March 15th Luncheon
REAL Revitalization: How?
On March 15, the City Club of Tacoma met at Landmark Center where we discussed Tacoma's economic legacy. The panel included Erik Andersson, TPU, Bruce Kendall, EDB, John Wolfe, Port of Tacoma, and Ali Modarres, UWT.
Erik Andersson
Economic development manager for TPU
Erik Andersson is the economic development manager for Tacoma Public Utilities. Since June 2016 he has been working on developing and implementing a strategy to support economic development efforts in communities in its TPU service area. Before that, Erik was the economic development manager at Pacific Power in Portland, working in communities in Northern California, Eastern Washington, and throughout Oregon. During that time, Erik worked on a variety of economic development projects including recruitment and expansion of food processing and technology businesses to developing regional support of historic theaters and downtown development strategies.
Bruce Kendall
CEO of the Economic Development Board for Tacoma-Pierce County
Bruce Kendall has held his position on the Economic Development Board (EDB) since 1999. The EDB is a private, non-profit corporation focused on the retention and recruitment of primary businesses in Tacoma and Pierce County, Washington USA.
Over the past 10 years, the EDB team has worked with companies that have invested more than one billion dollars in Pierce County and created more than 14,000 jobs. Key wins include: Toray, Mitsui-Soko, GKN Aerospace, NewCold, Niagara, James Hardie, Amazon, Milgard, Burkhart, Sierra Pacific, State Farm and many others. Bruce serves on the following boards: Institute of Technology at University of Washington Tacoma (immediate past-chair), Washington Economic Development Association, Washington Aerospace Partnership, Central Puget Sound Economic Development District, and Tacoma-Pierce County Workforce Development Council.
Mr. Kendall received his undergraduate degree from Whitman College and earned a Master's degree in Business Administration from the University of Washington.
John Wolfe
CEO Port of Tacoma
Mr. John Wolfe has been the Chief Executive Officer of Port Of Tacoma. Previously, Mr. Wolfe served as the Chief Commercial Officer of Port Of Tacoma and as Deputy Executive Director since June 2005. Prior to joining the Port of Tacoma, he served for two years as the Executive Director of the Port of Olympia, and before that as Olympia's Director of Operations and Marine Terminal General Manager. He also spent ten years with Maersk Sealand/APM Terminals in Tacoma, most recently as the terminal's Operations Manager. Mr. Wolfe earned a Bachelor's degree in Business Administration from Pacific Lutheran University in 1987.
Ali Modarres
Director of Urban Studies at the University of Washington Tacoma
Ali Modarres is the Director of Urban Studies at the University of Washington Tacoma. He is the editor of Cities: The International Journal of Urban Policy and Planning and serves on a number of research and policy advisory boards. Dr. Modarres earned his Ph.D. in geography from the University of Arizona and holds master and bachelor degrees in landscape architecture from the same institution. He specializes in urban geography, and his primary research and publication interests are socio-spatial urban dynamics and the political economy of urban design. He has published in the areas of immigration, race, and ethnicity in American cities, social geography, transportation planning, environmental equity, urban development and public policy. Some of his recent articles have appeared in the Journal of Urban Affairs, Cities, International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, and Anthropology of the Middle East.