2012 Guide to Huntsville - Huntsville/Madison County Chamber of ...

2012-2013 Guide TO 

HUNTSVILLE 

MadisOn COunTy, aLabaMa 

a smart place to live, work and play 

a PubLiCaTiOn Of The ChaMber Of COMMerCe Of hunTsviLLe/MadisOn COunTy

2 | Chamber of CommerCe of huntsville / madison County 256.535.2000 | www.huntsvillealabamausa.com 

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8 | Chamber of CommerCe of huntsville / madison County 256.535.2000 | www.huntsvillealabamausa.com

Contents 

12 | WeLCOMinG enTrePreneurs 

Huntsville’s a great place for a startup 

16 | HigH-res talent 

Simulation expertise is attracting gaming interest 

22 | LOW COsT LifesTyLe 

Businesses and employees say the area is easy on the wallet 

26 | a baLanCed PLaCe 

New arrivals are impressed with what they find 

32 | buiLdinG GreaT Minds 

Schools deliver the kind of smart students area demands 

38 | bOdy & Mind 

Your health care is in good hands here 

42 | federaL CiTy 

Redstone Arsenal vital to the nation’s security 

48 | We Can dO iT 

Cummings Research Park a center of technical creativity 

54 | daZZLinG shOPPinG 

Area’s variety is delightfully surprising 

58 | PLayTiMe 

Plenty to do in your leisure hours 

64 | deMOGraPhiCs 

65 | ChaMber sTaff 

ON THE COVER 

Opened in 2010, the davidson Center for the arts is a 21,000-square-foot 

expansion of the huntsville Museum of art that includes eight galleries 

and walls of windows overlooking big spring international Park. 

Photo by John Perry. 

2012-2013 Guide TO 

hunTsviLLe 

MadisOn COunTy, 

aLabaMa 

www.huntsvillealabamausa.com | 256.535.2000 Chamber of CommerCe of huntsville / madison County | 9 

v 

Published by 

The huntsville Times 

2317 Memorial Parkway sW 

huntsville, aL 35801 

256.532.4250 phone 

256.532.4183 fax 

v 

viCe PresidenT Of adverTisinG 

natalie Pruitt 

adverTisinG ManaGers 

becky fentress | Chad Ludwig 

Lauren O’neil | Lori Ziegelmann 

ediTOriaL direCTOr | Jim steele 

WriTers 

Kimberly ballard | deborah bennick 

bob Labbe | diana LaChance 

Lee anne Letize | anna Thibodeaux 

arT direCTOr | Leslie franklin 

GraPhiC desiGn | Kelly Perry 

PhOTOGraPhy direCTOr 

Michael Mercier 

v 

2012-2013 Guide to huntsville/Madison 

County, alabama is published 

by The Huntsville Times for 

the Chamber of Commerce of 

huntsville/Madison County 

for membership information, contact: 

The Chamber of Commerce 

of huntsville/Madison County 

225 Church street 

huntsville, aL 35801 

256.535.2000 phone 

256.535.2015 fax 

www.huntsvillealabamausa.com 

for more information about this 

publication, call 256.532.4250. 

The Huntsville Times also produces 

area guides, magazines, and other 

specialty publications. 

Copyright©2012 The Huntsville Times. 

all rights reserved. reproduction in whole or 

in part without written permission is prohibited.

welCome 

Thank you for picking up this copy of the 2012-13 Guide to Huntsville/Madison 

County, A Smart Place to Live, Work and Play. This publication is designed to 

provide information to newcomers and long-time residents alike about what 

drives our local economy and makes the Huntsville Metropolitan Area such a 

dynamic business community. 

Throughout the guide you will see – in words and photos – what drives our 

technology-based economy, such as Redstone Arsenal and Cummings Research 

Park. Likewise, the area continues to attract people from across the country 

based on excellent salaries and career opportunities as well as our high quality 

of life, low cost of living, short commute times and a thriving arts and recreation 

community. 

According to the 2010 U.S. Census, the Huntsville Metropolitan Statistical 

Area surged in growth to become Alabama’s second largest metro. That growth 

is fueled by a diversity of industry, including aerospace, defense, biotechnology, 

computer science and advanced manufacturing. 

As the lead economic development organization for Huntsville/Madison County, the Chamber’s primary mission is to 

prepare the community for economic growth, attract new employers and help existing industries expand. We accomplish 

this thanks to Chamber members and public partners investing in the Huntsville Regional Economic Growth Initiative 

(HREGI), which allows us to recruit targeted industries; help existing employers meet their expansion needs; 

promote the community’s image nationally and internationally; work with our local and regional universities and 

colleges for economic and workforce development; and continue to create a platform of economic diversity. 

Your Chamber of Commerce is here to provide you with information and personalized service to meet your needs. 

Please do not hesitate to contact us for more information at 256-535-2000 or visit our 

website at www.huntsvillealabamausa.com. We believe that when it comes to business 

and career opportunities, you will discover the truth in what we say: The sky is NOT 

the limit in Huntsville and Madison County! 

Jim Bolte 

dear friend, 

2012 Chair of the Board 

Chamber of Commerce of Huntsville/Madison County 


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Welcoming 

Entrepreneurs 

HuNTsVillE’s a gREaT plaCE fOR a sTaRTup 

By Diana LaChance 

The entrepreneurial spirit in huntsville has 

spawned well-known startups like adTran, 

digium and the hudsonalpha institute for 

biotechnology. 

This spirit is encouraged by a readily accessible 

corps of experienced entrepreneurs and by a city 

that embraces growth and is quick to help business 

people with strong ideas and a strong drive to 

succeed. This environment has created fertile 

ground for new businesses, both large and small. 

Huntsville is firmly wedded to the idea that 

business growth means community growth, and 

in 2010 the success of that model became evident 

when the rocket City became the second largest 

metropolitan area in alabama. it also led fDi 

magazine to name huntsville one of the Top 5 

small Cities of the future in north & south 

america in april 2011 and Forbes to name it one of 

the Top 20 Leading Metros for business just three 

months later. 

Growth in huntsville and Madison County took 

flight in the 1950s when Dr. Wernher von Braun 

and his team inspired the nation with the race to 

the moon and turned huntsville into the 

birthplace of the nation’s space industry. That 

created a long tradition of technological 

innovation in space and defense that continues 

today. illuminating that designation, Microsoft 

cofounder Paul G. allen announced in late 2011 

that his commercial spaceflight startup stratolaunch 

systems would locate in huntsville. 

“huntsville has a long history of rocket 

research and development, including von braun’s 

redstone rocket and numerous others, so it 

seemed logical that the development of this 

system could benefit from the experience in the 

n steve Cook, left, director of space technologies at 

dynetics and Gary Wentz, president and CeO of 

stratolaunch systems. Commercial space venture 

stratolaunch systems, cofounded by Microsoft 

cofounder Paul allen and commercial spacecraft 

designer burt rutan, has chosen huntsville as its 

headquarters. dynetics is a key part of the 

company’s space vehicle development. 

Photo by Glenn Baeske. 

area,” said stratolaunch President and CeO Gary 

Wentz, a former chief engineer at nasa. 

“furthermore, the experience required to 

combine a large rocket with an airplane is not 

found in most cities, but huntsville has a unique 

blend of both. With the magnitude of space and 

aviation programs and projects in the area, the 

city offered our team the opportunity to leverage 

a highly skilled workforce who has spent decades 

supporting nasa and the army programs at 

redstone arsenal.” 

a local company providing stratolaunch 

systems expertise is dynetics, which is charged 

with the technical integration and development 

of the mating and integration hardware. although 

dynetics’ director of space Technologies steve 

Cook said he can’t speak directly as to why the 

company was chosen as a partner, he does have a 

few ideas. 

“dynetics has a long history of dropping very 

large payloads from aircraft over the last 10 years, 

and we build and integrate small satellite systems,” 

Cook said. “so we have experience with the payload 

side of this, and we understand the market.” 

The company completed construction on a 

new 225,000-square-foot prototyping facility 

located in Cummings research Park this year. 

“it’s a huge facility with extensive laboratory 

and manufacturing capabilities, as well as the 

capability to house the engineering and project 

management staff,” said Cook. “and it’s good for 

our customers because they don’t have to travel 

halfway across the country to get hardware built.” 

it’s also good for the city, he adds. 

“With the current federal deficit and the city’s 

strong ties to the federal government, bringing in 

more non-federal dollars is an important way to 

even out the ups and downs of the federal 

budget,” said Cook. 

and the partnership with stratolaunch systems 

takes that diversification one step further. 

“huntsville has long been a leader in government 

space, but this partnership will now 

establish it as a leader in commercial space,” 

he said. “More related industries will take note 

because of it. and that’s good for everyone – 

current businesses and future opportunities.” 

reaching out into the future was on the mind of 

well-known huntsville entrepreneur Jim hudson, 

too, when he founded the 150-acre hudsonalpha 

institute for biotechnology to explore genomics 

– the study of genes, gene sequences and their 

functions ¬– and to foster a new kind of relationship 

between research and business geared to 

fast-throughput processes designed to speed 

scientific discoveries into new products. 


The institute has as its core missions science and 

research, education and economic development. 

for hudson, the decision to locate the campus 

in the rocket City was not a difficult one, based 

on his past experience. 

“separately, Lonnie McMillian, co-founder of 

hudsonalpha, and i started several companies in 

huntsville, all of which were successful,” he said. 

“so it was only natural that when we decided to 

start a major research institute, it should be located 

within the community that had been so supportive.” 

indeed, he said, it’s the community’s “no-nonsense, 

can-do attitude” as well as the way everyone 

roots for and appreciates success that make the 

huntsville area the best ever for a startup company. 

Many of the scientists who have since joined 

the institute have come to the same conclusion 

– and cite the institute itself as a critical element 

to their success. 

“in just the last five years, the number of new 

biotech companies has gone up significantly 

where hudsonalpha institute for biotechnology 

has served as the magnet and nurturing 

environment,” said Khursheed anwer, president 

and chief scientific officer of egen inc., a 

specialty biopharmaceutical company that 

operates out of hudsonalpha. 

and it doesn’t hurt that the city at large is so 

conducive to start-ups either, he added, 

mentioning growth opportunities and affordable 

cost of living as two key advantages. 

Like anwer, Mike Walters also credits the 

institute with creating a fertile environment for 

new companies. Walters serves as the chief 

strategy officer of Kailos genetics, another 

hudsonalpha mainstay that focuses on putting 

genetics into practice through its proprietary 

targeted enrichment technology. 

“Kailos Genetics is a living and thriving 

example of the vision behind hudsonalpha,” 

he said. “early on, those who saw the opportunity 

for a genomics-based institute in huntsville 

envisioned researchers within the institute 

sharing space and innovative science with 

commercial companies. and because our 

underlying technology is the product of work 

done by hudsonalpha scientist K.T. varley, Kailos 

Genetics chose to locate at the institute.” 

and like anwer, Walters said he’s found ample 

support outside of the institute as well. 

“We have individuals in huntsville who have 

realized financial independence and who don’t stop. 

They are committed to giving back to create a more 

diverse economic base for our future,” he said. 

That commitment paves the way for future 

generations of entrepreneurs. 

“The talent pool of professionals here has the 

entrepreneurial spirit, talent and desire to fuel 

this next step,” Walters said. 

Marshall schreeder Jr., Managing Partner of 

Conversant bio, a fellow hudsonalpha-based 

startup that supplies u.s.-sourced human clinical 

specimens for research and development 

applications worldwide, compares this mentality 

to “a rising tide that lifts all boats.” 

he said he has continued to be amazed by the 

unbelievable level of support for entrepreneurs in 

huntsville. 

n Glenn Clayton, 

founder and CeO 

of appleton Learning, 

says locating his 

company in huntsville 

was a “no-brainer.” 

* 

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“from local executives and fellow entrepreneurs 

to investors and groups like hudsonalpha, 

upcaret Partners, biztech and suds, huntsville 

has many people who actively seek to help new 

and growing businesses in our community,” 

schreeder said. 

“i am happy to call huntsville home for my 

company.” 

also benefiting from that rising tide are the 

many aspiring engineers currently enrolled as 

students in huntsville’s institutions of higher 

learning. and in turn, said adTran vice President 

of engineering Carrier networks Clint Coleman, the 

city’s university system is a great benefit to 

companies wanting to start operations in huntsville. 

adTran is a Fortune 500 huntsville success 

story. founded by Mark smith and incorporated 

in 1985, the company saw opportunity in at&t’s 

divestiture of its regional bell Operating 

Companies and began operations in 1986. the 

split created an opening for the company to start 

supplying networking equipment, and today 

adTran is a leading global provider of intelligent 

networking and communications solutions used 

by some of the world’s largest service providers. 

“The universities here are producing a lot of 

engineers,” Coleman said. “The university of 

alabama in huntsville is one of the places where 

we recruit, and we hire a lot of graduates. in fact, 

whenever we go back and look at our recruiting 

statistics, uahuntsville is usually the leader in the 

number of students we recruit, compared to 

other schools like Mississippi state and auburn.” 

in return, he said, the city supports the 

company’s recruiting. 

“Our leaders recognize that companies like 

adTran are providing jobs and tax revenue to 

the city to allow for growth, so they foster an 

entrepreneurial spirit and they invite entrepreneurism,” 

he said. 

an example of that entrepreneurial drive is 

Mark spencer, who started out as a college 

student trying to figure out a way to be able to 

make long-distance phone calls cheaply or for 

free using a computer. That college curiosity led 

spencer to develop open-source telephony 

n Michelle and Justin Givens found 

resources to help start Michelle’s 

business, image in a box, at the 

Women’s business Center of 

north alabama. 


software that is today called asterisk and locate 

his company Digium, which was founded in 1999, 

in huntsville. 

The company today has a broad product line 

that includes both software and hardware 

products for small, medium and large businesses. 

While in his startup phase, spencer relied heavily 

on adTran’s smith and others locally for 

expertise, and he said that ready resource 

remains a great community asset. 

“We have a whole culture of entrepreneurial 

mentorship here, so people who have established 

businesses spend a lot of time helping those who 

are just starting,” said spencer, who is now 

digium’s CeO. 

“When i was starting my company, plenty of 

people were available who i could network with. i 

could just call them up out of the blue and say 

‘hey, i’m going through some challenges and i’m 

looking for advice.’ They would meet with me, 

even if they didn’t know me.” 

Lower commute times for employees, lower 

housing costs compared to metropolitan areas of 

similar size, and tax abatement programs for 

businesses are all benefits to locating in Huntsville. 

