Board of Directors

Robert Balentine, chairman of Balentine, the Atlanta-based wealth management firm, was elected to the Garden Conservancy board of directors in June 2015 and became vice chair in September 2018 and chair in December 2023. An inveterate, dirt-under-the-fingernails gardener whose father was a rosarian and whose mother was a horticultural judge for the Garden Club of America, Robert's love of the natural world developed at an early age, when he enjoyed hiking and camping as an Eagle Scout.

In 2002, Robert founded the Southern Highlands Reserve, a nationally recognized native plant arboretum and research center in the Blue Ridge Mountains of western North Carolina. He has also held many other leadership positions in his community, including founding president of the Southeastern Horticultural Society and chairman of the board of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra.

He is the past president of the Rotary Club of Atlanta and a graduate of Washington & Lee University, where he served as a trustee for nearly a decade. Among other civic and business honors, he received the 2013 Business Person of the Year Lifetime Achievement Award from the Metro Atlanta Chamber and was named to the Atlanta Business Chronicle's list of “Most Admired CEOs” in 2018. His wife, Betty, shares his passion for gardening and is past president of her Garden Club of America chapter in Atlanta and chair of the State Botanical Garden of Georgia.

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