The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Hawks owner says Centennial Yards will energize downtown Atlanta scene
Billionaire philanthropist Antony Ressler discusses the $5 billion megaproject as construction is expected to soon begin a new phase, including a 5,000-seat arena, a hotel, restaurants, retailers and a plaza.
Atlanta Hawks lead owner Antony Ressler said Centennial Yards project is the catalyst downtown needs.
The $5 billion effort to transform the swath of parking lots and rail lines known as the Gulch into a thriving “mini-city” is poised to ramp up construction, with an 8-acre entertainment district set to break ground this summer. Ressler confirmed the expansion will include a 5,000seat arena, along with a 14-story hotel, two retail and restaurant buildings, and a plaza capable of holding large gatherings. By the end of the year, eight buildings in total will be under construction on the long-awaited project, located near Mercedes-Benz Stadium and State Farm Arena.
Ressler, who purchased the Hawks in 2015, is part of the development team alongside California-based CIM Group and NBA Hall of Famer Grant Hill. In an interview with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Ressler said he’s optimistic that the project will benefit the entire city.
(The interview was edited for length and clarity.)
Q: What does this moment mean for Atlanta?
A: We’ve been working toward this for five or six years. Having this 500,000-square-foot entertainment district is critically important, exciting and will lead to or accelerate all of the housing and residential and experiential retail (at Centennial Yards).
Having a vibrant downtown is what this is all about. It’s not just Centennial Yards. A really successful, vibrant entertainment district leads to a really successful Centennial Yards. And a successful Centennial Yards will lead to other successes around downtown.
And, yes, you’d be correct if you did criticize and say this should have gone faster. I’m with you. I don’t think COVID helped anything, but, let’s face it, it’s moving now, and it’s moving pretty rapidly. The good news is metro Atlanta is also moving, so to me the combination is pretty exciting.
Q: The entertainment district is expected to provide a new place for fans to gather right in the heart of downtown. How vital is that for Atlanta sports and for upcoming events like the World Cup?
A: I think there’s benefits on so many levels. A plaza where fans can gather of course is of great value, but so is a 5,000-seat arena, and so is a whole bunch of restaurants and bars and 4,000 to 5,000 apartments. All of that is bringing life and excitement to downtown.
Q: With all of this momentum around Centennial Yards, how does this impact the rest of downtown and its major developments?
A: I think it brings more capital, more retailers, more investors and more people wanting to live downtown. The location was always extraordinary. But whether or not downtown is a place that attracts people from all over to live, work and play, that’s the objective.
I bought the Atlanta Hawks nine years ago, and we want people to move downtown, but we also want people to come two hours before games and stay two hours after games. I’m sure the Atlanta Falcons and the United feel the same way. All of this will lead to precisely what I hope we’re looking for, which is much more life and activity in downtown Atlanta. There’s no doubt Centennial Yards with a successful entertainment district is making all of that move more quickly than it would have otherwise.
Q: It’s kind of a virtuous cycle of one feeding the other.
A: No question. This entertainment district will make people wanting to live downtown more excited. That’s a good thing.
You now have a stadium for 75,000 people, a stadium for 17,000 people and a stadium for 5,000 people. You’ll have an aquarium, a convention center, all sorts of bars, restaurants, clubs, activities and yet still have remarkable access to the MARTA station, to the airport and to colleges. The location is extraordinary, and we’re now combining it with all sorts of additional activities and life.
There is no doubt that we have an agenda from the Atlanta Hawks, which is to see downtown Atlanta dramatically improved and connecting with the rest of the city. That has been the objective (of Centennial Yards) from the beginning. These big plans are actually looking quite realistic, and, as they say, now it’s just a matter of time.
Q: There’s a lot of talk right now about converting older office buildings downtown into some other type of use — residential is the main focus. Centennial Yards has done that with The Lofts. What would you like to see happen with some of downtown’s offices that might not be competitive anymore?
A: I don’t think downtown Atlanta is different than any other downtown in America right now where some of their office space may not be functioning well as office space. Let’s face it, you have to come up with other alternatives, whether it’s residential or a different type of office or commercial. If that means some of the office has to be (converted), that’s good business.
