By Steve Tuttle To
borrow a sports metaphor, Mac Everett is
Charlotte's “go-to-guy,” the player who
is handed the ball when the game is on the line.
At several crucial moments in the city's recent
life, Everett has come through in clutch
situations:
* United Way
giving in Charlotte had been rising but the
campaign hadn't exceeded its targets in 10 years.
Everett agreed to head up the 1999 campaign and
raised $32.1 million, beating the goal by 10.7
percent.
* Charlotte's
traffic arteries were becoming so clogged that
Mayor Pat McCrory asked a top-drawer group of
leaders to find solutions everyone would agree
on, and he tapped Everett to direct the effort.
It was controversial, but in November 1998
Mecklenburg County voters backed the plan
endorsed by Everett's group by approving a $1.2
billion sales tax increase to fund a 25-year mass
transit plan.
* Charlotte's
black community was in up in arms in 1997 after
the shooting of three blacks by white police
officers. County Commissioner Parks Helms and
Mayor McCrory asked the Foundation
for the Carolinas to create a Task
Force on Race and Ethnicity. Prominent Charlotte
attorney Jim Ferguson and Everett co-chaired the
task force. “We needed a strong
representative of corporate Charlotte,”
Ferguson recalls. “When Mac started, he said
he could only make a commitment for six months.
That was in 1997. That's the longest six months
I've ever seen. He's still as committed as he was
from the beginning.” Everett's work to
improve race relations in Charlotte earned him
this year's Whitney Young Award presented by the Urban Leage of the Central
Carolinas.
Charlotte has a proud tradition of business
leaders like Everett stepping forward to serve
the community in pivotal moments like the ones
above. Executives like Hugh McColl, Ed
Crutchfield and the late Bill Lee repeatedly got
behind civic causes to move the city forward, and
Everett is upholding that tradition.
Now, Everett is stepping forward not just for
Charlotte but becoming the “go-to-guy”
for all of North Carolina by serving as chairman
of NCCBI, the state's largest and most
influential business organization. He took up the
gavel at NCCBI's 58th Annual Meeting in Raleigh
on March 15.
Understandably, expectations are high that he
will be a dynamic NCCBI chairman. He's regarded
as an energetic executive at the top of North
Carolina's business world capable of driving the
association to new gains in stature and
influence. There's every reason to expect he will
aggressively lead the state's business community
in the year ahead, given his record of doing just
that in Charlotte.
Everett is president of a six-state region at First Union, where
he's worked for 22 years in increasingly
responsible roles as the bank mushroomed through
acquisitions to become the nation's
sixth-largest. He was executive vice president of
an eight-county region in North Carolina, then
was responsible for the whole state. As First
Union expanded, Everett headed up banking
operations throughout the Carolinas, and since
last year he has directed operations in the
Mid-Atlantic Region covering Virginia, Maryland,
North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and
Washington, D.C.
Everett is one of the most powerful bankers in
Charlotte, a city full of such financial lions.
And as he's helped build his bank he's also
helped build the community by leading about every
major civic and charitable organization in the
Queen City. He was chairman of the Charlotte Chamber of Commerce
in 1997 and at one time or another chaired the Charlotte-Mecklenburg
Education Foundation, Communities-in-Schools,
the United Way of Central Carolinas, the YMCA of Greater
Charlotte and the Carolinas Partnership
regional economic development organization.
He's a trustee at UNC-Charlotte, a
member of the board of visitors at Davidson College
and a member of the Central Piedmont Community
College Foundation. He serves on more
than a dozen other boards and foundations.
Charlotte Mayor McCrory said Everett “is
a business leader who understands the importance
of community and follows through on both.”
When he handed the mass transit planning issue to
Everett's committee, “I gave them a
directive to come back with proposals that would
be both economically and politically viable. He
understood that direction and took it to a level
we would never have gotten to in Charlotte, and
we are now reaping the rewards of the work he
did.”
Having worked with Everett on many projects
over the years, Charlotte Chamber President
Carroll Gray advises NCCBI members to think big
-- and to be at meetings on time. “Mac is a
stickler about that,” Gray chuckles.
“His schedule is pretty packed and he
appreciates the value of time, not only his but
yours, and he wants to make sure the time
together is used the best possible.”
Everett, Gray adds, “is very focused, a
thoughtful leader who has the big picture in mind
at all times. He is very positive, upbeat, well
organized. He's focused on results but he's a
good team player and supports his
teammates.”