“There are a lot of reasons for businesses to 

locate here,” said randy Piechocki, president of 

PaLCO, a reverse logistics company. “huntsville is 

very conducive to startups, from being a good 

source of talent and networking opportunities to 

having a strong infrastructure in terms of 

communications.” 

PaLCO Chair and CeO Janice Migliore said 

diversity in business ownership has been of 

longstanding importance in the area. 

“i believe the trail in huntsville had already 

been blazed by other women owners since the 

very early years of von braun and his team and by 

redstone arsenal,” said Migliore. “and because of 

these established years of success, the support 

for diversity-owned companies is now evident 

throughout the community and through the 

continued work of the huntsville leadership.” 

it also helps that the city has a strong 

collaborative business culture that allows 

companies, diversity-owned or otherwise, to rely 

on and learn from one another. 

“The networking opportunities, leadership 

support and labor skills have made my job easier 

as a business owner,” she said. “i can contact 

other huntsville businesses, the Chamber, or 

huntsville leaders and have questions answered 

and solutions found.” 

huntsville has worked hard to enable and 

support diversity owned startups through the 

Chamber of Commerce of huntsville/Madison 

County and the Women’s business Center of 

north alabama. 


nancy Washington vaughn’s 2011 startup, 

Legal advantage human resources solutions 

LLC, is an example. 

“The professional development workshops 

offered by local experts at the Chamber of 

Commerce of huntsville/Madison County and 

the Women’s business Center of north alabama 

have been beneficial to me as i established my 

practice,” said vaughn. “and i am pleased to 

have the opportunity to provide professional 

development training at the Chamber of 

Commerce this year by conducting six employment 

and human resources law workshops 

created for businesses.” 

There are many resources available to 

huntsville business owners, said sara alavi, 

who relied on city resources to help her open 

silhouette boutique nine months ago. 

“they have really helped a first-time business 

owner like myself,” she said. “The Chamber of 

Commerce’s events are a great way to network 

and learn about all the wonderful local businesses 

in the area, while the Women’s business Center of 

north alabama has really been a wonderful 

resource for not only helping me start my business, 

but also to develop ideas and help it grow.” 

That appreciation is shared by Michelle Givens, 

owner of image in a box, another recent startup 

that provides businesses with graphic design, web 

development and corporate branding services. 

“The Women’s business Center of north 

alabama gave us the resources to start our business 

– help with coming up with a business plan, putting 

Customer Focused, Employee Driven 

n digium CeO Mark spencer says the availability of 

fellow businesspeople who are willing to help those 

starting out is a big plus for the area. 


us in contact with an accountant, a lawyer and help 

with writing contracts,” said Givens. 

appleton Learning founder and CeO Glen 

Clayton said locating his academic coaching/test 

preparation/academic assessment /school 

partnership company in huntsville was a 

no-brainer. 

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“as our company expands across the country, 

i am constantly reminded of how lucky we are 

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0000267222-01

High-Res Talent 

simulaTiON ExpERTisE is aTTRaCTiNg 

gamiNg iNTEREsT 

By Kimberly Ballard 

an interesting thing happened over the past 

50 years that coincided with huntsville helping 

nasa explore space, make it to the moon and 

then to build and maintain the international 

space station. 

Here on earth, 1950s pinball machines were 

evolving into arcade games and arcade games 

were morphing into atari interactive home game 

consoles, and consoles have blossomed into high 

tech electronic digital games that are downloadable 

to personal computers, laptops and mobile 

devices like iPhones and iPads. 

Gaming concepts, strategies and themes are 

still consistently based on the good guys beating 

the bad guys in galactic battles and futuristic 

apocalyptic wars, but modern gamers take on the 

roles of schwarzenegger-like superheroes and 

time-weary warriors and soldiers. 

during that time, huntsville was polishing a 

gleaming reputation in the space and defense 

industries for high-end visualization and graphics 

created by the city’s modeling and simulation 

experts. Maybe starting with something as simple 

as a conceptual rendering scratched out in scant 

detail on a cocktail napkin, or a crude model of 

perhaps nothing more than wooden crates nailed 

together to form a squat tripod with no legs, 

huntsville’s design engineers have constantly sought 

to project their vision into something tangible. 

inside their heads, a newly conceived lunar 

electric rover is already in motion, bumping along 

the dusty, cratered surface of a mock moon, or a 

meaner, more angular department of defense 

military fighter rides the clouds against a violent 

morning sunrise, or a bulbous toy-like launcher is 

jettisoning above a metallic city of the future. 

“nasa’s demand for realism pushes our 

modeling and simulation limits,” said Kenneth 

smith, vice president of analytical Mechanics 

associates inc. (aMa), a world-class provider of 

engineering, iT, visualization and business analytical 

services to the u.s. government and 

commercial organizations. “The industry expects 

it, and software makes it possible.” 

n The rocket City space Pioneers iPad Game created 

by analytical Mechanics associates inc. is a 

downloadable app designed to spark interest in the 

space program among young children. 

Photo by Eric Schultz. 

it was only a matter of time and inspiration 

before the incredible detail that is valued by 

nasa and the department of defense met up 

with the incredible realism required in the modern 

gaming world. and huntsville’s graphics and 

modeling and simulation guys just couldn’t help 

themselves. The work they were doing for the 

government was just too good to resist taking it 

to a different level. 

“i was looking at the sTeM (science, technology, 

engineering and math) element of these creations,” 

said Tim Pickens, dynetics commercial space 

advisor and chief propulsion engineer. “The lunar 

electric rover simulation was a perfect concept for 

education outreach, so i said to Kenneth smith, 

‘Let’s do a simple video game targeting fourth and 

fifth-graders in which you launch from earth and 

eventually land on the moon.’ ” 

Called the rocket City space Pioneers iPad 

Game and produced by aMa, it is now a downloadable 

app for all ages, designed to spark interest in 

the space program among young children. 

The game is actually three games in one. 

the first is called launcher, and players launch 

their spacecraft from rocket City, dodging space 

junk in order to get into orbit around the moon. 

in the second game, called Lander, players guide 

their landers to a safe touchdown on the moon’s 

surface. Game three is called rover, and players 

race their lunar rovers on the surface of the moon. 

Players must also conquer many mission 

challenges along the way. 

The rocket City space Pioneers team is led by 

members working at Dynetics, but is a joint effort 

between Teledyne brown engineering, andrews 

space, spaceflight services, Draper laboratory, 

Moog, Pratt & Whitney rocketdyne, the 

university of alabama in huntsville, the von 

braun Center for science & innovation and the 

huntsville Center for Technology. 

The team’s primary mission is to win a $30 

million Google Lunar X PriZe, an international 

competition to safely land a robot on the surface 

of the moon, travel 500 meters over the lunar 

surface, and send images and data back to earth. 

for its part, aMa has a number of mobile apps in 

its portfolio. The Lookshare app for the blind and 

GPs Lookaround app are both for commercial 

use. shedMobile is for engineers only, and Pav 

(Personal air vehicle) racing nasa Cup has 

limited accessibility. 

another huntsville company, aegis 

Technologies, has considerable expertise in 

nanotechnology modeling and simulation. 

aegis provided 3d model content from its 

in-house 3d elements Model Library for the 

iPad military simulation game known as 

armedforcehd, according to aegis business 

development director Georgina Chapman. sold 


MAKING SURE 

AMERICA THE BEAUTIFUL 

REMAINS AMERICA 

THE FREE 

© 2012 Lockheed Martin Corporation 

THIS IS HOW 

America will always be the land of the free. Because 

it is the home of the brave men and women of our 

military forces. Wherever they serve, on land, sea 

or air, their courage is inspiring. Their commitment 

to our nation and our way of life is unwavering. We 

thank them – each and every one – for their service 

and sacrifice. 

www.lockheedmartin.com 


0000277731-01 

0000278344-01


0000267212-01 

0000267213-01 

n John Ottander, Tim Pickens, Ken smith 

and stephen young play the new rocket 

City space Pioneers game. 


and distributed on iTunes, the game is produced 

by airborne Games LLC. 

aegis’ 3d elements is a real-time library of 3d 

models used by analysts for homeland defense 

security applications. Optimized for the 

simulation and training market, the models were 

used previously in vbs2 game-based training 

environments, but this was the first time they 

were used in an iPad game application. 

“We are very excited to be included in the 

armedforcehd game,” said david King, aegis 

vice president of simulation development. 

“airborne Games was great to work with and 

very knowledgeable in game theory and 

techniques, making it helpful to our team.” 

The quantity and quality of the military 

models aegis has in the 3d elements library 

provides a game company instant content 

optimized for a real time environment. 

“That makes it very attractive to a gaming 

publisher,” said scott Passon, aegis director of 

sales. “airborne leveraged the multiple levels of 

details we provided, allowing them to fine-tune 

game play performance. airborne also used 

high-resolution models for still renderings and 

lower levels of details in the real-time environment, 

which saved them a lot of money during 

their production phase.” 

another homegrown gaming company, 

gabriel interactive, was founded in 1999 by 

seasoned game development professional

Michael root, who owns the firm with his wife, 

dana. The company designs and produces 

electronic video games for the mainstream 

market. Michael, a veteran and a fan of the old 

atari games, built a team of business professionals, 

game developers, and designers who helped 

launch his first commercial product. 

some of Gabriel’s games are quite popular. 

robot arena i and ii, stunt spectacular, ride!, 

Carnival Cartoon and a John deere farm 

simulation series are sold at Wal-Mart, Target, 

best buy and staples. Gabriel has published 

games under the atari (infogrammes), valusoft 

and activision names. 

in 2011, the company received $1.7 million 

from the national Cancer institute for an 

anti-smoking game for girls that is being 

developed by dana root. The goal of the game 

is to communicate the myths and dangers 

associated with smoking to preteen girls in a 

fun, interactive way. it is currently in field 

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By Anna Thibodeaux 

according to the vice president and principal of 

decibel, the huntsville/Madison County business 

community enjoys close cooperation with elected 

officials at local, state and national levels. 

sally Colocho knows this firsthand. it is a 

primary reason decibel research is in the 

rocket City. 

she also said area businesses have a good 

understanding of when it is time to compete and 

when it’s time to work together for the benefit of 

the community. 

Cost has certainly been another factor that’s 

helped retain decibel, as well as many other 

companies. 

“Cost is now a significant driver in many of the 

acquisitions in which we are involved,” Colocho 

said. “With cost receiving more emphasis, it 

means we have to closely evaluate our internal 

cost structure to ensure we stay competitive.” 

The huntsville area has earned national 

recognition for its lower cost of living and lower 

costs of doing business. 

“Costs are still lower overall than many other 

places of similar customer presence, especially 

the national Capital region,” said Colocho. 

“There is great support from the community, 

the costs are still lower than many places, there is 

a talented pool of employees, and significant 

customers in the geographic region for both 

government and commercial opportunities, all in a 

beautiful and safe place to live and raise a family.” 

Michelle Jordan, huntsville’s director of 

economic development, said the city’s overall 

cost of living is about 90 to 95 percent of the 

u.s. average. 

“Our greatest advantage is in housing costs, 

which are about 80 percent of the national 

average,” Jordan said. 

n Cooperative local officials, good business relationships 

and low costs make huntsville ideal for decibel 

research. the firm’s board of directors is, from left, 

eric Cochran, Jeff gronberg, earl reed, Keith Hardy, 

dr. enrico Poggio and sally Colocho. 

Photo by Michael Mercier. 

That means a family selling a home somewhere 

else and buying a house in the huntsville 

region could save on average 20 percent. an 

average home priced at $100,000 nationally 

would cost $80,000 in Huntsville, compared to 

$250,000 in Washington, d.C. This advantage 

contributed to Cnn/Money naming huntsville 

one of the nation’s most affordable communities 

in 2010. 

equally successful has been the huntsville 

area’s impressive growth in its high-tech sector, 

which has become a strong economic magnet. 

that growth has benefited gurmej sandhu, who 

launched sigmatech inc. in 1986 to build on a 

career supporting nasa’s Marshall space flight 

Center and the army research, development and 

engineering Center. 

“it is a great place to start a business,” sandhu 

said. “Get involved in industry and government 


organizations to meet people, learn the market 

and establish a network.” 

especially in today’s tough economy, 

huntsville’s lower-cost edge has proven helpful to 

the city’s startups, he said. 

“There are resources available and you have 

access to one of the world’s leading science and 

technology business parks in Cummings research 

Park,” said sandhu, also the company’s chairman. 

“as a business startup, you have access to fortune 

500 companies, u.s. space and defense agencies 

and competitive higher education institutions 

such as the university of alabama in huntsville.” 

in recruiting new employees, sandhu said he 

believes huntsville’s lower cost of living plays a 

role because they see the differences in terms of 

housing, commutes and quality of life. 

in the past 50 years, this city in northern 

alabama has evolved from a cotton capital to the 

rocket City to a high-technology hub. The u.s. 

army’s aviation and Missile Command is housed 

in the nearby redstone arsenal, and the federal 

government employs more than 8 percent of the 

local workforce. 

The city’s thriving engineering community and 

tradition of innovation have made it an incubator 

for tech entrepreneurs. this is especially significant 

to Colocho’s company, which specializes in radar 

systems and sensor technology advancements. 

Their location positioned the company to provide 

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support to customers at the Missile defense 

agency (Mda), strategic Missile defense 

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Center (MsiC) and the u.s. army aviation and 

Missile research development and engineering 

Center (aMrdeC), all based in the area. 

“huntsville is a center for federal space, missile 

and sensor work,” she said. “Those federal 

organizations and agencies most in need of the 

expertise we provide are located in huntsville. 

being able to meet and work directly with our 

customers and their supporting contractors on a 

daily basis fosters excellent working relationships.” 

in addition to customer access, huntsville 

provides a highly educated and expertly skilled 

employee base. When considering potential 

locations for her business, Colocho said the choice 

was easy. 

“based on our experiences in the industry here, 

there was never a thought of starting anyplace 

else, though we have kept our eyes open for 

opportunities to expand with branch offices in 

other areas that would help us to support and 

grow our customer base,” she said. “several of us 

worked at other companies in the past that were 

not based in Huntsville but had offices here.” 

sandhu agrees the rocket City provided a 

great environment to start and grow a small 

business. 

“Today, sigmatech is one of the most mature 

government contracting small businesses in 

huntsville, operating for over 25 years,” he said. 

“There have been challenges, but we have 

adapted to evolving economic and market 

changes, varying growth phases and regulatory 

requirements to expand services and provide 

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solutions for customers.” 