So if the question is whether I’m concerned about it, if anything it’s a huge positive. It’s progress, and it’s how to transform a downtown. You’ve got to attract customers and businesses and people who want to live downtown and want to own restaurants, clubs and stores downtown.
Q: One of those larger offices is one of the Hawks’ and Centennial Yards’ closest neighbors, which is CNN Center. Is there any discussion on what you hope will happen with that property going forward?
A: We share a roof, so, yes, we have great interest in what the folks that bought CNN Center (are doing). I’ve heard many different things that were possible, but it’s a big building. We don’t own it, so it’s our job to be supportive of whatever they’re trying to build. I’m looking for a successful building that helps downtown.
And it’s not just the CNN Center. There’s several interesting developers with parcels and properties doing all sorts of things outside of Centennial Yards (in downtown). At the end of the day, each development helps the others and helps capital feel comfortable coming to downtown Atlanta. Attracting capital and creative real estate developers and entrepreneurs is how this becomes special.
Q: There’s kind of a kinship among downtown developers and stakeholders of trying to take what is the center of the Southeast and improve it.
A: Right now, I don’t think people across the country look at downtown Atlanta as attractively as we hope they will in the next five years. That’s really where the change is going to come.
Most people would say metro Atlanta is booming. I would hope that within the next five years, people will say metro Atlanta is booming, including downtown.
Grady Memorial Hospital ranks in the top 10 of the nation’s nonprofit hospitals for spending more on charity care than it receives in tax breaks, said a new report and ranking published Tuesday. Wellstar Health System also showed up high on the list — fourth in the nation for community spending by a nonprofit health system.
The rankings were based on 2021 tax filings examined by the Lown Institute, a nonprofit think tank. Lown examined close to 70 Georgia hospitals.
The result: Georgia had 22 hospitals listed among the nation’s top hospitals for community spending. Each of these hospitals had a “fair share surplus” in Lown’s latest analysis, which means their spending on financial assistance for the poor and community health needs exceeded the estimated value of their tax exemption.
It’s estimated that more than half of American hospitals are nonprofits, a status that gives them exemption from federal, state and local taxation. In return, the federal government requires those hospitals to operate for the public benefit and provide “charity care,” ensuring low-income individuals get medical care for free or at reduced rates.
Nonprofit hospitals’ free or discounted medical care can be potentially life-saving for some patients, especially as health care costs continue to rise. This year, roughly 1 in 4 adults said they have skipped or delayed health care in the past year because of cost, health research organization KFF said.
But nonprofit hospitals have been under fire for skimping on charity care.
Of the 2,435 nonprofit hospitals in the U.S. evaluated by the Lown Institute, 80% received more money in tax breaks than they spent on charity care and community investment, the report said. Lown calls that a “fair share deficit.”
The Lown Institute is calling for action to fix the shortfalls in charity spending, saying a minimum threshold of community benefit spending should be set for hospitals, based on hospitals’ finances, previous spending and local needs.
“When four out of five nonprofit hospitals do not meet obligations to benefit their community, it’s a sign that regulations and incentives need to be revisited,” said Dr. Vikas Saini, president of the Lown Institute, in a release. “Everyone wants to see their local hospital thrive, but not at the expense of the communities they serve.”
Some stood out for charitable giving. Grady ranked No. 7 in the nation for its “fair share surplus” spending of $71 million.
Among Georgia hospitals, behind Grady were Emory Healthcare hospitals ranking second and third for fair share surpluses in spending: Emory University Hospital Midtown at $43.7 million and Emory University Hospital at $42.9 million.
Wellstar Health System’s good showing on the Lown list is a ranking that was controversial last year and likely will be again this year.
Wellstar has come under intense criticism for the closure in 2022 of two Atlanta Medical Center hospitals, which served predominantly poor populations. But the hospital system was ranked No. 4 for its fair share spending among health systems in the U.S. Wellstar reported a robust surplus in charity spending, amounting to $85 million over seven affiliated hospitals for the year examined.
The Lown Institute calculated fair share spending for the 2,435 nonprofit hospitals by comparing spending on financial assistance and community health investments to the estimated value of its tax exemption. The source for its calculations on spending is IRS Form 990 for the fiscal year ending 2021.
Tax-exempt nonprofit hospitals and health systems are required to file a Form 990 annually, which includes each hospital’s own estimate of the value of the charity care they have provided, along with financial information on profitability and financial reserves.
