Macon Magazine

102 maconmagazine.com | December 2024/January 2025 children. The finishing touches are being put on the already impressive building, and the center is planning to open in January. It's been a transformative year for the Ocmulgee Mounds National Park and Preserve Initiative (ONPPI) to officially make the heritage and wildlife site a National Park. Since Knight's $1 million contribution, the organization expanded its capacity, swelling from a staff of two to five. The bipartisan, bicameral bill that would create the all-important National Park designation, H.R. 8182, has passed unanimously out of the Senate and received a glowing hearing in the House. "This is another step forward towards realizing a longstanding dream that has broad support," said Rep. Sanford Bishop (D-GA) a er the hearing. ONPPI leaders hope to pass the bill by the end of the year. Wesleyan College wanted to connect their students to the growth and excitement in Downtown Macon. Knight invested just over half a million dollars, and just a couple months later, the Wesleyan College Leadership Lab was born. It's a hybrid space – part art gallery, part public programming, part classroom. Executive Director Alexis Gregg is open to it all – from a Storytellers Macon performance to a Chicago stepping dance class to a Q&A discussion with the mayor. Gregg is grateful for how Knight has opened opportunities for students to mingle authentically with Maconites. "It's just helped them be a part of the community in a much more meaningful way," she said. "Having the space downtown has enabled the students to not only reconnect with the city, but to understand the ecosystem of Macon. They see how Macon is a close-knit community, how easy it is to be connected here. It's gotten them into businesses downtown. It's gotten them excited to be here. It's made them feel more at home here, and of course, help them get more internships locally and professional experiences." The scope of the gi has been transformational even a year in – and there's still more to come. Future developments include $5 million to Mercer University toward relocating the School of Medicine downtown and $1 million for NewTown Macon to extend the Ocmulgee Heritage Trail to the Pleasant Hill neighborhood. I NVE ST M E N T F U E L S N EW L E AD E R S O N T H E B LO C K Another way Knight provides thought leadership in Macon is by fueling its future through the Emerging City Champions program, powered in collaboration with 8 80 Cities to elevate new voices. In each cohort, 20 champions from Knight's eight resident cities are chosen for a $5,000 grant and a peer-to-peer learning studio bringing the group together. Stroud was one of them. "It's really focused on building people up as leaders," he said. "When I started looking at what people were doing, I realized that the ECC money could be used to build community, more so than just building things." "It allows us not to reinvent the wheel when we can see things that the other cities are doing... That interaction allows us to grow and to network among our peers." LEFT From left to right, current and former Macon- based ECC recipients Rachel Umana, Laura Gómez, Tonja Khabir, and Jonathan Wetherbee meet with Lynn Murphey (center) to connect.

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