Noah Covington of Bryan County Receives Volunteer of The Year Award

Noah Covington, Vice Chairman of the Development Authority of Bryan County, was named the 2020 Volunteer of the Year by the Georgia Economic Developers Association (GEDA) on Monday at its annual awards banquet.

Selected by GEDA’s Board of Directors, after being nominated by Justin Farquhar, Director of Business Recruitment and Existing Industry for the Development Authority of Bryan County, Mr. Covington has been a key leader in economic development for the last nine years in Bryan County. He plays a vital role in virtually every industrial project that comes to the county, having been involved in projects totaling nearly $155 million of investment and the creation or retention of almost 620 jobs in the community. Covington has played a significant role in a number of projects, including Daniel Defense, a firearms manufacturer; Spreetail, an e-commerce fulfillment center; AGCO’s Massey Ferguson tractor assembly plant; the expansion of heavy-foundation equipment manufacturer CZM’s local assembly plant and relocation of the company’s world headquarters to the county; the location of Swiss-headquartered electrical interconnector components manufacturer Preci-Dip’s first U.S. production facility; and the location of a transload facility for Medline Industries, a medical supplies manufacturer and distributor.

Covington is also a Bryan County Commissioner. He helps to educate his fellow elected officials and community leaders to understand the positive impact that economic development projects have on the community. He seems just as happy to assist with capacity building projects that will allow the development authority to continue to have success well into the future. He has demonstrated unwavering support by meeting with

prospects after-hours. On the Spreetail project, he helped convince the authority board and the County Commission to fund necessary infrastructure extensions within the company’s timeline. Bryan County was successful in locating this project and two of the three sites that were opened by the infrastructure extensions have landed projects since the work was completed.

Mr. Covington was present at GEDA’s November Annual Awards luncheon in Atlanta, along with his wife, friends and community supporters, to receive the Volunteer of the Year award. Bert Brantley, Deputy Chief of Staff for Governmental Affairs at the Office of Governor Brian P. Kemp, presented the award to Covington. Also, Lieutenant Governor Geoff Duncan addressed event attendees and congratulated all the winners. Nearly 100 economic developers from around the state attended the ceremony in-person and another thirty attended virtually.