The financial information from those tax forms is not subject to an auditing process, a recent KFF study said.
Further clouding the question of how much hospitals owe their communities, hospitals have broad flexibility to establish their own eligibility criteria for charity care and, as a result, eligibility criteria vary across hospitals, KFF said.
In Lown’s ranking, hospitals that dedicated at least 5.9% of overall expenditures to financial assistance and “meaningful community investment” were considered to have spent their fair share. The 5.9% threshold is based on established research into the valuation of the nonprofit tax exemption, Lown said.
Lown reported Georgia had 49 hospitals that showed a deficit in their charity spending, amounting to $324 million for 2021.
Specialty hospitals, such as Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, were not part of the rankings.
Of the 72 Georgia hospitals Lown examined, the largest charity deficits were held by Piedmont Atlanta (minus $44 million); Emory Saint Joseph’s (minus $30.5 million); and Emory Decatur (minus $27.3 million).
Grady declined to comment on the report. An Emory Healthcare spokesperson said the company needed more time to review the report before commenting. Piedmont did not comment before deadline.
The American Hospital Association has criticized the report and said it doesn’t capture the many ways hospitals help people beyond medical care.
In a blog post Tuesday, American Hospital Association President Rick Pollack wrote that Lown cherry-picked its data on how hospitals support their communities and missed important contributions, saying, “In addition to medical care, hospitals often provide many other important social services, including food security programs, maternal and prenatal education, vaccination clinics, nutrition and physical education classes, and subsidized transportation, to name just a few examples.”
A Wellstar spokesperson also made that point.
“As a nonprofit community health system, Wellstar conducts Community Health Needs Assessments to guide the programs we support, which extend beyond medical care to also include important issues such as food insecurity,” Wellstar spokesperson Matthew O’Connor said in a statement.
He also referenced investment this past fiscal year, not 2021, the year of tax forms evaluated by Lown.
“Wellstar invested nearly one billion dollars last fiscal year alone into supporting our communities, and we greatly appreciate our team members and community partners that enable us to make such a meaningful difference,” he said.
The hospital industry previously has objected to Lown’s findings, taking issue with what the institute counts as a community benefit or charity spending.
Pollack said in his blog post that the Lown report suffered from “biases, flaws and shortcomings,” and imposed an arbitrary and outdated threshold for “fair share” spending.
“America’s hospitals and health systems have proven their dedication to caring for their patients and communities time and again, particularly during the challenging circumstances in recent years,” Pollack said. “Though the Lown Institute’s so-called ‘Fair Share’ report highlights the important contributions of certain hospitals, it misses the larger point, selectively relying on isolated data to paint a negative picture about the hospital field in general.”
Lown’s methodology explains when it tallies charity spending, it excludes costs such as Medicaid reimbursement shortfalls, the cost of training new health care professionals and research. Medicaid shortfall costs, the group wrote in its report, were excluded “because hospitals are already reimbursed for Medicaid patients by the state,” and covering them “does not convey a hospital policy choice.”
Nationally, Lown found that hospitals spent an average of 3.87% of their budget on community investments but noted that “this proportion varied widely.”
Hospital charity care standards have been a recent focus of some discussion among lawmakers.
The Senate’s Health Education, Labor and Pensions Committee said in an Oct. 23 report that “in recent years, nonprofit hospitals have provided less charity care even as these hospitals saw a steady increase in their revenues and operating profits.”
The report called on Congress and the IRS to better set and enforce standards for hospital charity care, stating, “The disparities between the paltry amounts these hospitals are spending on charity care and their massive revenues and excessive executive compensation demonstrates that they are failing to live up to their end of the nonprofit bargain.”
The Lown Institute is based in Massachusetts, and its webpage says it is a nonprofit think tank focused on unnecessary care, accountability and health equity, among other concerns. It lists its financial supporters on its webpage; they include the Commonwealth Fund, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Kaiser Permanente and the John A. Hartford Foundation.
‘When four out of five nonprofit hospitals do not meet obligations to benefit their community, it’s a sign that regulations and incentives need to be revisited. Everyone wants to see their local hospital thrive, but not at the expense of the communities they serve.’
Dr. Vikas Saini, president of the Lown Institute