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Don't put off making a will
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You’ve said it before: “This year, I will make a will. This year, I will make sure that my family is provided for, just in case.”
You know you need to. You know that an estate left intestate creates a financial and legal burden for your family that prevents them from receiving the legacy you meant to leave them.
But then, you get busy at work and with family, and calling your estate attorney begins to fall farther and farther down to the bottom of the to-do list.
Well, not this year. Experts say one of the best ways to make sure you keep your resolution is to tell someone about it. Let your friends and family members know about your plans. That way, they can remind and encourage you to follow through. Better yet, call a qualified estate-planning attorney and make an appointment today while it is fresh in your mind.
Some surveys suggest that as many as 70 percent of American adults have no estate plan at all. Without at least a will in place, the ultimate decisions about how your estate will be distributed will be made by the government.  
A will is the first step to accomplishing a well-thought-out estate plan. The will states who you are, who you want to settle your estate and how you want your things distributed. A will should revoke any prior wills you have created and will set guardians for any minor children.
If you already have a will, you should consult with your estate attorney about what else you need to assure that your family is protected. Depending upon your situation and your goals, you may want to ask about a durable power of attorney, a health care directive, a HIPAA release, a trust or other elements that work in concert with your will to protect you, your family and your assets.
While certainly a good start, a will can be a clumsy way to distribute your assets. Wills must be processed through probate court. The probate process can be lengthy, expensive and can be fraught with unexpected surprises. Probate is a public process that any adult with an interest in your estate could use to contest your will, subjecting your family to litigation.
A trust is a private, legal alternative to a will that does not require probate. Your estate attorney can help you draft many different types of trusts depending on your needs, but one of the most popular is a revocable living trust. An RLT is a flexible estate-planning strategy that holds your assets but still allows you to use them while you are alive and distribute them after your death. It also can provide a seamless transition of legal authority of your assets to take care of you and your family if you become incapacitated.
Other kinds of trusts can be used to accomplish an amazing array of goals from tax planning to legacy building to asset protection. These include a life insurance trust, qualified personal-residence trust, charitable-remainder trust, grantor-retained annuity trust and gifting trust.
Don’t let another year go by with your family and assets unprotected. Contact a qualified estate-planning attorney today and give yourself the gift of peace of mind.

Barid of Richmond Hill and Smith are co-founders of Savannah-based Smith Barid LLC, which specializes in estate and special-needs planning.

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Record April boosts Savannah's container trade at port
GardenCityTerminal
The Port of Savannah moved 356,700 20-foot equivalent container units in April, an increase of 7.1 percent. - photo by Provided

The Georgia Ports Authority's busiest April ever pushed its fiscal year-to-date totals to more than 3.4 million 20-foot equivalent container units (TEUs), an increase of 8.8 percent, or 280,000 TEUs, compared to the first 10 months of fiscal 2017.

"We're on track to move more than 300,000 TEUs in every month of the fiscal year, which will be a first for the authority," said GPA Executive Director Griff Lynch. "We're also anticipating this to be the first fiscal year for the Port of Savannah to handle more than 4 million TEUs."

April volumes reached 356,700 20-foot equivalent container units, up 7.1 percent or 23,700 units. As the fastest growing containerport in the nation, the Port of Savannah has achieved a compound annual growth rate of more than 5 percent a year over the past decade.

"As reported in the recent economic impact study by UGA's Terry College of Business, trade through Georgia's deepwater ports translates into jobs, higher incomes and greater productivity," said GPA Board Chairman Jimmy Allgood. "In every region of Georgia, employers rely on the ports of Savannah and Brunswick to help them become more competitive on the global stage."

To strengthen the Port of Savannah's ability to support the state's future economic growth, the GPA Board approved $66 million in terminal upgrades, including $24 million for the purchase of 10 additional rubber-tired gantry cranes.  

"The authority is committed to building additional capacity ahead of demand to ensure the Port of Savannah remains a trusted link in the supply chain serving Georgia and the Southeast," Lynch said.

The crane purchase will bring the fleet at Garden City Terminal to 156 RTGs. The new cranes will support three new container rows, which the board approved in March. The additional container rows will increase annual capacity at the Port of Savannah by 150,000 TEUs.

The RTGs will work over stacks that are five containers high and six deep, with a truck lane running alongside the stacks. Capable of running on electricity, the cranes will have a lift capacity of 50 metric tons.

The cranes will arrive in two batches of five in the first and second quarters of calendar year 2019.

 Also at Monday's meeting, the GPA Board elected its officers, with Jimmy Allgood as chairman, Will McKnight taking the position of vice chairman and Joel Wooten elected as the next secretary/treasurer.

For more information, visit gaports.com, or contact GPA Senior Director of Corporate Communications Robert Morris at (912) 964-3855 or rmorris@gaports.com.

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