Opportunity, according to Jordan, tops a list of 

reasons businesses choose to start in the area. 

They also include technology base, federal 

aerospace and defense programs, a growing 

population and strong economy. since 2005, 

private businesses in the huntsville metro area 

have grown by nearly 8 percent. 

“This is a much higher growth rate than the 

rest of alabama which, at less than 1 percent, 

hardly grew at all during the same time frame,” 

she said. “it is more on line with other centers of 

technology like raleigh, n.C., and austin, Texas, 

where companies are creating jobs through 

innovation and the spinoff of new technology.” 

alabama’s lower tax base and overall lower 

rate of pay than many other areas have been 

advantageous, too. Jordan said the area’s quality 

of life and value, including a world-class research 

park, government and university research, a 

highly technical workforce and other key assets 

turn the idea of “low cost into high value.” 

Madison County’s entrepreneurial attitude, 

success with business startups, mentoring and 

small business programs have all also contributed 

to the area’s growth. 

anticipated business growth and expansion is 

huntsville’s testimony to its nurturing business 

environment. economic forecasts show 

Huntsville continuing to benefit from the 

activities at redstone arsenal and growth in 

technology fields such as life sciences and 

information technology, Jordan said. 

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Moody’s has placed huntsville in its Top 10 

nationally for risk-adjusted return, meaning the 

outlook is positive as a place to make new 

investments. 

“however, we are always mindful of the role 

and dependence we have on aerospace and 

defense programs and their propensity to face 

cycles of ups and downs,” Jordan said. “We are 

continuing to work to diversify the economy and 

bring in new industries and grow new businesses 

even as we seek to grow activities at redstone.” 

“We are expecting additional growth in 2012, 

with growth projected on some of our existing 

tasks and also with new work,” sandhu said. 

“Geographically, in addition to huntsville, we 

expect to add employees in the national Capital 

region and Colorado springs, Colo.” 

decibel also anticipates growth, further 

supporting the Tennessee valley’s business-friendly 

environment. While a quarter of the company’s 

planned facility was completed in Cummings 

research Park in 2009, plans are to expand. 

“We are proud to announce that we will begin 

work on this final portion of the building in april 

and will have it ready for occupancy by October,” 

Colocho said. “We are currently pursuing new 

efforts in Huntsville to support Updated early 

Warning radar at Mda, d3i (space, cyber and 

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n Kevin Mcghaw got a job offer and was 

pleasantly surprised when he and his 

wife rotrice made the trip from 

Washington, d.C., to check out 

huntsville. now the McGhaw family 

are among the many newcomers to 

the area. rotrice and Kevin McGhaw 

stand behind their children, 

Kaiya and Kevin Jr. 

Photo by Bob Gathany. 

A Balanced Place 

NEw aRRiVals aRE impREssEd wiTH 

wHaT THEy fiNd 

By Diana LaChance 

huntsville has earned an impressive array of 

accolades over the years, including being named 

by Kiplinger’s Personal Finance as one of the 

country’s Top 10 Cities for raising families and by 

Cnn/Money as one of the nation’s Most 

affordable Cities. 

huntsville has been atop the latter’s list of 

one of america’s Top 25 Places to retire for the 

past two years running. but people who move 

to the huntsville/Madison County area often 

find something extra beyond what the 

accolades can convey, and they discover a fuller 

understanding of exactly what these impressive 

achievements mean. 

Take it from aaron King, Kevin McGhaw and 

becky Pillsbury, all of whom began their lives and 

their careers elsewhere, but ended up relocating 

to huntsville in recent years. 

For aaron King, a former army officer and 

West Point graduate, moving to huntsville 

probably seemed like just another stop on the 

military train. 

“i’ve lived in san diego, indianapolis, Lawton, 

West Point, and a dozen other cities and towns 

around the united states,” he said. 

but what he discovered when he got here was 

a place like no other he’d lived. “i have found home 

here in huntsville,” he said. “i can honestly say 

there is no other place i would rather call home.” 

King and his family, wife Kristen and 

3-year-old daughter elizabeth, arrived in the 

rocket City in July 2011. he had been recruited 

for the position of director of transition for 

huntsville City schools by superintendent dr. 

Casey Wardynski to help with the “transformational 

reform and system overhaul.” 

despite holding a master’s degree in 

educational leadership, King said, “i had 

apprehensions, as anyone might.” Today, those 

apprehensions have given way to pride at what 

has been accomplished – “the district went from 

$19.5 million in the red to over $3 million in the 

black” – and optimism for the future. 

“as a school system, we are on the move and 

we’ll soon pass the rest of the state,” he said. 

“We are looking to be the best school system in 

the country, and that’s just one of our goals.” 

King is quick to share credit, however. he said 

that a lot of the success is due to the city 

leadership’s support and involvement. 

“i cannot tell you how many times i have had 

the opportunity to sit and talk with the mayor, 

city council, county commissioners and state 

representatives. for most cities this size, that’s 


unusual,” he said. “The best part is that they 

actually listen and tend to make sound 

judgments based on the best information 

available. i cannot say enough good things 

about the Chamber and our local businesses; 

they are all working diligently to aid us in the 

revamp of our schools.” 

he added that the commitment among the 

leadership extends to the community as a 

whole. “i think huntsville’s leaders are doing a 

fine job in making the city a great place to live,” 

said King. “i’m impressed with the transparency 

of the city’s officials, the police department 

and the fire department, as well as our 

elected leaders.” 

he and his wife especially appreciate the city’s 

“small-town feel,” he said, and spend many a 

warm evening “taking walks in our neighborhood 

and in general just spending time together.” in 

short, said King, “i feel lucky to be in the position 

i am in and even luckier to lay my head down in 

one of the greatest cities in the united states: 

huntsville, alabama.” 

Like King, Kevin McGhaw is another recent 

transplant. he, his wife rotrice, and two children 

moved to Huntsville in the winter of 2008 when 

he took a position at Marshall space flight 

Center as legislative affairs specialist for nasa. 

although he was excited about his new job 

opportunity, he was less than enthusiastic about 

the move it entailed. 

“it wasn’t an anti-alabama stance,” he said. 

“i just didn’t know anything about huntsville. 

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i had grown up in Washington, D.C., and figured 

i’d grow old there and maybe move to Miami… 

i didn’t know a soul here!” 

it wasn’t until he received the job offer and he 

and his wife came down to take a closer look at 

huntsville that he realized what he’d be missing 

out on by not moving. “We went to bridge street, 

Jones valley – we loved it! Madison County, 

huntsville, the whole region,” he said. 

so he and his wife made an agreement: if 

the city was able to meet their top three 

criteria, they would move here. Those criteria: 

a church home where they could feel like they 

were part of a community, a school system 

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home in a great neighborhood where their kids 

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nearly five years later, the Mcghaw family 

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looking for in quality of life, we’ve found right 

here,” said McGhaw. 

That’s because the city has exceeded 

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in which you want to raise your kids.” 

On top of that, he feels safe here. 

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three friends within a 10-house radius, and three 

of my daughter’s best friends live in the 

neighborhood, so they can walk to their friends’ 

house and we’re more at ease about them 

making it there,” he said. 

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and for McGhaw and rotrice, there’s one 

other noticeable improvement: Their commute 

times. On a good day in d.C., it would take him 

50 minutes to an hour to get to work. That meant 

regularly missing his kids’ after-school activities. 

“now i can coach my kid’s little league 

football team,” he said. “i’m able to take the kids 

to bible study and choir practice and saxophone 

lessons.” 

as for rotrice, she now works from home. 

“That absolutely adds to our quality of life,” 

said McGhaw. 

McGhaw anticipates that quality will improve, 

thanks to what he’s seen since becoming the 

legislative affairs specialist. 

“i work with the mayors of both Madison and 

huntsville, as well as the county commissioner, 

and they have a team approach to leadership,” 

he said. “The borders aren’t as important to them 

as improving the quality of life for the region. i 

just can’t commend enough the way the three 

have worked together in collaboration. They 

collectively go to the state or d.C. to lobby for 

resources because it’s best for the entire region 

– that’s unique.” 

some stores and restaurants close earlier at 

night than in d.C., but McGhaw said that is a 

small trade-off. 

“yes, things do close a little early or don’t 

open on sunday, but the people here want to 

go to their kids’ games like i want to go to 

mine,” he said. “and it’s that community 

support, even among people who don’t have 

kids, that makes the city such a great place to 

raise a family.” 

McGhaw suggests potential residents check 

out the area for a day or two. 

“if your job is relocating and you’re apprehensive, 

just fly down and visit,” he said. “i suspect 

you will leave with a very different perspective.” 

That’s advice becky Pillsbury probably should 

have taken before she and her husband, Jim, 

decided to buy a retirement property in 

Kentucky. as a military family, the Pillsburys had 

lived all over the country, but had decided to 

spend their sunset years on a golf course 

residence they had purchased while Jim was 

stationed in Kentucky. 

Then in 2003, Lt. Gen. Pillsbury was promoted 

to commander of redstone arsenal and the 

army aviation and Missile Command. 

“We were here for all of six months when Jim 

looked at me and said ‘We’d better sell that 

property in Kentucky and buy something here,’ ” 

becky said. “and i said, ‘you’re absolutely right.’ 

it was that quick.” 

becky wasn’t initially thrilled about the move 

to northern alabama. for one thing, she didn’t 

know much about it. her only exposure to 

huntsville had been a short visit with her son and 

daughter to the u.s. space and rocket Center 

while Jim was deployed during the Gulf War. 

for another thing, she and Jim had only 

recently moved to Germany, where she said she 

“still had so much to buy and see and do!” but 

she put those unfulfilled aspirations aside for her 


n Lt. Gen. (ret.) Jim Pillsbury, his wife, becky, 

and daughter Katherine spend time at home 

with their dogs, Pepper in the back and Trooper 

in the front. The Pillsburys already had a r 

etirement home purchased in Kentucky, 

but once Jim was promoted to commander 

of redstone arsenal, the family fell in love 

with huntsville. 

Photo by Dave Dieter. 

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n Kristen, elizabeth and aaron King arrived in 

huntsville in 2011. aaron says he has “found 

home here in huntsville” after having lived in 

over a dozen other cities and towns around 

the united states. 


husband, who she said had no such qualms. 

“Jim had been here many times before and 

was so excited about coming here,” said becky. 

“he knew the command was open and he was 

just thrilled he’d been given the honor of 

earning it.” 

Once they got here, becky never looked back. 

she was also particularly impressed with the level 

of volunteerism among residents. 

“it’s a city where people who come here want 

to be involved and see what a marvelous place it 

is and want to make it better,” she said. “This is a 

town of fixers.” 

a fixer herself, Becky and some colleagues 

founded still serving veterans (ssv) in 2005, an 

advocacy center for wounded or disabled 

veterans which has brought $21 million back to 

the tennessee Valley through benefits, jobs and 

training. but as much as becky was growing to 

love the city, the military had other plans for 

the Pillsburys. 

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after less than four years here, Jim received 

another promotion, this time as deputy 

commanding general of the army Materiel 

Command (aMC), and the family moved up to 

fort belvoir, outside of Washington, dC. 

“When we were sent to d.C., we found out 

they were moving the aMC to huntsville as part 

of the 2005 base realignment and Closure,” 

becky said, “so we were thrilled to know we 

would be coming back.” 

in the interim, the Pillsburys continued to stay 

in touch with the friends they had made in huntsville. 

becky also stayed active in ssv. 

“i was still helping in d.C., with good access to 

our state’s senators and congressmen,” she said. 

Jim, meanwhile, traveled back and forth 

regularly for work. 

“and every time Jim would come back to 

huntsville, he would bring someone with him,” 

said becky. “and almost every one of them 

ended up moving here!” 

To those who had yet to make the visit, becky 

said she would “describe huntsville as d.C. 

without all the traffic, without all the people and 

located in the bible belt. it’s got all the things you 

want from a large town in a small town.” 

by the time the Pillsburys themselves 

returned in January 2011, they were ready to 

stay. Jim officially retired that July and they 

ended up settling just outside the huntsville city 

limits on two acres right on the flint river. “ 

a dollar goes a lot further in huntsville than 

it does in d.C.,” becky said. “you can travel 45 

minutes out of town here and get 12 acres and a 

house twice the size of the one you’d find for the 

same price there.” 

They also managed to entice their son and 

daughter to settle here. 

“it’s very unusual for military children to be in 

the same town where their parents retire, but my 

son ended up moving here, getting married and 

becoming a lawyer, and my daughter moved 

here after graduating from college and now 

works here, too,” she said. “even my daughterin-law’s 

sister moved here – it’s almost like we’re 

starting our own community.” 

What keeps them all here is easy for her to 

describe. 

“We love how diverse it is here, and that there 

are people who are so different from each other,” 

said becky. “We love the fact that we can see 

broadway plays, but also go up to Monte sano 

and see the city lights down below.” 

The military community is also an important 

component. 

“We still love supporting the military, and we 

still feel welcome to come and help with different 

events on post, celebrating the promotions and 

retirements,” she said. 

Then there’s always the commute. 

“When we would go to the theater in d.C., it 

took about two and a half hours round trip,” she 

said. “here, from the time we leave the theater 

to the time we walk into the house, it takes 15 

minutes. if that’s not quality of life, i don’t know 

what is!” n 

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n Lilly McKay harris, left, J.J. Gomez and 

esther Martinez, all age 10, check out the 

new laptops issued to Jill Cox’s fifth-grade 

classroom at Chaffee elementary school. 


Building Great Minds 

sCHOOls dEliVER THE KiNd Of smaRT 

sTudENTs aREa dEmaNds 

By Deborah Bennick 

no one in huntsville will blink if you say you 

want to grow up to be a rocket scientist. after 

all, this has been the home of rocket scientists 

for decades. 

Or maybe you want to pursue medical 

research, or helicopter design, or weather, or 

agriculture. how about robotics? With high-tech 

jobs booming here, area schools and universities 

constantly tweak and develop curricula to 

help students prepare for careers in a cuttingedge 

workforce. 

among the latest moves on K-12 and 

university campuses: integrating more technology 

into classrooms, increasing the number of 

advanced placement courses, making career 

readiness programs accessible to more students, 

and adding more graduate degree programs. 

Local companies with international reputa- 

tions embrace the schools on many levels, 

whether it’s to help develop curriculum, involve 

students in research, mentor interns, sponsor 

competitions or offer volunteers as math tutors. 

