This year’s Leadership Atlanta class, announced earlier this month, includes 16 lawyers and a judge. All told, lawyers make up almost one-fifth of the 89 business executives, community leaders, educators and entrepreneurs selected for the nine-month program, which kicked off with an orientation on Wednesday.

Leadership Atlanta, which will celebrate its 50th anniversary next year, is one of the oldest community leadership-development organizations in the country. The group has named Mike Hobbs, a partner at Troutman Sanders and a 2008 Leadership Atlanta graduate, as the chair of its board of trustees for a one-year term, effective June 1.