Aug 22, 2012 Advisory Council – McCall

by | Aug 27, 2012 | Meetings & Minutes

Time and Attendance

Meeting start and finish:

1:15 PM – 2:30 PM

Members Present (alphabetical order):

Don Bailey (City of McCall), Scotty Davenport (Cascade Chamber), Ray Moore (unincorporated Valley County)

Members absent:

David Carey (McCall Chamber), Dick Carter (City of Cascade), Wendy Davenport (rotating member: City of Donnelly), Ken Minshall (rotating member: City of Donnelly), Julie Steinberg (Donnelly Chamber)

Non-members present:

Michelle Groenevelt, Todd Hatfield, Gene Drabinski, Bryan Williams

Facilitator (no voting rights):

Willem Braak, UI Extension, Valley County

Decisions and notable points from the 8/22 meeting

(1) Public input & comments

NOTE: comments and discussion may be paraphrased for brevity

Todd Hatfield:

Asked about follow-up on his suggestion at the July 22 meeting to add the word “Economic” to the suggested URL for the Development Council website.

Response: after the July meeting, the facilitator had proposed additional URL options with the term “economic” in the domain name. The council’s feedback was not conclusive, and three domain names are currently reserved:

  • ValleyCountyDevelopment.org (the meeting’s original decision)
  • www.ValleyEDC.org (neutral and conveniently short)
  • www.ValleyEconomicCouncil.org (received 3 preference votes).

All three url’s currently lead to the same web site which has the term “economic” prominently in the header. The council can still make a final choice between the three domain names at the October meeting.

Todd Hatfield :

He was happy that it was reiterated that members-at-large should represent businesses and NGOs (Non-Government Organizations), especially since the chambers do not represent the full business spectrum in Valley County;  but the distinction of “non-government” can be blurry. Organizations like hospitals and public schools are, in his opinion, extensions of government. An initiative like the McCall College, however, is a community initiative seeking private funding, and should be able to provide a member-at-large to the council. He  suggested the council make a clear distinction between privately and publicly funded organizations.

Response: There was some discussion with at least one of three attending council members agreeing with Todd (there was no vote). Since even a local college initiative may pursue public funds in addition to private funds at a later date, the council recognized the difficulty with such a criterion. The facilitator suggested to, at this point, not set a “hard and fast rule” and make the community interest and initiative the driving issue. The council decided not to set a clear criterion at this point and to wait for the pool of applicants to see if this would be an issue.

Michelle Groenevelt:

Was the council still considering organizing some kind of social/networking event for communities, businesses and NGOs? This kind of event can have a very positive effect on regional cooperation and thus the community’s economy.

Michelle Groenevelt:

The McCall chamber is planning a survey during the winter to inventory winter recreation in Valley County (covering a variety of activities from snowmobiling to back-country skiing).

Todd Hatfield:

Suggested to move the opportunity for public input to the end of the meeting.

With the limited participation, the council actually provided opportunity for public input throughout as well as at the end of the meeting, resulting in a very engaged meeting.

 

(2)  Council-member Update 15 minutes

  • Don Bailey updated the council on the search process for the McCall City Manager.
  • Several council members did not make it to the meeting (3 with notice, 2 without). The next meeting will need to address reasons and attendance.

(3)  Selecting the members-at-large

A 3-member sub-team had taken on the task to draft an invitation to solicitation. Ray Moore will follow-up with Julie Steinberg and David Carey to have an invitation finalized before the next meeting. It will be up to the sub-team to publish the invitation (UI extension can assist in submission to web and newspaper, if desired).

(4)Regional branding project

At the last meeting branding was identified as a project that could serve several different economic development goals: it could help the recreation sector in all communities; create a regional image for business start or relocation prospects; promote regional cohesion and cooperation.

Some preliminary research suggests that a “full-blown” branding project could be very expensive (up to $250K) and to that extent out of reach for some time to come. Other feedback was on the persistent disconnect between the “north and south of the valley”, prompting the continuing need to be explicitly inclusive to both sides. The discussion (council and public input) then explored what the aim of the project should be and what (minimal) parameters would work to accomplishing this:

  • the principal outcome of the project should be an “umbrella label” (and short description) for the region that stakeholders (communities, businesses and NGOs)  can identify with. This message would then allow for cross-pollination between individual marketing/advertising efforts.
  • the umbrella label can inspire some sort of “logo” or visual recognition, but should reflect the agreed upon regional identity; not drive it.
  • all individual organizations and communities should still be able to generate their own message (be it, for example, for advertising the region for tourism, doing businesses recruitment or promote retiree relocation); the “umbrella message” should be style guide for better regional recognition.
  • there have been several attempts in the past (for example: Payette River Mountains – Tamarack), and earlier discussions (Idaho Rockies, Recreation versus tourism, the Northern Rockies)
  • It was suggested that local marketing groups contribute to this discussion and be involved with (or at least invited to) a next meeting
  • Can the University of Idaho business school assist in this process?

Willem Braak will prepare a structured agenda for the next meeting that would cover or explore these comments and suggestions

(5) Meeting adjourned at 2:30 PM

Next meeting: September 26, 1:00 PM in the County Commissioner’s room in Cascade.

Tentative agenda items: (1) branding project; (2) member attendance.