Well-developed cooperative education programs 

give university students a head start on their 

careers, and often a job at graduation. 

students can be found building missiles on the 

u.s. army’s redstone arsenal, designing 

propulsion systems for the national aeronautics 

and space administration, or studying genetics at 

the hudsonalpha institute for biotechnology. 

high school and college teams hone their design, 

build and test skills in such competitions as the 

Great international Moonbuggy race, nasa’s 

discovery/new frontiers program or the firsT 

LeGO League robotics contest. 

in response to industry suggestions, the two 

largest public school systems are revamping 

career readiness programs as well as adding 

college prep classes. high schools have engineering, 

medical and construction academies, as well 

as courses in modeling and simulation, computer 

programming, genetic technologies, computer 

networking and robotics. 

“We are integrating career readiness into our 

schools versus having a separate school for 

career and technical education,” says huntsville 

City schools superintendent dr. Casey 

Wardynski. “We are also increasing the use of 

technology within our curriculum for career/ 

technical education.” 

Moving the classes out to high schools makes 

them accessible to more students who can 

graduate and go right to work for contractors 

handling government projects. 


“The programs that we moved out to the 

schools have taken off,” says Ken Kubick, director 

of personnel/pupil services for the Madison 

County School System. 

HUNTSVILLE CITY SCHOOLS 

This system of about 23,000 students is going 

wireless in all schools and issuing a netbook or 

pad-style computer to every student in grades 5 

through 12. Each fall the new fifth- and ninthgrade 

classes are assigned the computers they 

will carry for four years, with fifth-graders 

switching machines when they get to ninth grade. 

“There are so many resources that the 

student can get through their computer, and 

this puts it in their hands,” says Keith Ward, 

system spokesman. 

A couple months after getting the computers, 

fifth-grade teacher Jill Cox reports a positive 

response from her Chaffee Elementary School 

students, who use them for most subjects. “Now 

that we have them, I can’t imagine teaching 

without them. It’s so much fun.” 

Superintendent Wardynski says the system is 

also focused on the Common Core Standards, 

nationally developed standards that have been 

adopted by the State of Alabama. “This is a key 

focus, especially for children moving to Huntsville 

from different areas … because they will hopefully 

see consistency with curricula and standards from 

where they moved.” 

The system turns to business and industry 

leaders and the universities to develop curricula, 

particularly for its career-focused programs. 

Special tracks focus on such expertise as 

cyber-security, biomechanical systems engineering, 

computer-aided design, robotics, digital 

media and nursing. There are plans to add courses 

in game technology, medical technology and 

police/fire services. 

The system includes seven high schools (one 

an International Baccalaureate World School), 

five magnet programs and preschool classes. For 

17 years SchoolMatch has given it the “What 

Parents Want” award, and Expansion Management 

magazine ranks it among the top systems 

in the nation. 

In 2010, 84 percent of graduates continued 

their education at post-secondary institutions and 

41 percent earned scholarships, according to the 

2009-2010 Annual Report. 

Grissom High School regularly makes the list 

of best high schools in America by Newsweek 

Magazine. The Washington Post Challenge 2011 

also tapped Grissom as one of the best. New 

Century Technology High School is sixth on the 

2011 list of “Most-Connected Classrooms” by 

U.S. News & World Report. 

MADISON COUNTY SCHOOL SYSTEM 

The second-largest system in the county 

serves more than 20,000 students in campuses 

spread around the county, outside the city limits 

of Huntsville and Madison. 

The system is “continually ranked as one of 

the best across the state of Alabama,” Kubik says. 

The system embraces the Alabama Math, Science 

and Technology Initiative and the Alabama 

Reading Initiative. 

Scores for national standardized tests are 

“way above average,” according to Geraldine 

Tibbs, director of communications and public 

relations. Math and science teachers have 

earned national “Teacher of the Year” acclaim, 

and there is a Blue Ribbon School and three Blue 

Ribbon Lighthouse Schools. Part of a larger U.S. 

Dept. of Education effort to identify and 

disseminate knowledge about best school 

leadership and teaching practices, Blue Ribbon 

Schools are recognized by the National Blue 

Ribbon Schools Program as having students who 

achieve at very high levels and/or where the 

achievement gap is narrowing. 

Engineering, medical and construction 

academies set up at the high schools are staffed 

with professionals who garnered years of 

experience in their field before earning teaching 

certificates, Kubik says. 

Plenty of jobs in the Huntsville area require 

skills on high-tech equipment without a college 

degree. Career Technical Center classes let 

students practice on the computerized machinery 

they will use after graduation. Local companies 

such as Brown Precision Inc. and Dixie Metalcraft 

Corp. actively recruit graduates to work on 

medical and aerospace machining for commercial 

and government contracts, according to 

instructor Jeff Breece. 

MADISON CITY SCHOOLS 

Topping 9,000 students, this system 

established in 1998 achieves standardized test 

scores for all grades tested that are above the 

national average. 

At the high school level, the emphasis on 

career training helps students get an early start 

through courses in engineering, biomedical 

technology and health sciences. Students 

interact with engineers and medical experts 

through partnerships with such employers as 

n The University of Alabama in Huntsville offers 

various co-op programs in association with local 

industry for its students, like this student working 

at ADTRAN. 

www.HuntsvilleAlabamaUSA.com | 256.535.2000 CHAmber of CommerCe of HUntSville / mAdiSon CoUnty | 33

n Victor Obadina researches the spectral 

properties of glasses doped with metallic 

particles at the Chambers Building on the 

Alabama A&M University campus. 

Photo by Glenn Baeske.

NASA, Raytheon, Miltec Corp., SAIC and local 

hospitals. 

“We are working to have every career 

technical program end in a senior project or 

internship, ” says Camille Wright, director of 

secondary instruction. “Every student should 

have two to three courses in a certain pathway” 

by graduation. 

The emphasis on professional fields pays off 

come graduation time. In 2011, students were 

offered $31 million in scholarships and 93 percent 

of the graduates went on to two- or four-year 

colleges, including four to military academies. 

Newsweek magazine, The Washington Post 

and U.S. News & World Report all routinely rank 

Bob Jones High School as one of America’s best 

high schools. 

Recognizing that technology helps keep 

students engaged, Superintendent Dr. Dee 

Fowler says students in grades 7 through 12 are 

encouraged to bring laptops, smart phones and 

other devices to school. 

Every classroom is networked with Internet 

access, online resources and cable TV access. 

The system’s use of advanced technology has 

gained state and national recognition. 

PRIVATE SHOOLS 

Private schools encourage students to explore 

ways they can give back to their community while 

they pursue academic goals. 

A Valley Fellowship Christian Academy team’s 

water purification system won a NASA-sponsored 

competition, but more importantly, it can be put 

to use when the school does mission work in 

South America’s Amazon region. 

“We’re trying to instill in the students how they 

can contribute to society,” says Patti Simon, 

administrator for the school and president of the 

Huntsville/Madison Private Schools Association. 

“Science goes hand in hand with practical ways to 

help the community.” 

As well as participating in industry-sponsored 

competitions, Simon says private schools enlist 

parents to share their professional knowledge, as 

two engineer fathers did during six-week teaching 

stints at Valley Fellowship. 

The independent and religiously affiliated 

schools in the area serve ages pre-kindergarten 

through high school. Information about individual 

schools can be found on the Web site for the 

private school association (www.huntsvillemadisonprivateschools.org). 

Each spring the 

association organizes a Parade of Schools, when 

the schools are opened for tours. 

The 50-year-old Randolph School serves 

kindergarten through 12th grade with a college 

preparatory curriculum. It has twice been named 

a national School of Excellence by the U.S. 

Department of Education. 

Collaborations with the local arts community 

and the University of Alabama in Huntsville 

enhance the curriculum, while computer labs, a 

wireless network and a laptop program for grades 

8-12 put students in touch with technology. 

On the west side of Huntsville, Madison 

Academy offers an advanced placement 

curriculum and dual enrollment with Calhoun 

Community College and the University of 

Alabama in Huntsville. Out-of-town trips expose 

students to history, art, marine biology, and 

academic and art competitions. An exchange 

student program, mission trips and an emphasis 

on community service provide new experiences. 

n Madison County Career Technical center 

student Landon Holman programs a 

computer numeric control (CNC) machine. 



COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES 

Accredited colleges, universities and technical 

schools in the area involve students and 

professors in cutting-edge military, biotechnical 

and scientific projects. 

The University of Alabama in Huntsville 

The University of Alabama in Huntsville’s 

research expenditure increases regularly, with this 

year’s $85 million going toward projects within 

the individual colleges and in independent 

research centers, laboratories and institutes. 

Research focuses include applied optics, 

information technology, modeling and simulation, 

nano devices and space propulsion. The 

atmospheric science department is ranked one of 

the best in the nation. 

Part of the University of Alabama system, 

UAHuntsville’s five colleges – Engineering, Nursing, 

Business Administration, Science and Liberal Arts 

– serve around 7,700 students, about 1,600 of them 

graduate level. The school offers 67 degree-granting 

programs, and plans to add master’s degrees in 

earth system science and integrated science, 

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6241 University Drive • Suite B-1 • Huntsville, AL 35806 

Phone 256-971-0113 • Fax: 256-971-5406 

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technology, engineering and math. 

UAHuntsville has one of the largest cooperative 

education programs in the Southeast, 

according to spokesman Ray Garner. Each year, 

around 400 students spend time immersed in 

their field of interest at such places as ADTRAN, 

BellSouth, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and 

Honda Manufacturing of Alabama. 

Back in the classroom, student teams tackle 

real-world problems put to them by corporations, 

Army agencies and NASA. Mentors from the 

agencies judge their work, Garner says. 

For 2012, U.S. News & World Report ranks 

UAHuntsville 190th on its list of 1,600 best 

national universities and puts the engineering 

school’s graduate program in the top 100. In other 

accolades, the school has been named among 

the best educational values by Consumer Digest 

magazine, USA Today and Princeton Review. 

Popular Science magazine named the 

Propulsion Research Center the third “Most 

Awesome Lab in 2011,” part of its “Best Places to 

Pursue Science” feature. Further bolstering the 

research reputation is The Carnegie Foundation 

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for the Advancement of Technology, which 

recently upgraded the school’s status by putting it 

in the highest classification for research. This 

category puts it in the top 3 percent of four-year 

accredited public universities in the Untied States. 

Alabama A&M University 

Alabama A&M University spreads its 

disciplines over five colleges: Agricultural, Life 

and Natural Sciences; Arts and Sciences; Business 

and Public Affairs; Education, Humanities and 

Behavioral Sciences; and Engineering, Technology 

and Physical Sciences. This land grant 

university provides a variety of research facilities 

for students and local industry to utilize, including 

a wind tunnel and an agricultural research station. 

Its programs for food science and safety, plant 

and soil science, animal science and forestry 

funnel students into other prominent fields in 

Alabama, such as animal production, agriculture 

and protection of forest resources. 

The campus serves nearly 7,000 undergraduate 

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Oakwood University 

Oakwood University is a historically black Seventh-Day Adventist 

college that promotes compassionate Christian values while educating 

students in 47 different programs, among them chemistry, math and 

computer science, nursing and business. Students are regularly involved in 

disaster relief and community work. U.S. News & World Report ranks 

Oakwood as one of the best regional universities in the South. 

Also located in Huntsville are Calhoun Community College, J.F. Drake 

State Technical College, the University of Alabama at Birmingham’s 

Huntsville Regional Medical Campus and Virginia College at Huntsville. 

COMMUNITY COLLEGES 

Calhoun Community College 

Calhoun Community College’s three campuses offer 49 associate 

degree programs and 52 career/certificate programs. The largest 

two-year college in the state, Calhoun focuses on careers in the area, 

with programs in nursing, aerospace technology, automation and 

robotics, and biotechnology. It offers a pre-engineering degree to prepare 

students who plan to transfer to a four-year institution to earn an 

engineering degree. 

The applied technology program offers a major in renewable energy 

technology, including study of solar, wind and hydropower energy, so 

students can pursue careers in the green energy workforce. 

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education program. 

J.F. Drake State Technical College 

J.F. Drake State Technical College works closely with local industry, 

offering training for current and future employees. Business, engineering, 

manufacturing and applied technology, health sciences, salon management 

and culinary arts/hospitality services departments prepare students to enter 

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Body & Mind 

YOUR HEALTH CARE IS IN GOOD HANDS HERE 


With two first-rate regional medical centers, a 

groundbreaking cancer treatment/research 

center and a world-class biomedical industry 

growing out of the HudsonAlpha Institute for 

Biotechnology, Huntsville beats five of six 

comparable technology communities in 

city-to-city comparisons of key consumer costs in 

healthcare. 

According to the American Chamber of 

Commerce Research Association’s Cost of Living 

Index, Huntsville costs are lower than Austin, 

Texas; Charlotte, N.C.; Raleigh, N.C.; Richmond, 

Va.; and San Jose, Calif. 

Newcomers to Huntsville who are concerned 

about replacing trusted doctors and reliable 

medical care for existing health conditions and 

problems that may later arise can put their body 

and mind at ease. For those who need reassur- 

ance about quality care and living arrangements 

for aging parents or family members, Huntsville 

offers sweeping options in assisted living, 

rehabilitation and in-home elderly care. 

Or, if you are anxious about access to 

alternative medical techniques and services, 

specialized women’s health care or comprehensive 

options for aesthetic and personal care 

services, worry no more. 

REGIONAL MEDICAL CENTERS 

According to Pam Hudson, CEO of Crestwood 

Medical Center, the Huntsville area is fortunate to 

have so many options for most any health care 

need. 

“The competitive environment of health care 

and the broad spectrum of specialties available in 

our community results in state-of-the-art care for 

n A Crestwood Medical Center surgical team 

works with equipment. Crestwood CEO 

Pam Hudson says Huntsville is fortunate to 

have so many healthcare options. 


patients,” Hudson said. “This is what Crestwood’s 

mission is all about − a passionate and skilled 

team serving our community by providing quality 

care and service excellence for all patients and 

their families who choose our hospital.” 

Anyone considering Huntsville/Madison 

County as a place to live or work shouldn’t be 

concerned about access to quality health care, 

said David Spillers, CEO of Huntsville Hospital, 

Alabama’s second largest hospital system. 

“We are very blessed to have advanced 

services and highly trained physicians that you 

wouldn’t usually find in a community our size,” 

he said. 

Spillers said one reason for this benefit is that 

Huntsville Hospital has grown from a local 

hospital to a regional facility serving all of the 

Tennessee Valley. 

