EDC Investor Categories: Transportation

Tampa Hillsborough Expressway Authority

 

 

The Tampa Hillsborough Expressway Authority (THEA) is a user-financed public agency led by a Board of local citizens. The dynamic transportation agency owns, manages, and operates the Selmon Expressway, Meridian Avenue, Brandon Parkway, and the Selmon Greenway. With over 200,000 daily expressway commuters and thousands of pedestrians utilizing THEA‘s urban trail networks, the agency is focused on serving and investing in the community to transform and excel with transportation options that enhance the quality of life. Using toll revenues and bonds, all tolls collected by THEA are reinvested back into projects in Hillsborough County.




Greg Slater

Greg Slater is the Executive Director/CEO of the Tampa Hillsborough Expressway Authority (THEA) – a dynamic transportation agency that owns, manages and operates the Selmon Expressway, Meridian Avenue, Brandon Parkway, and the Selmon Greenway. With over 200,000 daily expressway commuters and thousands of pedestrians utilizing the agency’s network of urban trails, Slater oversees an agency focused on adding value to the community and offering transportation options that enhance the quality of life.

Slater is a transportation leader committed to serving people with passion, integrity, and trust. He has over two decades of public service experience in various transportation modes, most recently serving as Secretary of the Maryland Department of Transportation (MDOT). He oversaw 17,000 lane miles of highways, 2,500 bridge structures, and tolled facilities, including two tollways, two tunnels, and four major bridge structures: a local and commuter bus network, a light rail metro system, commuter rail, and paratransit services.

At THEA, he continues to serve the community and organization with the values that have guided him over the last 25 years of his professional career. Greg is committed to building a transportation system foundation for the next generation, a roadway of the future, and creating partnerships that make transportation in Tampa Bay safer and more efficient.

Greg Slater
Executive Director & CEO

Signode

Signode is a leading transit-packaging provider with a proud tradition of offering a range of innovative and effective products and solutions to our customers globally.

With over $2B in revenue, 80+ manufacturing facilities across 6 continents and over 9,000 employees worldwide, Signode is a leading manufacturer of a broad spectrum of transit packaging consumables, tools, software, and equipment that optimize end-of-line packaging operations and protect products in transit.  Signode brings this extensive product portfolio together under hundreds of trusted brands to offer complete transit packaging solutions to its customers.




Hillsborough Transit Authority (HART)

Created on October 3, 1979, the Hillsborough Transit Authority (HART) is the regional mobility provider in Hillsborough County, serving a population of more than 1.4 million residents in the cities of Tampa, Temple Terrace, and parts of unincorporated Hillsborough County, the fourth most populated county in Florida. Its total service area covers 1,000 square miles. HART operates fixed-route local and express bus service, door-to-door paratransit service, flex-route service, and manages the TECO Line Streetcar System.

HART’s mission is to Take People to Places that Enhance Their Lives.




Scott Drainville

Before coming to HART, Drainville served as the director of transportation and maintenance for CitiBus in Lubbock, Texas. He has also held transit leadership positions at the D.C. Circulator in Washington, D.C., and served as a mechanical foreman with the Rhode Island Public Transit Authority for more than 18 years.

Drainville attended Bryant University’s Executive Development Center for Business Management. He holds certifications from the National Transit Institute in Senior Maintenance Leadership, Procurement and Contract Administration, as well as multiple certifications in heavy-duty maintenance and repair. He started his career as a diesel technician in the late 1980s and has more than 30 years of public transportation and fleet maintenance experience.

Scott Drainville
Chief Executive Officer, Hillsborough Transit Authority (HART)

Tampa International Airport

 

 

Tampa International Airport is the Tampa Bay region’s gateway to the West Coast of Florida, serving nearly 17 million passengers each year with nonstop service to more than 70 domestic destinations as well as locations in Europe and Latin America. The airport is widely regarded as one of the best in the world for its focus on customer service and convenience. The main terminal, built in 1971, features a groundbreaking hub-and-spoke design with the world’s first airport people mover. The airport is a significant economic engine for the region. The airport and its tenants employ more than 7,500 people and have an economic impact of more than $7.1 billion each year.