Gloria Pace King, president of the United Way
of Central Carolinas, says it was amazing to
watch Everett blend the demands on his time
during the year he led the United Way campaign.
“He made the time to do it,” she says.
“I think he's an example of the adage that
busy people are the ones who get things done.
People create time and opportunities for the
things they believe in, and that's the case with
Mac.”
Expect an action-packed, fun year with Everett
as chairman, King tells NCCBI members. “He's
very high energy, he's fun, he loves to win, and
that to me is a winning combination.”
If Everett sounds a bit like a bulldog in
pursuit of his business and civic goals, that's
exactly what he is: a 1969 graduate of the University
of Georgia with a degree in economics.
He's a devoted family man and father of two
twenty-somethings, the sort who knew how
important it was to be at the soccer games and
school plays.
We
chatted with Everett recently and asked him to
talk about his priorities as NCCBI chairman. He
said there are three areas he will focus on --
education, rural economic development, and
strengthening NCCBI's ties with local chambers of
commerce.
First, he made it clear that he doesn't intend
any wholesale changes in NCCBI's mission. “I
don't plan to take NCCBI anywhere,” he
laughed. “I plan to work with the board and
the Executive Committee to figure out what are
the pressing issues and bring together the
appropriate people to move us in the right
directions.
“I am much more of a consensus builder
than I am a ready, fire, aim kind of guy. I want
to work closely with people from all across the
state to first determine what we should be
shooting at and figure out some strategies for
getting there.
“In general NCCBI's priorities over the
years haven't changed and I don't see any reason
for those priorities to make a sudden
change.”
Still, Everett plans to put his imprint on
NCCBI and to keep the association abreast of the
times.
“There are some specific things that
might change because of changing conditions in
the marketplace. For instance, NCCBI has had a
long-standing emphasis on education that goes
back to (the late Duke Power Co. Chairman) Bill
Lee (who was NCCBI chairman in 1988) and others.
Today there may be a few different issues we need
to focus on to improve education.
“One may be alternative education, to be
a little creative in how we educate people. Part
of that is charter schools. In the set-up of
public education today there are opportunities to
do things a little differently than we have in
the past and maybe create some partnerships.
“In other states schools have created
partnerships with YMCAs, for instance. In some
states, businesses and public schools have formed
partnerships beyond what we talk about today.
They've created schools in office buildings.
Alternative education -- finding ways to better
educate our younger people -- is very important
to me.”
First Union has repeatedly demonstrated its
support for public schools, most recently sending
7,500 employees into schools in five states to
read to children and donate books.
Everett's focus on education extends beyond
the public schools to include higher education.
Passage by the General Assembly of a major bond
package for higher education will be a top
legislative priority of NCCBI this year. Everett
is co-chairman of the NCCBI-led coalition backing
the bonds.
“It's not just the UNC System, it's also
the community colleges,” Everett said.
“We need to look at it as a holistic
education system. We have some dire needs in
terms of the infrastructure of the system. It's
been neglected. Our university system and our
community college system are two of the best
parts of the state and they are about to be
tarnished.
“I see that from three perspectives. I
see it as a parent -- we have a son (enrolled) in
the UNC System and we have a daughter who is
extending her education through the community
colleges. And in both cases I see the need for
more classroom space.
“As a trustee of a UNC System campus, I
see us falling woefully short of providing
adequate classroom space and facilities for the
students we have now, not to mention the ones
coming later.
“From a business perspective, I see the
UNC System and the community colleges in terms of
an economic development tool that gives us an
advantage over other states. The perfect example
of that is TIAA-CREF (the huge pension fund that
recently relocated to Charlotte). John Biggs (the
pension fund president) said one reason they came
here was our university system. It's just a very
important asset that we can't let get any worse
from a capital needs standpoint.”
Everett
also said he wants NCCBI to seek legislative
support for implementing the recommendations
advanced in February by the Rural Prosperity Task Force,
the group appointed by Gov. Jim Hunt to determine
how best to kick-start sputtering economies in
the state's rural counties, many of them ravaged
by Hurricane Floyd. The task force was led by
Everett's friend, Erskine Bowles, the Charlotte
investment banker and former White House chief of
staff.
“We want to pick that up and help focus
the resources of the business community on
implementing these recommendations,” Everett
said. “I think we've got to increase the
awareness of rural issues and develop
partnerships between the richer and poorer areas
of the state.”