38 | CHAmber of CommerCe of HUntSville / mAdiSon CoUnty 256.535.2000 | www.HuntsvilleAlabamaUSA.com

“We are still community owned, but we have 

seen our community and our service area expand 

in recent years,” he said. 

Huntsville Hospital Health System today 

includes hospital affiliates in neighboring 

communities in Athens, Decatur and Sheffield, 

as well the new Madison Hospital, which opened 

in February. 

Recognized by Blue Cross Blue Shield as a 

“Tier 1” hospital, Crestwood Medical Center is 

designated a Blue Distinction Center for bariatric 

surgery, knee and hip replacement and spine 

surgery, and as a Center of Excellence for 

bariatric surgery. 

The recent renovation of Crestwood’s new 

maternity center provides mothers and their 

newborns the most advanced environment for 

labor and delivery available anywhere. It 

features Labor, Delivery, Recovery and 

Postpartum (LDRP) rooms, which allow the 

patient to remain in one room throughout all 

four phases of the birthing process. LDRP rooms 

permit a more stable environment for mother 

and child, while leaving plenty of room for 

visiting family members and guests. 

Also, Crestwood Medical Center recently 

acquired Robotic Assisted Surgery capabilities. 

“I am pleased that we have been able to 

acquire the da Vinci Robot, affectionately known 

as ‘Rosie,’” said Susan Bryce, Crestwood’s 

assistant chief nursing officer and director of 

perioperative services. “This acquisition further 

expands the ability of our surgeons to provide a 

level of technology that helps to keep our patients 

closer to home when the robotic technology is 

the best option for our patients.” 

The da Vinci is the perfect case of less being 

more − less invasive, less bleeding, less pain, less 

scarring − all benefits that translate into quicker 

recovery times. 

Huntsville Hospital is likewise focused on 

quality care and excellent service. 

“Just recently, Huntsville Hospital was ranked 

No. 1 in heart surgery in Alabama for 2012, 

according to Healthgrades,” Spillers said. 

In addition, Huntsville Hospital for Women & 

Children is one of three pediatric hospitals in 

Alabama, and more babies are delivered there 

than any other facility in the state. Huntsville 

Hospital also serves as the region’s trauma center. 

“All things considered, our community stands 

out in the Southeast and nationally,” Spillers said. 

“And one of the reasons is the availability of excellent 

health care services.” 

CANCER TREATMENT AND RESEARCH 

The significance of Clearview Cancer 

Institute’s research and Phase I clinical trials 

cannot be overstated. Their commitment to 

research involves an integrated cancer treatment 

program that includes medical oncology 

and hematology (study of blood), radiation 

oncology and gynecologic oncology. Treating 

more than 350 patients a day, Clearview has a 

staff of 14 physicians located in the 

115,000-square-foot facility. 

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Providence Place Apartments is Huntsville’s most anticipated 

luxury apartment home community. Situated perfectly in the 

Village of Providence, every element of your life is catered to 

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“It is extremely important for cancer patients 

who move to Huntsville to know that if you are 

out of options or seeking another opinion, 

Clearview provides Phase I clinical trials that offer 

promising new cancer treatments not yet 

available for general use,” said Leslie Vallely, 

Clearview public relations director and a breast 

cancer survivor. 

After more than 25 years of cancer research, 

Clearview is responsible for more than 30 

scientific breakthroughs of new FDA-approved 

cancer fighting treatments. Those include 

Herceptin for breast cancer; Gleevec for Chronic 

Myeloid Leukemia; Rituxan for lymphomas; 

Avastin for colon and lung cancers; and Gemzar 

for pancreatic cancer. 

Clearview also offers Phase I–IV interventional 

treatments and diagnostic research in outpatient 

settings. Additional services include imaging, full 

laboratory services, genetic counseling and 

education and supportive care services. 

FAMILY WELLNESS 

In support of Huntsville’s critical care facilities, 

Huntsville has a wide range of family care and 

specialty services available. Family walk-in clinics 

and urgent care centers scattered across the city 

provide on-the-spot doctor’s attention as an 

alternative to emergency room visits. 

Several women’s health facilities provide 

friendly, comfortable environments where the 

staff members know their patients by name, and 

women feel free to discuss female issues with 

someone who listens and understands. From 

obstetrics with 3D ultrasound capability to full 

gynecological concerns like menopause and 

menopause-related problems, adolescent 

gynecology, birth control, pelvic screening and 

childbearing advice, Huntsville offers the finest in 

women’s health. 

Back and neck pain sufferers will find comfort 

in several experienced chiropractic specialists in 

the Huntsville area. Providing non-surgical, 

evidence-based alternatives to back and neck 

pain, chiropractic care now has a symbiotic 

relationship with physicians. Huntsville chiropractic 

professionals use cutting-edge techniques 

including research-based decompression therapy 

to ease disc pain; the McKenzie exercise and 

physical therapy method; popular active-release, 

movement-based soft tissue massage; and simple 

adjustments for joint pain. 

If you prefer holistic or alternative forms of 

medical care, Huntsville residents will find 

herbal-based medicine, acupuncture for pain relief, 

as well as health food stores and organic markets 

with products that promote natural healing. 

PERSONAL CARE 

When it comes to extreme personal makeovers 

for health, wellness, anti-aging and 

aesthetics, Huntsville provides one of only two 

fully integrated spa, salon, ambulatory cosmetic 

surgery and aesthetic dentistry clinics in the 

United States. 

Huntsville has full cosmetic surgery centers 

where SmartLipo procedures remove love 

handles, leg fat and flab from your arms; 

tummy-tucks, face-lifts and procedures to make 

you look 10 years younger. 

Huntsville residents have access to the most 

advanced aesthetic procedures as well, including 

CO2 fractional laser resurfacing and total face 

rejuvenation, full mouth reconstruction, implants, 

veneers, root canals, teeth bleaching treatments 

and a full range of salon services, weight-loss 

programs, skin care products, facials, massage, 

chemical peels, laser hair removal, fillers and 

injectables, manicures and pedicures. 

Because nutrition is tied in every way to 

disease prevention and management, Huntsville 

has licensed registered dieticians who work 

closely with doctors, hospitals, local gyms and the 

school system to show patients and consumers 

how their nutritional intake can change the way 

they feel, and even affect medical diagnoses. 

Susan Scott, a licensed registered dietician 

and owner of SCS Nutrition One of Huntsville, has 

written a children’s cooking program called 

“Know What’s Cooking,” and is currently 

promoting it to educate children about what they 

are eating and how to cook it. 

“I recently saw a child about 6 years old 

looking at the bell peppers in the grocery produce 

department,” Scott said. “She asked her mom 

whether they could buy one so she could taste it. 

It was distressing to watch the parent dismiss her 

interest in fresh, healthy vegetables, when at the 

checkout, I saw her allow the child a candy bar. 

Those are the behaviors I wish I could change.” 

CARE FOR THE AGING 

According to CNNMoney.com, Huntsville is 

one of the nation’s Leading Places to Retire. 

Many families relocate their aging relatives 

when they move, and here they find a broad 

selection of options. 

Faith-based continuing care retirement 

communities (CCRC) with independent apartments 

are available for spry seniors. Assisted-living 

units aid those who need some help, memory-care 

facilities serve Alzheimer’s patients and facilities 

with skilled care help those who need it. 

The life care CCRC concept and its tax 

advantages are positive and affordable. 

Huntsville also offers transitional care and 

rehabilitation facilities for people recovering 

from surgery, recuperating after a stroke or a 

heart attack or healing from a broken hip. With 

plenty of physical, occupational, and speech 

therapy, wound care, and respiratory care 

services available in the city, stronger elderly 

citizens with few if any medical problems may 

consider an in-home personal care professional 

or companion. 

Home care professionals do not provide 

medical assistance, but run errands, care for pets, 

prevent clients from being injured and help them 

bathe, cook, eat and deal with incontinence 

issues if necessary. 

Also, several area hospice facilities provide loving 

end-of-life care. n 


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Federal City 

REDSTONE ARSENAL VITAL TO THE 

NATION’S SECURITY 

By Anna Thibodeaux 

With nearly 35,000 workers, Redstone Arsenal 

has evolved into a multi-faceted, multi-functional 

cluster of organizations serving as one of the U.S. 

Army’s most extensive facilities and a major 

economic generator for the Tennessee Valley. 

Huntsville Mayor Tommy Battle readily calls 

Redstone Arsenal the area’s major economic 

driver, bolstered by $60 billion annually 

running through the arsenal. Of this total, 

nearly $12 billion boosts the area economy in 

payroll and products. 

Redstone Arsenal has translated into jobs and 

innovation, and is the reason the Rocket City “has 

more engineers per capita than anywhere in the 

U.S.,” Battle said. Additionally, he said gaining 

the Army’s four-star command made Huntsville 

much more important strategically, resulting in 

the staffing of 12 general officers at the arsenal. 

The move has given Huntsville more presence 

with the military, especially the U.S. Army Space 

and Missile Defense Command (SMDC). It has 

also generated income that drives local 

businesses and is the reason many people and 

businesses locate in the area. More than 450 

aerospace and defense contracting companies 

are located here, according to the Chamber of 

Commerce of Huntsville/Madison County. Many 

of these companies perform technology research 

and development in support of arsenal activities. 

Redstone Arsenal employs more than 15,000 

contractors in direct support of its daily 

operations. The sizeable pool of technical 

expertise, maintained through aerospace and 

defense contracts, helps provide the Huntsville 

community with the highest concentration of 

engineers in the country and is vital to supporting 

n Redstone Arsenal has nearly 35,000 

workers and pumps nearly $12 billion 

into the area economy annually. 


the Department of Defense and NASA contract 

programs, as well as many other commercial 

technology applications. 

Cummings Research Park (CRP) provides 

Redstone Arsenal’s Department of Defense, 

Army, NASA and Department of Justice 

organizations with critical support in engineering, 

science and other core technical areas. CRP 

began as a public-private initiative and the park 

has become a symbol for the “synergistic 

growth” of the Tennessee Valley. The park 

continues to attract and retain the world’s major 

technology and research development companies 

to support customers, many with activities 

based on Redstone Arsenal. 

Col. John S. Hamilton, commander of the 

U.S. Army Garrison-Redstone Arsenal, said the 

relationship is symbiotic. 


“Team Redstone is very proud of the 

contributions provided through the skill, energy 

and ingenuity of the Redstone Arsenal workforce, 

who come to us from all over the 

Tennessee Valley,” Hamilton said. 

The combined workforce salary for military, 

government civilians and on-site contractors is 

about $3.1 billion a year. Of the $9.8 billion 

Alabama receives in federal dollars, Redstone 

Arsenal receives $5.8 billion of it. Redstone 

Arsenal’s role in the Army has considerable 

potential for growth as the nation relies more on 

science and technology for advantage on the 

battlefield. This role can also grow as the 

installation’s efforts impact the civilian world, 

similar to the Army’s development in the late 

1960s of a Cold War communications network 

that grew into what is now the Internet. A 

continued investment in science, technology, 

research, development and testing can be 

transformational and better the nation and U.S. 

capabilities. 

As an installation, Hamilton said Redstone 

Arsenal is unique. 

“Engineering and science remain the primary 

skill sets required for the ongoing research and 

development in rockets, missiles, aviation and 

other very technical disciplines on Redstone 

Arsenal,” he said. “The transformational 

synergies created through adding new organizations 

and their functions are truly extraordinary.” 

The synergies are translating into impressive 

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How Redstone ARsenAl gRew into A 

MAjoR FedeRAl CoMplex 

BRAC 1988: Gained Central Test Measurement & Diagnostic Equipment (TMDE) Activity from 

Lexington-Bluegrass Army Depot 

BRAC 1991: Gained Armament, Munitions & Chemical Command (AMCCOM) from Rock 

Island, Material Readiness Support Activity from Lexington-Blue Grass Army 

Depot (was slated for Letterkenny in BRAC 1988) and Logistics Control Activity 

from Presidio (later became LOGSA) 

BRAC 1993: Reversed the decision to move AMCOM from Rock Island to Redstone Arsenal 

BRAC 1995: Gained the Aviation mission component of the Aviation & Troop Command, 

Aviation Research & Development Center, and PEO Aviation from St. Louis, Mo., 

and merged with Missile Command, Missile RDEC and formed AMCOM and 

AMRDEC 

BRAC 2005: Gained the headquarters of Army Materiel Command, U.S. Army Space & Missile 

Defense Command and U.S. Army Security Assistance Command, and gained the 

Missile Defense Agency, Redstone Test Center, Second Recruiting Brigade and 

Second Medical Recruiting Battalion. 

Total Redstone Arsenal workforce population has increased from about 24,500 in 2004 to about 

35,000 today. 

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0000266628-01 

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n Helicopters await evaluation at the 

U.S. Army Test and Evaluation 

Command’s Rotary Wing Center on 

Redstone Arsenal. 


especially in the fields of science and engineering, 

and also logistics and management. The Aviation 

and Missile Command (AMCOM) Ombudsman 

Office fields inquiries from businesses interested 

in conducting business with AMCOM. 

Overall, Redstone Arsenal provides full-spectrum 

support to the nation’s defense from 

ballistic missile defense to space operations, to 

research and development, to test and 

evaluation, to logistics and acquisition centers, 

to foreign military sales and soldier recruitment 

for the Army. The installation has transformed 

from one of the Army’s best-kept secrets, in 

terms of locations to be stationed, to a national 

center of gravity of great strategic importance to 

the country. 

Compared to similar installations in 

landmass, Redstone Arsenal activities can be 

best compared to Aberdeen Proving Ground 

(APG), Md., or Rock Island Arsenal, Ill. Redstone 

Arsenal is about 38,125 acres while Aberdeen 

Proving Ground is about 72,000 acres (35,000 

acres of land and 37,000 acres of water) and 

Rock Island is about 1,000 acres. Additionally, 

Redstone Arsenal maintains more than 35,000 

employees compared to Aberdeen Proving 

Ground with more than 22,000 and Rock Island 

at 7,000. 

Better described as a federal office park, 

the arsenal is not a heavy troop installation 

such as forts Stewart, Hood or Bragg. 

Redstone retains fewer than 1,000 soldiers in 

uniform, who are mostly senior officers and 

non-commissioned officers. The arsenal 

workforce is already dominated by Department 

of Defense/Department of the Army 

civilians and contractors. Engineers, scientists, 

logisticians and contract-acquisition personnel 

are required to support Redstone Arsenal’s 

ongoing research and development, space 

operations, materiel management and 

homeland defense missions. 


