Agile on the Green raises over $30,000 to benefit Komen Atlanta

Duluth, GA; October 05, 2009 – Agile, one of the Southeast region’s fastest growing IT talent firms, announced the results of last night’s Agile on the Green (AOTG) golf charity fundraiser held at Bear’s Best in Duluth, Ga.

The first major fundraising event in Atlanta to mark the launch of Breast Cancer Awareness Month, AOTG attracted 18 VIP sponsors from Georgia’s technology community, 89 golfers and raised more than $30,000 for Susan G. Komen for the Cure Greater Atlanta Affiliate. Seventy five cents of every dollar raised stays in Georgia, to help make low-cost and no-cost mammograms available to residents in Atlanta’s 10-county metro area. The o ther 25 percent of funds raised are used to support cutting-edge breast cancer research.

“With today’s fundraising, we have donated over $130,000 to Susan G. Komen (over the event’s six-year history),” AOTG Founder and Agile CEO Tricia Dempsey told attendees during the event’s awards ceremony. This year’s AOTG sold out three and a half weeks early, a first in the event’s history. “The real winners are the women locally who will benefit from funds raised and that stay in the local community,” Dempsey says.

The golfing team of Andre Reese, assistant vice president, IS Operations for Cox Enterprises, Tim Tyler, Sou theast territory manager for Big Fix, and Preston Futnell, vice president of Sales for Reflex Systems, were this year’s AOTG tournament champions with the lowest team score of 59.

“It was a great day – we had a lot of fun while supporting a worthwhile cause. It was the first time I’ve ever won,“ says Reese, a third-time participant in the tournament.

Kelly Dolan, executive director of Komen Atlanta, congratulated all the participants and applauded the passion of Dempsey, who started Agile on the Green and her company, Agile, while recovering from a stage-3 breast cancer diagnosis. “To have started the tournament the way Tricia did out of the adversity of breast cancer is a great testament to Tricia’s strength and commitment to this cause, and that is what motivates this entire cause,” she says.

Dempsey acknowledged that the economy has affected everyone’s business and personal life, but the impact is also being felt on residents, who struggle to get regular screenings and treatment for a disease that one in eight women is diagnosed in. Dempsey says one in three Georgians has gone without health insurance at some point over the last two years, and that has resulted in less people getting clinical exams, affording mammograms and continuing on a treatment program once they receive a diagnosis. Oncologists and o ther officials worry that these economic realities will affect survival outcomes of breast cancer. According to Komen Atlanta, 98 percent of breast cancer detected in the initial stage has more than a five-year survival rate.

AOTG’s mission was not lost on first-time AOTG attendee Phyllis Gray, account manager for Matrix Resources, a five-year breast cancer survivor.

“My cancer was caught very early. I was a big runner and ate right – I realized that this could happen to anybody. When something like this happens, you think about all the needs of o ther people going through cancer,” Gray says. “The contribution people give to the community and to the Susan G. Komen organization through events like AOTG really help those who are not as fortunate as we are – so they can get through this battle and journey. The money raised also helps increase the knowledge of breast cancer in the community because cancer is one of those diseases if caught early can be cured,” she adds.

In addition to the championship award, AOTG also presented a special pink ribbon award to sponsor Primus Software, for the company’s long-term support to AOTG over the last five years.

Other executive VIPs in attendance last night were senior executives from Bank of America, Home Depot, Georgia Power, McKesson, AutoTrader.com and Cox Communications.