National Summits and Special Events
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One of the primary ways the Tennessee Valley Corridor, Inc., advances ongoing collaboration and cooperation among key Corridor institutions, organizations, businesses and elected leaders is through the Corridor’s annual National Summit.
The recent 2008 TVC National Technology Summit in Huntsville was the 19th in a series of regular economic development Summits the Corridor has organized to help strategically link the technology-rich Tennessee Valley Corridor – from North Alabama through East Tennessee into Southwest Virginia and Southern and Eastern Kentucky.
Under the leadership of the Corridor’s nine Congressmen and a Corridor-wide board of leading business, government, education and economic development leaders, these regular Summits have become the region’s best vehicle to convene, inform and mobilize top leaders on issues of importance to advancing federal missions and to leveraging those federal missions and the Corridor’s research institutions for new regional job creation.
Keynote speakers at past Summits have included: U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff; U.S. Secretary of Energy Samuel Bodman; U.S. Army Chief of Staff General George W. Casey, Jr.; U.S. Senators Lamar Alexander, Bob Corker, Bill Frist, Jeff Sessions and Jim DeMint; Tennessee Governor Phil Bredesen; FedEx founder and chairman Fred Smith; Tennessee Valley Authority chairman Bill Sansom and CEO Tom Kilgore; U.S. Deputy Secretary of Commerce David Sampson; former U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge; former U.S. Secretary of Energy Hazel O'Leary; former U.S. Secretary of Transportation Frederico Pena; former NASA administrator Dan Goldin; former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman, former Kentucky Governor Ernie Fletcher and former Tennessee Governor Don Sundquist; as well as current Congressmen Zach Wamp, Hal Rogers, Jimmy Duncan, Rick Boucher, David Davis, Bud Cramer, Lincoln Davis, Robert Aderholt, Bart Gordon, Gresham Barrett and Bob Inglis; and dozens of other national and regional leaders.
In between these National Summits, the Corridor also organizes or supports subject-specific conferences, meetings and seminars in support of the Corridor’s core initiatives. Recent events have focused on:
- New Industrialism and Reindustrialization
Below: Congressman Hal Rogers (R-KY) and Michael Chertoff, U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security talk over dinner at the 2005 National Summit in Washington D.C.
- Homeland Security and Community Preparedness
- Workforce Training
- Venture Capital
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Below, from left to right: Former Senator |
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