The arsenal is also home to more than 

55 major organizations. They represent a 

significant contribution towards supporting 

U.S. national security. Generally, these 

organizations support five key operations: 

materiel management and acquisition; space 

operations and missile defense; intelligence 

and homeland defense; research, development, 

test and evaluation; and sustainment of 

Redstone Arsenal activities. 

“Huntsville’s Marshall Space Flight Center 

and Redstone Arsenal play an important role 

in our national discussion on technology and 

defense, and its successes are highly respected 

in Washington, D.C.,” said U.S. Rep. Robert 

Aderholt, R-Ala. “Redstone has a long-proven 

track record of creativity, talent and efficiency 

that is an example to other government entities 

throughout the South. Whether it be AMCOM, 

SMDC or MDA, Huntsville is playing as large a 

role in our nation’s security as any other region 

in America.” 

With the 2005 BRAC, (military base realignment 

and closure), Redstone Arsenal was 

positively impacted, as it was in previous BRAC 

decisions. New organizations transitioning to 

Redstone Arsenal as a result of BRAC 2005 

directives include the Army Materiel Command 

(AMC) headquarters, Army Security Assistance 

Command (USASAC) headquarters, SMDC 

headquarters, Second Recruiting Brigade and 

Second Medical Recruiting Battalion. 

Additionally, BRAC law significantly expanded 

the presence of the Missile Defense Agency 

(MDA) on Redstone Arsenal and merged the 

Aviation component of the Redstone Test Center 

(RTC) from Fort Rucker, Ala., to Redstone 

Arsenal. Although not part of BRAC law but 

attributable to BRAC actions, the Army recently 

moved the Army Contracting Command (ACC) 

and the Expeditionary Contracting Command 

0000279482-01 

Brian Bellomy, Agent 

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PO Box 1085 

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(ECC) to Redstone Arsenal. Call to subscribe 256.532.4444 or log on to www.huntsvilletimes.com 


0000278876-01 

0000277913-01 

INFORMATION YOU CAN DEPEND ON

n Above, the lobby of the new Von Braun III 

complex at Redstone Arsenal includes a 

display of Huntsville-based space pioneer 

Dr. Wernher von Braun’s desk. 

n At right, U.S. Army Astronaut Col. Shane 

Kimbrough visits officers at the Program 

Executive Office for Aviation on the 

arsenal to recruit them as Army 

astronauts. 

n Below, the Boeing Co. transports a 

Ground-based Midcourse Defense 

training interceptor on I-565 on its way to 

the arsenal. 

Photos by Eric Schultz. 


n Rick Ward & Company performs 

at the annual Blues, Brews & BBQ 

on Redstone Arsenal as the crowd 

stays cool under umbrellas. 


It also brought AMC’s commander, Gen. Ann 

Dunwoody, the first four-star general to be 

assigned to Redstone Arsenal. BRAC funding 

for all construction projects on the arsenal 

amounted to about $426 million, and BRAC 

operations funding totaled about $422 million. 

However, the base realignment is not the 

only contributor to growth on Redstone 

Arsenal and in the Tennessee Valley. Redstone 

Arsenal is adding non-Department of Defense 

organizations. Among them are the Federal 

Bureau of Investigation and the Bureau of Alcohol, 

Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Despite 

this growth, the arsenal continues to maintain 

a large number of buildable acres on the 

installation, allowing for additional growth. 

Redstone Arsenal’s history sets it apart as 

a distinctive military installation, marking its 

beginnings at the outset of World War II as a 

chemical munitions manufacturing and storage 

complex supporting our soldiers overseas. The 

arsenal’s original mission was changed forever 

when Dr. Wernher von Braun and his team of 

scientists arrived after the war to continue 

their research on rockets. Army Gen. Holgar 

Toftoy, Gen. John Medaris and von Braun were 

essential to the early successes of the nation’s 

rocket programs. 

Redstone Arsenal grew in its importance 

when President Dwight Eisenhower established 

NASA in 1958. The arsenal emerged 

as a recognized leader in science, engineering, 

research and development in rocket, missile 

and aviation programs. 

Since that time, the unique synergies 

created among the arsenal’s many different 

organizations have provided valuable contributions 

to the nation’s defense and the area’s 

economy. 

“We’ll continue to grow,” Mayor Battle said. 

“We’ve successfully been through two BRACs 

and will see consolidation. We work hand-inglove 

with our arsenal.” n 

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• Ample Power for manufacturing and distribution 

• Easy access to I-565 and Gate 7 of Redstone Arsenal 

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Copyright © 2009 ADTRAN Inc. All rights reserved. ADTRAN and NetVanta are registered trademarks of ADTRAN, Inc. 


0000278078-01 

0000267052-01

we Can do it 

CUMMINGS RESEARCH PARk, A CENTER OF 

TECHNICAL CREATIVITY 

By LeAnne Letize McGee 

Celebrating its 50th anniversary this year is 

Huntsville’s vibrant and ever-growing hub for 

technology, research and development, 

Cummings Research Park. 

Boasting close to 300 businesses and 25,000 

employees, CRP is the second largest research 

park in the country and the fourth largest in the 

world. CRP’s well-established companies and 

new companies alike work hard to devise 

innovative solutions to complex problems, 

develop state-of-the-art technology to manage 

complex systems and make ground-breaking 

biotechnology discoveries. It is no wonder that 

Huntsville was recently named one of Forbes 

Top 20 Leading Metros for Business, and one of 

fDi magazine’s Top 5 Small Cities of the Future in 

North & South America. 

Started in 1962 as a way to keep government 

contracting firms close to their clients at 

Redstone Arsenal, CRP was created by Milton 

Cummings, then president of Brown Engineering 

(now Teledyne Brown Engineering Inc.), and his 

vice president Joseph C. Moquin. What Cummings 

and Moquin began with just 382 acres has 

grown over the years into 3,843 acres with two 

sprawling sections divided by the busy thoroughfare 

Research Boulevard. 

Today, companies looking to relocate or 

expand in CRP can choose from a full 500 acres 

and 90,000-100,000 square feet of office space at 

any given time. 

Growing businesses in Huntsville is not just 

good for CRP but is good for the whole community, 

said John Southerland, CRP’s director at the 

Chamber of Commerce of Huntsville/Madison 

County. “What this means for Huntsville is more 

jobs, more high-tech jobs, more high-paying 

jobs.” These high-tech jobs also bring other jobs 

n Founded in Huntsville, ADTRAN is now a 

leading global provider of networking and 

communications equipment and employs 

1,700 people. The firm has been named 

Alabama’s Large Manufacturer of the Year. 


in the community to support those workers, such 

as bankers, retailers, restaurants and more, said 

Southerland. “So the spin-off of all of that is 

continued growth in the community, and it’s the 

right kind of growth, very educated, highly-technical, 

highly-skilled workforce – we want to bring 

in these people who can benefit everyone in the 

community,” he said. 

As a model for transforming research into 

business success, CRP is restricted to technology 

industries, which means its workforce is very 

educated, highly technical, and highly skilled. 

Huntsville’s concentration of high-tech 

workers is second in the nation only to San 

Jose’s Silicon Valley, according to the TechAmerica 

Foundation, and the area was recently 

recognized as one of the country’s leading 

“Hotbeds for High-Tech Growth” by AreaDevelopment 

magazine. 


Pairing these high-tech professionals with 

CRP’s award-winning research centers and 

acclaimed academic institutions creates high 

visibility and fosters collaboration between all 

CRP tenants, causing what Southerland calls a 

“natural synergy” at the park. 

“We have an amazing skill set out there in 

the park, everything from some of the world’s 

leading biotechnology and research scientists, 

to software engineer developers, to pioneers 

in modeling and simulation,” he said. “Getting 

all of these talented people together gives this 

community a gathering of intellectual 

capability that you just do not find in other 

parts of the country.” 

Becoming part of CRP is an ideal choice for 

technology-based businesses. In addition to the 

thriving intellectual environment that fosters 

innovation, and the proximity to the park’s other 

major players, CRP has a multitude of perks. It 

is centrally located within a community that is 

consistently ranked as one of the top places in 

the country to work, raise a family and retire. 

It is less than five minutes from the Redstone 

Arsenal, 10 minutes to the Huntsville International 

Airport, and it has easy access to all of 

Huntsville’s major roads. It has a great physical 

infrastructure and design that makes travel 

within the park easy. 

It has beautiful greenways and walking trails, 

and includes Bridge Street Town Centre, which 

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0000265540-01

provides a variety of dining, retail and entertainment 

options as well as hotel accommodations. 

Most of the work coming out of CRP has 

historically been done by high-tech contracting 

firms that provide defense and aerospace 

support to Redstone Arsenal tenants such as 

the Department of Defense, the U.S. Army and 

NASA – winning Huntsville its recent ranking as 

the nation’s third largest aerospace and defense 

manufacturing hub by Business Facilities 

magazine – but CRP also includes research 

centers, biotechnical companies, academic 

institutions and commercial-sector companies. 

CRP’s rich diversity has contributed to its 

success, as evidenced by Huntsville making the 

USA Today Top 5 List of Communities Leading 

the Economic Recovery and its designation by 

Milkin Institute as one of the 10 Best Performing 

Cities in the Country for its creation and 

sustainment of American jobs. 

Though the various companies at CRP are 

diverse in their offerings, Southerland said they 

all share the same entrepreneurial vision. 

“The great thing about Cummings is that it is 

a place where the entrepreneurial spirit is 

cultivated,” he said. “It is a great combination of 

very smart people coming together and creating 

or developing an idea, or creating a product or 

new service, and then it grows from there.” 

The list of CRP companies that have enjoyed 

such growth is huge, but as a sampling Southerland 

names a few: ADTRAN Inc., AEgis Technologies 

n Cummings Research Park is the engine 

for Huntsville’s high-tech jobs that grow 

other businesses such as banks, retailers 

and restaurants, said John Southerland, 

CRP director. 


Group Inc., and LogiCore Corp. 

ADTRAN was founded in Huntsville in 1986 

and is a leading global provider of networking 

and communications equipment. Taking the 

spot as the cornerstone building at the center 

of the western portion of the park, ADTRAN 

has 1,700 employees, was named Alabama’s 

Large Manufacturer of the Year, and holds 

more patents than any large corporation 

headquartered in Alabama. 

ADTRAN continues to celebrate record 

revenue quarter after quarter, and is continuing 

to add to its workforce, thanks to its forwardthinking 

philosophy and the fact that it is not 

dependent on the federal budget for aerospace 

or defense, said Southerland. 

“That is the kind of diversification in the 

industry we love,” he said. 

AEgis is a rapidly-growing company that 

specializes in cutting-edge modeling and 

simulation and micro/nanoscale technology 

development. It was co-founded by Steve Hill 

in Huntsville in 1989. 

“AEgis is an industry leader in the world of 

modeling and simulation. It is exceptionally 

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high-tech and they are about as cutting-edge 

as it gets,” said Southerland. 

And there is no place AEgis would rather be 

than at CRP. 

“It is great to be co-located with lots of 

teammates and industry partners, and (the park) 

has a great IT infrastructure for high-tech 

business,” said Hill. “Also, the excellent reputation 

(of CRP) is helpful for people knowing about the 

park and where we are.” 

LogiCore Corp. was founded in Huntsville in 

2002 by Miranda Bouldin and is a technology 

services and solutions company that provides 

engineering and technical support services to the 

federal government, primarily in defense. 

It has 150 employees in four states and in 

several countries. Having just moved to CRP in 

2011, LogiCore has seen so much growth that it 

plans to build a new 35,000-square-foot building 

in the park. This is just the sort of growth 

Southerland likes to see at CRP. 

“It’s just great to see small local companies 

growing,” he said. “It shows you that you can be 

a big company and grow and prosper here, like 

Boeing, like Lockheed Martin, or you can be an 

entrepreneur here and start your own company 

and grow it.” 

Bouldin cannot say enough about the benefits 

of being in CRP. 

“The reason we moved over here is because 

it is a great central location for our customers, 

we are right around the corner from Redstone 

Arsenal, it has great visibility for the current prime 

contractors we work with, such as SAIC, AEgis, 

Dynetics, and it was just really a convenient area 

for us to be in based on where our customers are 

located,” she said. 

She encourages new businesses to make CRP 

their home. 

“It is a great area for entrepreneurs to move 

in, primarily because it gives you credibility and it 

shows you are committed to your business,” she 

said. “Moving out here said, ‘I am in this business, 

I am committed to growing my business, and I 

want to be amongst the other industry partners 

that can help me to grow my business.’” 

Huntsville is famous for its history with the 

space flight industry, which began more than 50 

years ago with the creation of the Marshall Space 

Flight Center. And although NASA has recently 

seen changes to its programs, 2012 is still an 

exciting year for aerospace in Huntsville and CRP, 

said Southerland. 

This is thanks to two new commercial space 

flight programs, the Stratolaunch and Sierra 

Nevada Corp.’s Dream Chaser, as well as NASA’s 

heavy-lift vehicle program. 

“We have several different things that are 

going on here now that are involving manned 

and unmanned spacecraft, government and 

commercial, which opens up a world of opportunities 

and possibilities that were not here just a 

year ago,” Southerland said. 

Stratolaunch is a partnership between 

Microsoft cofounder Paul G. Allen, and Dynetics, 

one of CRP’s pinnacle aerospace engineering 

Westminster Christian Academy 

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For more information contact Melissa Gilliland, Office of Advancement 

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0000270014-01 

0000267625-01

0000278347-01 

n LogiCore Corp. holds a 

ribbon-cutting at its 

headquarters at Cummings 

Research Park. Founded in 

2002, the company has 150 

employees in four states and 

is planning to build a new 

building at CRP. 


companies, to create a massive one-of-a-kind 

airplane that will launch rockets bearing mediumsized 

payloads into orbit. It will be headquartered 

in Dynetics’ new 226,500-square-foot, state-ofthe-art 

building that opened in April 2012. 

Sierra Nevada has an office in CRP and will 

be working with NASA to use the orbital crew 

vehicle called the Dream Chaser to develop the 

capability to transport astronauts and cargo to 

the International Space Station. The Dream 

Chaser will undergo wind tunnel tests at 

Marshall, and Marshall will provide engineering 

support and data processing. 

Meanwhile, NASA will be moving forward 

with the Space Launch System that replaces 

the Constellation program and will provide a 

heavy-lift vehicle for human space exploration. 

While defense and aerospace contractors 

make up a large portion of CRP companies and are 

responsible for its cutting-edge technology and 

systems, equally as impressive is the extremely 

fast-growing industry of biotechnology. 

