PROFILE

Steve Bares

President and Executive Director, Memphis Bioworks Foundation

The rubble outside Steve Bares' office window is all the steel girders, cement and other materials that fell when the old Baptist Central Hospital building was brought down in a massive implosion late last year.

Crews continue to eat away at the heap, where one day soon a biomedical research park will go up in the midst of a revived Memphis Medical Center a district of the city that includes many neighborhoods, parks, transportation spokes and hubs, universities and hospitals.

Making that transformation happen is Bares' job.

Step by step the foundation is doing the work that will make the Medical Center the heart of a dynamic economic development machine for the city, county and region.

"Our community finally appreciates the economic engine represented by the universities and colleges here," Bares says.

"We're saying to ourselves, 'Oh, the universities really do matter.' They aren't just educational centers training physicians and scientists. They are an integrated part of the fabric of the community's economic development. We're working with the universities and state government to make sure that research programs are consistent with our overall strategy."