He said business leaders in the urban Piedmont
should understand that promoting rural prosperity
will only rebound to their benefit. “The
rural communities (First Union) serves are the
backbone of this state. As much as I look at
Charlotte and say Charlotte is a big part of the
engine driving our economy, I know we need to
help the rural communities, because then we all
can achieve more.”
The task force report included proposals to:
* Boost
information technology development by extending
high speed, affordable Internet access to rural
areas, with an eight-cent monthly surcharge on
phone bills to pay for it.
* Provide
investment by creating a Rural Redevelopment
Authority to serve as a development bank for
small businesses. The state would capitalize the
RRA with $200 million from the tobacco settlement
fund.
* Expand
educational opportunities by increasing workforce
development programs, expanding literacy programs
and providing more training for dislocated
workers. Funding would be expanded to attract and
retain quality teachers in rural school
districts. The state should equalize funding for
public schools and community colleges in rural
areas.
* Pass a $1
billion water and sewer bond issue to help rural
communities attract new industries.
* Develop new and
expanded agricultural markets for high-value
horticultural crops to strengthen the state's
agriculture economy.
* Create a center
where communities can get the development
assistance they need and get paired with the
state's community economic development resources.
As his third priority, Everett said he would
like to give more attention to the working
relationships between local chambers of commerce
and NCCBI, which for decades has been recognized
as the state chamber of commerce. Eighty-two
local chambers are NCCBI members.
A couple of years ago NCCBI solidified its
partnership with local chambers by creating the
Council of Local Chambers, an advisory group that
meets quarterly for briefings on issues.
“I like the support that NCCBI has given
to the Council of Local Chambers,” Everett
said. “I believe we become a much stronger
state as the local chambers come together and
share common concerns. I think it is very
important for local chambers to meet together.
Maybe that creates subgroups that can coalesce
around particular issues, and maybe we can
advocate for some of their issues.”
Malcolm
E. Everett III was born Oct. 8, 1946, in Macon,
Ga., the son of a second-generation small
business owner and the middle of three brothers
and sisters. His dad owned a wholesale automobile
parts business, and young Everett spent his
summers delivering auto parts to gas stations and
garages. He was a good high school athlete and
played baseball at Georgia.
He started out at SunTrust Banks in business
development and in 1978 moved to First Union as
vice president of trusts and investments. Early
on he met Cliff Cameron, then the bank's chairman
and CEO, who would become Everett's mentor. Some
who know both men see parallels in how Everett is
following Cameron's example as a civic and
business leader in Charlotte.
But even as he committed his time to community
causes, Everett never forgot his family.
“The most important thing to me is my
family. There's never been a question about that
priority in my 30 years of working.”
Mac and Andy Everett's daughter Candy Everett
Bing is 26. Son Jay Everett is 22.
He has two hobbies, golf and NASCAR. Everett
plays to a three handicap at Quail Hollow but
goes to the track whenever he can.
“I am a big NASCAR fan. It's a new
interest of mine in the last four or five years.
I've gained an interest in it through Felix
Sebates (who owns two race teams), who is a
friend of mine.”
NCCBI members will quickly notice that Everett
is warm and friendly in conversation, a definite
extrovert. “I love to be with people, and I
especially love to be with people who are close
to the issues. In my business that means being
with the people who are close to our customers
every day.
“I like to gain consensus around issues.
I'm perfectly willing to make a tough decision
when I have to but I would rather gain
consensus.”
He said he's already juggled his schedule to
plan to be at NCCBI events over the coming year.
He has decided to lead 22 fall area meetings --
one more than the record 21 that Phil Phillips
staged last fall. Everett wants to add
Statesville to the existing list of area meeting
sites around the state.
Everett will warmly welcome everyone at the
area meetings, Mayor McCrory and others
predicted. “He's extremely approachable and
leads a good meeting,” the mayor said.
“I would say you will find that Mac's ego
doesn't need to be stroked. He's very
level-headed, outgoing. I think he follows in the
norm of a lot of our past business leaders in
Charlotte who take the issues seriously but they
don't take themselves too seriously. That's why
he's so approachable.”
COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL. This article
first appeared in the April 2000 issue of North
Carolina magazine.
Steve Tuttle can be reached at stuttle@nccbi.org
or at 919-836-1411.
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