EB-5 COMMUNITY ECONOMISTS
Kimberly Atteberry
Vermilion Consulting LLC
Kimberly Atteberry has worked as a labor
economist for over 20 years, both in
the private and public sectors. Her first
exposure to EB-5 came during her tenure
as the USCIS Chief Economist. While
at USCIS, she improved the quality and
responsiveness of the EB-5 adjudication
process. Atteberry served as the agency
expert for EB-5 Immigrant Investor
L IS T ED BY AL PHAB E T IC AL O R D ER
economic analyses, providing guidance
to senior U.S. Department of Homeland
Security leaders, members of Congress and
staffers, external stakeholders, and adjudicators. She also taught both economics and
marketing at the United States Air Force
Academy as one of a select group of civilian
instructors.
After leaving government service in
2011, Atteberry restarted her economic
consulting practice, Vermilion Consulting
LLC, focusing primarily on EB-5 economic
analyses, TEA analyses, business plan writing, and general programmatic consulting.
Vermilion’s clients include numerous EB-5
stakeholders, including regional centers,
developers, broker-dealers, local & state
governments, investment banks, private
equity firms, and immigration attorneys.
Atteberry’s EB-5 submissions stand
apart from those of other service providers
because they are written in plain language,
and are designed to ease the adjudicator’s
workload. This app roach has allowed for
more rapid adjudication. Atteberry custom-
izes each submission with the investors’ goals
and ultimate I-829 adjudication in mind.
By submitting thoughtful, straightforward
documents, she helps ensure success at
the culmination of the EB-5 immigration
process.
Atteberry’s unique perspective provides
clients the ability to quickly and efficiently review projects for EB-5 suitability.
Additionally, her teaching experience allows
her to communicate complex concepts
using understandable terms. Her hands-on
engagement with clients allows Atteberry
to guide the process with an eye on the
end-game and achieving desired results.
Atteberry enjoys working in the EB-5
industry, where she says there is never a
dull moment. The collaboration with other
industry participants provides satisfying
opportunities for professional development.
She values her experiences in the EB-5
industry, and eagerly anticipates a bright
future for the program. Atteberry and her
husband, Christopher, operate Vermilion
from Santa Fe, New Mexico.
nomics/econometrics from Texas A&M
University and is an Associate Professor
of Finance and the Program Director of
the Certified Financial Planner Program
at Florida Atlantic University in Boca
Raton, Florida.
The firm has used RIMS II and
IMPLAN Pro Input-Output models
to estimate the economic job creation
impacts in support of I-924 regional
center applications, I924A and I-829
job reporting and RFE (Request for
Evidence) responses for dozens of regional
centers, resulting in excess of 400 job
creation and TEA reports submitted to
USCIS in the EB-5 program, resulting in
a 100 percent approval rate. To date, the
firm has analyzed projects with capital
expenditures in excess of $13.5 billion
with associated gross revenues of $8
billion, and job creation estimates of over
215,000 jobs.
Projects include $10-$40 million
hotels and assisted living facilities, $200
million to$500 million destination and
resort hotels and office buildings, hospitals,
manufacturing, a $1.4 billion deep water
cargo port off the coast of Louisiana, and
a $1.3 billion electrical transmission line
project in the southwest United States, two
of the largest projects submitted to USCIS.
Barnhart is also an active speaker in the
national EB-5 circuit, having discussed
EB-5 job creation and RFE issues in
seminars across the United States as well as
in China.
Barnhart teaches Corporate Finance
and Investments, and his research addresses
mutual funds, futures markets, exchange
rates and econometric applications in testing financial theories. His research has been
published in the Journal of Financial and
Quantitative Analysis, Harvard University’s
Review of Economics and Statistics, the
Journal of Empirical Finance, the Journal of
Banking and Finance, Financial Review, the
Journal of International Money and Finance,
the Journal of Futures Markets, and other
finance and economics journals.
Profile
Profile
Scott Barnhart
Barnhart Economic Services LLC
Scott W. Barnhart is President of
Barnhart Economic Services LLC, a
consulting firm founded in 2005. The
firm employs three Ph.D. economists
and specializes in EB-5 and non-EB-5
economic job creation studies, TEA
(Targeted Employment Area) designations, and EB-5 business plan writing.
Barnhart received his Ph.D. in eco-
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