It began booming when in 2008 the Hudson- 

Alpha Institute for Biotechnology opened on the 

western side of CRP on the park’s 150-acre 

biotech campus. The Institute has become a 

world leader in biotechnology and the work it is 

doing is phenomenal, said Southerland. 

“There is a bright future there at Hudson- 

Alpha,” he said. “Most of the companies there 

are fairly small and growing; they are doing some 

amazing things and are growing very quickly.” 

The Institute is split into two sections, with 

one side of its landmark building being used by 

for-profit businesses and the other side reserved 

for researchers. The building was designed to 

facilitate collaboration between the two sides. 

The Institute is clearly a world leader in biotechnology. 

“If you look at the area where the United 

States is still leading the pack globally – it is 

biotechnology, especially the study of the human 

genome,” said Southerland. 

“It is very open air with a lot of light and glass, 

and they share all of this common space where 

people can converge and chit-chat,” Southerland 

said. “Common areas were strategically designed 

to facilitate discussion and collaboration among 

the research, science and business staff. From 

the water coolers to the cafeteria, the people 

working at the Institute are all together.” 

This open, accessible communication is the 

best benefit of being part of CRP, said Randy 

Ward, president and chief operating officer of 

Diatherix, one of the fast-growing biotech 

companies at the Institute. 

“Where normally you would have to drive to a 

university somewhere and try to get permission 

to go in and talk to someone (about an idea or a 

research question), we just go over and talk to 

them,” he said of the researchers at the Institute. 

“It is amazing to have this in one building. There 

is nowhere like it.” 

Diatherix is growing at super-speed. It has 

recently tripled its volume and will soon expand 


into a larger space at the Institute. Its success and 

notoriety is helping to secure CRP’s reputation as 

a world leader in genomic research. “We bring 

people here from all over the United States, and 

(the Institute) gives so much validity to what we 

do. It just blows people away when they see 

this,” said Ward. 

Southerland said Diatherix is another example 

of CRP’s entrepreneurial spirit, and he is excited 

to see such explosive growth in biotechnology at 

CRP. Utilizing technology created by Hudson- 

Alpha researcher Dr. Jian Han, Diatherix’s lab 

provides the fastest large multiplex PCR infection 

testing in the United States (at just 6 hours time), 

is the only lab in the United States that can test a 

single human specimen utilizing molecular 

testing for 25 pathogens, and is the only one to 

test a specimen for viruses and bacteria at the 

same time. 

“The great thing about what they did was 

they took the technology of the scientific side of 

HudsonAlpha, which is a non-profit, and they 

took research done from Dr. Jian Han and they 

transferred that technology into something 

commercial that is changing the models for how 

doctors diagnose, and therefore treat, patients,” 

Southerland said. 

With extraordinary companies and institutions 

working together to meld big ideas with a 

‘can do’ spirit to serve the needs of government, 

technology, biotechnology, and more, the future 

of CRP is exciting. n 

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dazzling shopping 

AREA’S VARIETY IS DELIGHTFULLY SURPRISING 


Forbes cited Huntsville as one of the Top 10 

Smartest Cities in the world. With all that 

brainpower at work, Huntsville residents expect 

technologically advanced products and smart 

merchandise that represents the fruits of their 

intellectual endeavors. 

They enjoy a diverse selection of sophisticated 

shopping options that guarantee value and 

promise convenience. From high-ticket luxury 

items like automobiles, home furnishings and 

jewelry to everyday fashion, home décor and 

daily necessities, Huntsville gives its residents 

plenty of shopping opportunities, always within a 

15-minute drive from anywhere in the city. 

SHOPPING WITHOUT DROPPING 

Huntsville provides diverse shopping experiences, 

all convenient from any part of town. 

Shoppers can spend a couple of hours 

browsing the traditional stores at Parkway Place 

Mall and then in 10 minutes find themselves 

strolling the waterside esplanade of Bridge 

Street Town Centre with its more than 70 upscale 

boutiques and specialty stores. 

Five minutes away from Bridge Street are 

stores found exclusively in Huntsville at Madison 

Square Mall, while 13 minutes in a southeasterly 

direction is one of the city’s greatest shopping 

experiences for Huntsville-owned retail shops, 

offices and dining at Main Street South. 

“Parkway Place and Madison Square Mall 

each offer an array of stores that cannot be found 

anywhere else in the area,” said Jana Kuner, 

group marketing director for CBL & Associates 

Properties Inc., owners of both malls. “Each 

center offers extra amenities including indoor 

n Bridge Street Town Centre has more than 70 

boutique and specialty stores, and features a 

Monaco Pictures theater. Photo by Dave Dieter. 

play areas, food courts and soft seating.” 

Belk has a store at each of the shopping 

centers, providing apparel for the entire family, 

cosmetics, shoes and accessories, and a variety 

of house wares and decor. 

“With weather patterns like they are in the 

Tennessee Valley, we often find ourselves inviting 

shoppers to warm up, stay dry or beat the heat in 

our enclosed shopping centers,” Kuner said. 

“Main Street South is a hidden jewel, perhaps 

one of Huntsville’s most forward-looking 

shopping villages, built in the 1980s and designed 

with Main Street America in mind,” explained 

Michael McCurry of McCurry Real Estate Inc., 

who bought Main Street South in 1999. A 

spectacular three-floor circular atrium houses 

many professional businesses. 

The main level is reserved for locally owned 


0000279515-01 


0000278343-01

art galleries, photography studios, restaurants 

and retail shops like Sabghi Jewelers, a full 

service store filled with hundreds of gemstones 

and diamonds, gold and silver chains and 

pendants, and watches in all price ranges. 

“Main Street South is quaint and has a quiet 

atmosphere where people can grab something 

delicious to eat while wandering in and out of the 

shops. Because it is such a beautiful setting, we 

have a lot of events here, including weddings,” 

McCurry said. 

Huntsville’s newest shopping extravaganza 

lies on the edge of Cummings Research Park. 

One of the unique features of Bridge Street Town 

Centre is the open-air promenade lined with 

shops that delight any age group and restaurants 

to whet any appetite. At any given time, visitors 

will see children devouring yummy sweets from 

the Chocolate Crocodile, mom still in a swoon 

from a relaxing day at Blue Medspa, and dad 

hurrying everyone into Connor’s Steak House or 

P.F. Chang’s in time to catch the 7 p.m. showing 

at Monaco Theatre. 

“We have very active entertainment at 

Bridge Street, particularly at night,” said Marty 

Dubey, the center’s marketing director. 

“Gondola rides on the lake, the children’s 

carousel, and pavement performers almost 

every night make for a romantic date night, 

family night or group outing. We offer a 

complete shopping experience.” 

n Enjoying a meal at Lime Fresh in Bridge 

Street Town Centre are Ashley Blankenship 

of Grapevine, Texas, and Thomas Espy and 

Michael Streeter of Madison. 

MAkING A HOUSE A HOME 

Retail saw the emergence of superstores 

in the 1990s, ushering in an expectation of 

convenience and demand for integrated 

products with services to make shopping easier. 

Huntsville retailers adopted the cost-effective 

“big city” model of one stop shopping that has 

significantly affected how shoppers buy products 

for their home. 

Setting up house is a top priority for new 

Huntsville residents. Those customers expect 

comparable design services that help them 

create practical, functional spaces in their 

kitchens, bathrooms, living areas, home offices, 

entertainment spaces and laundry rooms. Maxon 

Bromley, general manager of Valley Appliance, 

said there is more to buying kitchen appliances 

than deciding between a white top-mount or 

black bottom-mount refrigerator. 

“We are truly a one stop shop for sales, service 

and installation, but we also help customers 

design and remodel their bathrooms and 

kitchens, mudrooms – which usually house their 

washers and dryers – and we provide solutions 

for closets, cabinets, entertainment centers and 

even built-in bookcases,” he said. 

Any retailer in the area can provide the 

newest innovative green home appliance 

technology. Much of this technology is 

developed and produced in Huntsville at 

LG Electronics. 

Both Bassett Home Furnishings and Townhouse 

Galleries in Huntsville provide integrated 

interior design services along with retail 

furnishings for their customers. 

According to Jennifer Ryan, sales manager at 

Bassett, customers building or decorating and 

furnishing $400,000 homes are looking for more 

than a furniture store that sells a chair here and 

sofa there. 

“They want high quality customization and 

30-day delivery – and they get it,” Ryan explains. 

“We have professional design consultants on 

staff with many years of experience.” 

Providing full interior decorating and design 

services streamlines the process. 

“We develop relationships with our customers, 

go out to their homes and measure, help them 

stage a room one at a time, and determine what 

they like, and coordinate their tables, chairs, 

sofas, rugs, cushions and artwork,” Ryan said. 

“What’s more, if the customer happened to have 

a townhouse or beach house down on the coast 

or in another state, we can help them decorate it 

from here in North Alabama, and as long as there 

is a store in their area, have it drop shipped to 

their vacation home wherever that might be.” 

LUXURY LIVING 

Huntsville can even provide the security 

conscious with an integrated home monitoring 

system with all the bells and whistles of an estate 

on Long Island. 

“We are a local company providing outstanding 

local installation, tech support, maintenance 

and monitoring,” said Billy Chancellor, owner of 

BBC Systems. “There is no automatic billing 

renewal and no buy-out on a contract. If you 

need advice or a service call, a real person 

answers the call.” 

Most families barely scratch the surface of 

what a wireless touch-screen home security 

system can provide, said Chancellor. 

“We have systems that control your air 

conditioning if you are away for a period of time, 

keeping it cool enough to keep the chocolate 

from melting, but warm enough to keep the 

power bill at a minimum,” he said. 

“They can control the inside and outdoor 

lights in case you don’t want people to know you 

are gone, and there are apps for your phone that 

allow you to control the electronics in the house 

from your phone.” 

The touchpad lets you leave messages for 

other family members and works from a central 

station with options for 24/7 monitoring.” 

Are you getting married or engaged? Do you 

have a family heirloom that needs reset or 

redesigned? Huntsville’s Donny Maleknia is a star 

jewelry designer who gave up microchips for 

“ice” chips, merging an artistic eye with a girl’s 

best friend. When customers pull up in front of 

Donny’s Diamond Gallery, they are greeted with 

a wave before entering the showroom and 

welcomed with a goblet of sparkling water 

served on gold embossed cocktail napkins. 

Then Donny walks customers through their 


expectations. “If you can dream it, Donny will 

create it,” said his wife and store manager, 

Fatemeh Nazarieh. 

It’s true what they say about Southerners 

loving their pickup trucks, but according to 

Paige Pearman Sandlin at Ray Pearman Lincoln 

Mercury, major car manufacturers have 

categorized Huntsville as a luxury car market. 

“Huntsville is a great city to purchase a 

vehicle,” she said. “We are just large enough to 

be considered a luxury market, but small enough 

to keep that intimate, hometown feel. Many of 

our dealerships are still family owned, so buyers 

deal with an experienced hometown dealer. You 

will find all the major manufactures and brands 

here in Huntsville, from economy to luxury, and 

you can buy at competitive prices.” 

Dealers include Mercedes Benz of Huntsville, 

Lexus of Huntsville, Bentley Cadillac, Smith 

Infinity and Woody Anderson Ford. 

Relocate America, a consumer-driven agency 

and resource for people relocating to different 

cities, named Huntsville one of the country’s Top 

10 Places to Live. Huntsville Mayor Tommy Battle 

said one reason for that is a smart populace. 

“Huntsville,” he said, “stretches the limits of 

our cerebral capacity with more PhDs and 

engineers in one city than anywhere else in the 

country.” 

Smart people make smart shoppers, and in 

Huntsville they find what their heart desires. n 

n Above, Parkway Place features a 

Belk and an array of other stores, 

as well as the all-climate shopping 

convenience of an indoor venue. 

n Below, cars pack the parking lots at 

Madison Square Mall, another indoor 

shopping experience. Both are owned 

by CBL & Associates Properties Inc. 


playtime 

PLENTY TO DO IN YOUR LEISURE HOURS 

By Bob Labbe 

The old adage “so much to do, so little time” 

perfectly describes the Huntsville and Madison 

County recreational scene. 

Arriving into one of the premier family- 

oriented communities in the South, one quickly 

sees and feels the wondrous ways of life that 

make North Alabama the place to be. 

Huntsville/Madison County provides a deluge 

of recreational opportunities for both youth and 

adults. For the second time in three years, 

Huntsville has been recognized as a “Playful 

City” by KaBOOM, a national nonprofit 

dedicated to saving play for America’s children, 

and it is among 100 cities in the United States 

that make play a priority and use innovative 

programs to get all members of the communities 

active, playing and healthy. Huntsville has been 

tabbed as “One of the Best Places to Live” by 

Men’s Journal and “One of the Nation’s Leading 

Places to Retire” by CNN/Money. 

“Time and time again our residents and 

newcomers tell us that the quality of life here is 

n Checking out camping equipment 

during a Huntsville Operation Green Team 

Play Day at Hays Nature Preserve’s 

Terrame Natural Playground are, from 

left, Tyler Wages, Carson Wages and 

Erika Ritchie. 

unparalleled,” said Tommy Battle, mayor of 

Huntsville. “There is truly something for 

everyone here. Huntsville has it all. The 

community is welcoming, open and inclusive.” 

PLAYGROUND MECCA 

If leisure style of recreational playtime is 

what you’re looking for, then look no further. 

There is truly something for everyone here, 

whether you enjoy peaceful walks along 

numerous greenways, fishing, hunting, hiking 


or the more involved recreational sports. 

The City of Huntsville has 66 public playgrounds 

- which encompass over 3,000 acres 

- and 24 Huntsville City School playgrounds. 

Huntsville has a wondrous play park for 

children with Kid’s Space, which is located at 

Memorial Parkway and Airport Road. Huntsville 

also boasts the special needs playground named 

Everybody Can Play at Brahan Spring Park, 

which is dedicated to those who are physically 

and mentally challenged. The park is easily 

accessible for all levels of children. The park is a 

collaboration of the City of Huntsville with the 

local Optimist and Kiwanis Clubs. 

Just 20 minutes from downtown Huntsville, 

the 250-acre Sharon Johnston Park lies nestled 

in the rolling hills of northeast Madison County. 

The forested park with its stone and cedar 

fencing reflects the early settlement look. 

The park includes a 12-acre fishing lake, 

Olympic size swimming pool, campgrounds, 

picnic pavilions, shooting range, soccer fields, 

playground and a 5K walking/running course. 

