TOP ECONOMISTS
KIMBERLY ATTEBERRY
VERMILION CONSULTING LLC | PRESIDENT
Kimberly At teberr y is the
president of Vermilion
C o ns u l tin g L LC. Ve r milio n
helps varied organizations
leverage the benefits of the
Immigrant Investor Program
(EB-5). Vermilion Consulting provides expert advice on
project feasibility, EB-5-compliant business plans, job-
creation analysis and targeted employment area (TEA)
analysis. Prior to Vermilion, Atteberr y was the chief
economist of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. In
2000 and 2002, she taught economics and marketing at the
United States Air Force Academy as one of a select group
of civilian instructors.
WHY DID YOU GET INVOLVED
IN THE EB-5 INDUSTRY?
In 2009, I was hired by USCIS as the agency’s first economist.
After a short time there, I was asked to launch and lead a new
division within USCIS focused on economic and statistical
analysis. While my duties ranged from procurement oversight
to regulatory analysis to special projects for leadership, my
most interesting task was to train and advise EB-5 adjudicators
on economic impact studies, business plan review and
unemployment analysis. Once I left government employment,
it made sense to incorporate EB-5 work into my overall
consulting practice.
WHAT NEW TYPES OF PROJECTS
AND TRENDS ARE YOU SEEING
IN THE EB-5 INDUSTRY?
Given recent uncertainties in our industry, I have seen a shift
toward pursuing rural projects and obtaining approval for
regional centers that include extensive rural areas. More
importantly, since the SEC has started to enforce securities
laws within the EB-5 industry, and USCIS has begun to
terminate unlawful and unproductive regional centers, it
seems the industry is shedding many entities that probably
should not have been in EB-5 in the first place. As a result,
project quality has improved significantly as well-educated
professionals enter the industry.
JEFFREY CARR
ECONOMIC POLICY RESOURCES | PRESIDENT
Jeffrey Carr is president of
EPR, with more than 35 years
of experience as an economist.
Carr has completed more than
250 EB-5 assignments in 47
states and territories, including
impact studies and business plans for investor petition
filings, TEAs and regional center business-operations
plans. He has lectured on EB-5 throughout the U.S. and
China. Carr also has extensive experience in applied
economics, including economic tax revenue forecasting;
economic, regional economic and fiscal impact analyses;
and presenting state economic fiscal data to Wall Street
bond rating agencies. Carr formerly worked in the U.S.
Congress for a member from Michigan.
WHY DID YOU GET INVOLVED
IN THE EB-5 INDUSTRY?
EPR had been in the business of completing economic impact
studies for more than 20 years when the state of Vermont
first contacted us in 1997 about assisting with a regional
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EB5 INVESTORS M AGAZINE
center application. EB-5 impact assessment studies and our
expert witness experience in legal cases were a logical
extension of our core competencies for success in EB-5. The
more we got involved in the EB-5 industry, the more excited
we became about helping immigrant workers and their
families throughout the country. We continue to bring that
same level of excitement to all of our EB-5 projects today.
WHAT NEW TYPES OF PROJECTS
AND TRENDS ARE YOU SEEING
IN THE EB-5 INDUSTRY?
Like everyone, we remain hopeful that a consensus on a
workable set of EB-5 reforms can be reached to potentially be
a path to a reasonable number of additional visas for the
program. Until that occurs, it seems unlikely that activity
within the EB-5 industry will be able to recover to a level to
make the program a solid contributor to U.S. job growth. Key
points of reform discussion are going to continue to revolve
around the minimum investment amount, how to fairly define
TEAs, the adoption of regional center integrity measures, and
additional safeguards to assure national security.