leading a program aimed at training the next generation of orthotists and researchers who specialize in designing, constructing and fitting medical devices such as braces, splints and supportive footwear.
Sept. 16, 2025 Capitol Beat News
Landowners near Rivian defeat state demand for legal costs
Ty Tagami reports that a half dozen landowners who filed a lawsuit that might have halted development of the massive Rivian auto plant near Social Circle do not have to pay some of the legal costs spent by the state to defend the project. Lawyers hired by Georgia and by a local development authority asked a judge in Morgan County to make the landowners pay for the taxpayer dollars Georgia paid them, arguing that the plaintiffs had brought a frivolous lawsuit.
Sept. 16, 2025 Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Former Republican Geoff Duncan enters Georgia governor’s race as Democrat
Greg Bluestin reports that former Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan entered the race for Georgia governor on Tuesday as a Democrat, completing a political transformation that has taken him from a pro-Donald Trump Republican to a contender for the state’s highest office under a new party banner. Duncan’s decision to join a field already crowded with prominent Democrats raises a central question: Can a onetime conservative stalwart who championed GOP priorities win a Democratic primary likely dominated by liberals?