All facilities are handicap accessible. 

n Kasey Schweitzer and son 

Brandon Wigginton enjoy a 

tire swing at the Everybody 

Can Play playground at 

Huntsville’s Brahan Spring Park. 


0000279611-01

n Huntsville Mayor Tommy Battle visits with 

Brian Coats at the Everybody Can Play 

Playground, which offers playtime access to 

people with various physical challenges. 

Soft surfaces help prevent injuries. 

On the opposite side of Madison County is the City of Madison with 

its array of facilities, which have been upgraded and expanded over the 

last two decades to accommodate the influx of residents in the city that 

borders Madison and Limestone Counties. Dublin Memorial Park 

includes indoor and outdoor swimming pools, gymnasium, Dublin 

Tennis Center, a new disc-golf course, Kid’s Kingdom playground and 

several soccer fields. Madison also has Palmer Park, which can host 

baseball, softball, soccer and football programs. 

Nearby Madison is the community of Monrovia/Harvest with Phillips 

Park, home to youth sports on athletic fields and indoor recreation 

center. The community continues to swell with families and so have the 

recreational facilities in an attempt to welcome the newest community 

members with enough programs to satisfy the most ardent of sports 

enthusiasts. 

GREENWAYS 

The Huntsville/Madison County community has an assemblage of 

some of the newest, best kept greenways anywhere in the South. 

A greenway is a corridor of undeveloped land, as along a river or stream 

or between urban centers that is reserved for recreational use or 

environmental preservation. These provide the perfect setting for 

nature lovers of all ages, whatever the season. Huntsville alone has nine 

greenways covering over 26 miles of nature’s beauty. 

0000282974-01

The City of Madison has more than six miles 

of trails with the addition of the newest greenway, 

Bradford Creek, which involves a two-mile 

path from Liberty Middle School south to I-565. 

A joint venture between Huntsville and 

Madison is the newly built Creekwood Park, 

located off Slaughter Road, which borders both 

cities. The park includes an 18-hole disc golf 

course, dog park, pavilions, playgrounds and an 

extension of the local greenway. 

The Land Trust of North Alabama has various 

public properties and five nature preserves to 

help residents and visitors experience the local 

treasures of nature. The newest Land Trust 

property is the Harvest Square Recreational 

Preserve, located alongside a lake in Harvest. 

Atop a beautiful mountain in Huntsville’s 

eastern side, Monte Sano State Park offers 

2,400 natural acres with 14 miles of trails. The 

park also offers cottages, camping, picnic areas 

and pavilions, playgrounds and an amphitheater. 

Newly restored, the historic Monte Sano Lodge 

again welcomes guests. 

Nevertheless, it’s the hiking and biking trails 

that may close the deal for outdoor enthusiasts 

considering relocating here. Stunning vistas 

have made the mountaintop important as a 

natural attraction. The trails range from mild 

elevation changes for walkers to rough terrain 

for the more serious hikers and bikers. 

The Green Mountain Nature Trail, a free 

attraction, is located in southeast Huntsville. 

Natural beauty radiates from trails and an 

abundance of plants and wildlife. A lake, pavilion 

chapel and covered bridge make for a perfect 

encounter for any recreational hiker and 

outdoors lover. The Hays Nature Preserve in 

Hampton Cove, built by the City of Huntsville, 

includes 1,000 acres. 

OUTDOORS RECREATION 

While conventional sports have and always 

will be a mainstay of recreational exploits, the 

great outdoors of the area is booming with 

those who look to being among nature. 

Along the shores of the 650-mile Tennessee 

River, Ditto Landing offers more than 500 acres 

of delightful scenery on or near the currents of 

the waterway. For boaters, Ditto Landing offers 

a full-service marina with wet slips, heated dry 

storage, the Alabama Marina Police and the 

U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary. 

Arriving at the facility on Hobbs Island Road 

just off South Memorial Parkway, you wind your 

way through nature with bountiful trees, picnic 

areas and campgrounds before emerging at the 

marina, which offers 102 covered and 68 

non-covered wet slips. Adjacent to the marina is 

a dry storage building that can accommodate 

250 boats, personal watercraft and trailers. 

Ditto Landing is a complete recreational 

facility. The marina is a small part. The site 

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0000270019-01 

Independent Residents, 

Marvin & Evelyn O’Donnell 

Marvin O’Donnell: “If you can’t live at 

home, Regency is the place to go. We’re 

better satisfi ed here than we ever thought 

we’d be. They have bus service (limousine 

service I call it) that will take you 

anywhere in town that you need to go. I 

highly recommend it!” 

Evelyn O’Donnell: “Marvin and I have 

found a home at Regency. You meet 

people from all over the world here and 

they are just as nice as can be. All of the 

help here really tries to make us happy… 

they cook good food… It’s just been 

fabulous! We are happy here.” 

Assisted Living Resident, Malcolm 

Reeves’ Daughter, Robin Monroe: 

daughter of Resident Malcolm Reeves and 

the late Wilma Reeves, “I visited several 

places and I knew when I walked in, 

that Regency was the place I wanted my 

parents to live. I can put down my head 

at night and know that my dad is safe. “ 

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0000279619-01

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n Kathryn Williams hits a shot at Becky Pierce 

Municipal Golf Course. 

includes a campground, recreational vehicle 

accommodations and three pavilions. The U.S. 

Coast Guard Auxiliary and the Huntsville Power 

Squadron each offer safe boating classes. 

The Tennessee River offers all types of 

freshwater fishing opportunities, but one of the 

best-kept secret fishing spots is Madison County 

Lake. Located near Gurley, 11 miles east of 

Huntsville, this 105-acre fishing bonanza holds 

six different kinds of fish. 

An accessible fishing pier allows anglers to 

drop their lines into the deepest of the waters of 

the lake, and launching ramp is available for 

those using boats. Once on the water, boaters 

must use trolling motors. If you’re ages 16 to 64, 

you’ll need a fishing license. 

For hunters, an array of game is available on 

thousands of acres. Hunters are required to 

obtain a hunting license and attend a hunter’s 

education class if born after Aug. 1, 1977. 

For a more adventurous route through 

Madison County’s outdoors, canoeing is available. 

North Alabama Canoe & Kayak, located just east 

of downtown Huntsville in the Brownsboro 

community, offers expert guides down the Flint 

River and Paint Rock River. Courses are available 

for a more venturesome trek on the backwaters 

leading to the Tennessee River. Additional details 

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ACTIVE SPORTS ENTHUSIAISTS 

Huntsville has top-notch athletic facilities 

from new construction to renovation of existing 

facilities. Huntsville Tennis Center has 24 lighted 

rubico courts. Becky Pierce Municipal Golf 

Course is managed by Robertson Golf. Metro- 

Kiwanis Sportsplex is comprised of six lighted 

fields and is host to numerous league and special 

tournaments year-round. 

The natatorium is located at Brahan Spring 

Park and features swimming and diving all year 

round while hosting numerous swim competitions. 

The natatorium has been the home 

swimming hole for many collegiate and 

Olympic swimmers. 

The Huntsville Track Club, established in 1971, 

boasts over 1,300 members and hosts more than 

20 events annually, including three of the most 

decorated races in the south: the Cotton Row 

Run 10K, the Rocket City Marathon and the 

Sprint Triathlon. 

Disc golf has become very popular, and 

Madison County sports several courses including 

layouts at Dublin Park in Madison, Creekwood 

located at the border of Huntsville and Madison 

at the Indian Creek Greenway, Brahan Spring 

Park, UAHuntsville and on Redstone Arsenal. 

The area golf links include Hampton Cove 

Golf Course as part of the statewide Robert 

Trent Jones Golf Trail. Two championship 

courses provide golfers of all levels challenging 

and beautiful layouts. 

Additional public courses can be found 

throughout Madison County including Huntsville 

Municipal, Sunset Landing and The Links on 

Redstone Arsenal, which is scheduled to open to 

the general public through an extensive overhaul 

of current Redstone Arsenal properties in the 

next two years. Three private golf country clubs 

are also available within the city limits. 

For bowling enthusiasts, the area has five 

bowling centers including the Redstone Lanes 

Bowling Center, which services civilian and 

military employees and their families. Each 

bowling center has a pro shop with the latest 

equipment and a qualified instructor. 

Ice skating has always been a fun way to bring 

a little of the North down home to the South, 

and the multi-million dollar Benton Wilcoxon Ice 

Complex has proven that Southerners love the 

sport. The year-round dual rink offers recreational 

skating along with several adult and youth hockey 

leagues. All are held on two regulation-size rinks 

at the complex located on Leeman Ferry Road 

next to Joe Davis Stadium. 

“We have this topographical jewel box 

nestled in the foothills of the Appalachian 

Mountains, bordered by the Tennessee River 

and rich valley farmland. Our residents enjoy 

spending time taking advantage of our many 

outdoors parks and our Southern heritage to 

the fullest,” said Mayor Battle. n 

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demographics 

INCOME & AGE 

AVERAGE HOUSEHOLD INCOME 

Madison County $74,304 

City of Huntsville $67,940 

City of Madison $101,574 

Huntsville Metro $71,906 

Source: 2010 American Community Survey 

POPULATION 

Madison County 334,811 

City of Huntsville 180,105 

City of Madison 42,938 

Huntsville Metro 

Source: 2010 U.S. Census 

417,593 

HOME SALES FOR 2011 

number of houses sold 8,441 

Average selling price $161,252 

days on the Market 122 

number of Houses on the Market 7,450 

Median selling price $138,000 

Source: Huntsville Area Association of Realtors 

HUNTSVILLE’S INDICATORS 

2011 COST OF LIVING 

National Average=100 

Composite index 93.6 

grocery items 95.8 

Utilities 96.2 

transportation 101.8 

Healthcare 95.2 

Misc. goods & services 

Source: The Council for Community 

and Economic Research 

102.4 

EMPLOYMENT 

total non-Agricultural 

employment 207,633 

Manufacturing 22,475 

non-manufacturing 185,158 

Civilian labor Force 210,164 

employment 93,824 

Unemployment 16,340 

Unemployment Rate 7.8% 

Source: Alabama Department of 

Industrial Relations, Annual Averages 

2011 AIRPORT TRAFFIC 

passengers 1,260,715 

Cargo weight 446,278,100 

Source: Huntsville-Madison County 

Airport Authority 

HUNTSVILLE/MADISON COUNTY 

LEADING EMPLOYERS 

U.s. Army/Redstone Arsenal * 

nAsA / 

30,000 

Marshall space Flight Center * 6,000 

Huntsville Hospital system 6,280 

the Boeing Company 2,600 

Huntsville City schools 3,000 

Madison County schools 2,389 

sAiC 2,242 

(science Applications international Corporation) 

City of Huntsville 2,206 

UAHuntsville 1,675 

sanmina-sCi Corporation 1,578 

teledyne Brown engineering 1,530 

AdtRAn, inc. 1,740 

CinRAM, inc. 1,450 

intergraph Corporation 1,325 

northrop grumman Corporation 1,252 

Verizon wireless 1,200 

Madison County Commission 1,122 

directV 1,100 

lockheed Martin Corporation 1,040 

Crestwood Medical Center 1,000 

toyota Motor Manufacturing 1,000 

January 2012, Chamber of Commerce of 

Huntsville/Madison County 

* includes on-site contractors 


Chamber staff 

EXECUTIVE STAFF 

Chip Cherry 

CCe, president & Ceo 

tammy gregory 

executive Assistant 

Ashley shady 

Resource desk Coordinator 

Becky Moretti 

Resource desk Assistant 

ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT 

ethan Hadley 

Vice president, economic development 

john southerland 

director, 

Cummings Research park | project Manager 

lucia Cape 

Vp, workforce & industry Relations 

Ken smith 

director, Research & information services 

Harrison diamond 

project Manager 

Amy locke 

economic development, workforce & 

industry Relations Administrative Assistant 

COMMUNICATIONS 

patricia McCarter 

Communications director 

Kristi sherrard 

graphic designer 

Hiroko sedensky 

web designer 

Rêvé smith 

Communications specialist 

GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS 

Mike ward 

Vice president, governmental Affairs 

tina leopold 

governmental Affairs Assistant 

FINANCE & ADMINISTRATION 

Christy nalley 

director of Finance & Administration 

jamie gallien 

it Manager 

Mary Mcnairy 

Accounting specialist 

lori warner 

Accounting specialist 

joe watson 

Facilities supervisor 

MEMBERSHIP 

Mike Brazier 

director, Membership 

donna McCrary 

Membership specialist 

Amy Brantley 

Membership sales 

Melissa putzier 

Membership sales 

SMALL BUSINESS 

pammie jimmar 

small Business Manager 

Mitzi Floyd 

small Business Coordinator 

Kathleen Byrne 

events Coordinator 

Amanda Bishop 

events Assistant 


Come Outside & Play! 

• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 

• • • 

The nation’s largest open-aired butterfly house 

•••••••• Five interactive treehouses 

Water features to cool down in the summer heat ••• 

A Children’s Garden 

Miniature Garden Railway 

Plant Collections & scenic trails 

too numerous to name! 


• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 

• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 

0000279293-01 

0000279466-01

Deliver mission 

success. 

At URS, our commitmenttoputting themission first never 

ends. With customers including the Department of Defense, 

NASA andthe Department of Homeland Security,webelieve 

that everyopportunitycomes with acollectiveresponsibility 

to perform. So whether it’s operations and maintenance, 

installation andlogistics management,technical services, 

nuclearand chemical demilitarization,orflight services and 

training, we deliverabove andbeyond. Whichiswhy more 

people in the Federal sector are turning to us to get it done. 

We are URS. 

FEDERAL 

INFRASTRUCTURE 

POWER 

INDUSTRIAL & COMMERCIAL 

URS.COM 

0000268377-01

NATIONAL SECURITY 

Huntsville’s government agencies are committed to missions that extend around the 

globe and into the depths of space. For 40 years, SAIC employees in Huntsville have 

delivered innovative solutions for their toughest problems. We have 2,200 employees in 

Huntsville working on mission-critical challenges and 41,000 around the globe working for 

our communities, our nation, and the world. 

SAIC is committed to making the world a better place by solving problems in national 

security, energy and environment, health, and cybersecurity. 

For more information, visit saic.com 

NATIONAL SECURITY •ENERGY&ENVIRONMENT•HEALTH •CYBERSECURITY 

© SAIC. All rights reserved. 

Smart People Solving Hard Problems 

...right here in Huntsville 

NYSE: SAI 

0000267214-01

2012 Guide to Huntsville - Huntsville/Madison County Chamber of ...

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