Area players entering 2026 March Madness ► PAGE 7
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Developer plans hockey-centered North Point Mall By JON WILCOX jon@appenmedia.com
HANNAH YAHNE/APPEN MEDIA
From left, residents Alison Schwab, Sarah Grace, Matt Thompson and Josh Cusick smile after participating in a group rowing workout session at Champions Place March 17.
Disabled adults find kinship at Champions Place campus By HANNAH YAHNE hannah@appenmedia.com ROSWELL, Ga. — For Alison Schwab, living at Champions Place in Roswell alongside 13 other physically disabled young adults is the college experience she never had. “This has been adulthood with training wheels, and it’s been really nice to have this safety net and knowing that all of these people have my back,” Schwab said. Schwab has grown up alongside
most of the residents since she was 11 and started playing wheelchair sports with them through the Titan Program, another arm of the Champions Community Foundation. The Champions Community Foundation was founded in 2009 by Rick Thompson to fight the isolation and depression that young adults with conditions, such as cerebral palsy or spina bifida, can face after aging out of high school. Two of Thompson’s three kids were born with a rare form of muscular dystrophy – his daughter passed away
when she was 3. Matthew, his second son, was once expected not to live past 10, but is now in his 30s. When Matthew was nearing the end of high school, Thompson found his life’s calling starting the Titan Program which has grown to offer wheelchair sports and social events to more than 130 individuals. That turned into a dream of offering people in this community a safe and accessible independent living environment.
See CHAMPIONS, Page 20
ALPHARETTA, Ga. — A North Point Mall redevelopment plan calls for a 20,000seat hockey arena, a performing arts center, hotels, and a variety of mixeduse amenities in an area city officials have long described as underutilized. Submitted by Jamestown, the developer responsible for Ponce City Market, the plan redefines the aging mall as an expansive sports district that could be anchored by a new National Hockey League franchise. Jamestown entered into a partnership with the mall property owner, New York Life, in February. The project is competing with a similar plan in Forsyth County to attract a national hockey team to a $2 billion mixed-use arena development, known as The Gathering at South Forsyth, off Ron-
See MALL, Page 3
CITY OF ALPHARETTA/PROVIDED
A redevelopment plan reinvisions North Point Mall as a bustling sports-entertainment district anchored by a hockey arena.