Joe Lopano

Joe Lopano arrived in Tampa on January 1, 2011, as Tampa International Airport’s new CEO. He has worked 37 years in the aviation industry. Prior to accepting the CEO position in Tampa, he worked at the Dallas/Fort Worth Airport for 14 years as its Executive Vice President for Marketing and Terminal Management. His experience also encompasses 19 years in the airline industry, including serving in leadership positions at Continental Airlines.

Joe serves on the boards of the Tampa Bay Chamber, Visit Tampa Bay, the Westshore Alliance, the Tampa Bay Partnership, the Tampa Bay Defense Alliance, the U.S. Travel Association’s Gateway Airports Council and the Hillsborough County Metropolitan Planning Organization. He is a member of the executive committees for the Tampa Bay Economic Development Council, the Airports Council International–North America U.S. Policy Board and the Tony Jannus Society. He is an Honorary Commander at MacDill Air Force Base, and was selected to participate in Leadership Florida.

Joe was named Visit Tampa Bay’s 2015 Ambassador of the Year and received the 2015  Aviation Professional of the Year Award from the Florida Department of Transportation.

Joe received a bachelor’s in finance and accounting from Pace University in New York. He and his wife, Janet, live in South Tampa and have three grown children.

Joe Lopano
CEO

Port Tampa Bay

Port Tampa Bay’s longstanding supremacy among Florida ports is based largely on its leadership in handling of bulk and break‐bulk cargos, including phosphate, steel and petroleum, as well as in the shipbuilding industry. Over the past decade, Port Tampa Bay has impressively advanced its container-handling capabilities and seen a rapid growth in regional distribution facilities. Port Tampa Bay handles more than 34 million tons of cargo a year, nearly 40 percent of all cargo moving in and out of the state of Florida. This embraces virtually every imaginable commodity, including vehicles and oversized project cargos, from all corners of the world. Top trade partners include India, Mexico, Brazil, Trinidad, Canada, Russia, Australia, Japan, Argentina and Turkey. At the same time, the Port of Tampa has emerged among the top eight U.S. cruise ports, smoothly handling nearly 1 million passenger moves a year.




Paul Anderson

Paul Anderson is a Former Federal Maritime Commissioner and joined Port Tampa Bay as Chief Executive Officer in December 2012 after holding a series of high-profile leadership positions in the public and private sectors. Nominated to the Federal Maritime Commission by President George W. Bush in 2003, and unanimously confirmed by the U.S. Senate in 2004, Anderson served a five-year term ending in 2008. In addition, the president designated Anderson as the Commission’s Chairman and re-nominated him for a second five-year term. A highlight of Anderson’s service included his appointment to the Committee on Marine Transportation, a cabinet-level strategy group responsible for the nation’s seaports and reporting directly to the president.

 

He previously served as the Chief Executive Officer for the Jacksonville Port Authority and spent 10 years as an executive with JM Family Enterprises, a diversified automobile business headquartered in Deerfield Beach, Florida. Anderson also served as a senior director of Seabulk Marine, Inc., an international marine transportation company in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

 

Anderson has served as an advisor on intermodal issues to multiple governors including former Florida governors Jeb Bush and Charlie Crist. He worked closely with U.S. Senator Rick Scott during his time as Florida’s governor and maintains a close relationship with the state’s current Governor, Ron DeSantis.

 

Anderson holds several leadership positions in national and state-wide trade organizations and foundations. He recently completed a second term as the Chairman of the Florida Ports Council, having been reelected by his fellow Florida port directors. Anderson also serves on the board of the Coalition for America’s Gateways and Trade Corridors (CAGTC). Anderson has lived in Florida for over 35 years, except during the period of his public service in Washington, D.C. Anderson is a 1982 graduate of the University of Florida and completed the Senior Managers in Government program at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.

Paul Anderson
President and CEO