the council first came back to a discussion of the July meeting, where the decision was made to reevaluate continuation of the council based on the first 6 months experience. Council members felt that the investment of time and energy was worthwhile; the following summarized the voiced consensus:

• The council provides a valuable forum for regional coordination and discussion, and seems to provide the positives that similar forums (VAPP, UPRED) had offered in the past, but with a more defined representation.

• This forum is well positioned to provide guidance to capitalize on, and/or mitigate larger events in the regional economy (Tamarack, mining) if or when the need arises.
• The number of projects and funding opportunities generated by or vetted through the council should ideally increase with time

With the council now established, Willem Braak addressed the members in his position as office chair for University of Idaho Extension in Valley County. He asked if the Council was willing to also function as advisory council to the local extension office; this would mean that the council, on an annual basis, would provide input and feedback to the local extension office with respect to the educational (extension) programming. With its broad community representation, the council is a natural sounding board to provide such feedback and input.

Aware of the time burden that meeting preparation and chairing places on individual members, the October Council meeting had asked to explore three separate pathways:

• continue to find volunteer time and support among the council members
• create or borrow a part-time administrative position to at least cover administrative commitments
• tap into the Department of Commerce funding for professional support

To address the first, Wim had found support from Karla Miller, David Papiez and Ken Minshall to create a small steering committee to prepare the council meetings that would take shared responsibility for chairing the council meetings. This steering committee would meet in an informal setting (coffee, breakfast) between council meetings, open to all council members.

For its first 6 months the council has functioned in an informal setting with just a charter and meeting rules, and expressly without formal structure, bylaws and procedures. Even though there is no urgent need to adopt a formal structure, recently discussed projects like the Business Plan Contest and others would benefit from an independent but community-recognized organization. For the members to explore a more formal structure, it would be helpful to develop a better understanding of what other regional economic development organizations have done, and what could work well for the specific charter of the Valley County Council.  Wim has discussed the possibility for students from the University Of Idaho College Of Law to help develop such an understanding. Law professor Stephen Miller directs the Economic Development Clinic in Boise and is willing to have his students take on the project this spring semester.

the 3d directive of the October meeting (see [Steering Committee and chairperson] ) stipulated that the council wanted to explore tapping into the Department of Commerce funding for professional support, for which an RFP (Request for Proposals) will be issued this spring.

Since this RFP would assume the use of a paid individual, some of the discussion reiterated earlier important requirements for any paid support, if decided upon. The last thing the council wants is be a “self-perpetuating organization”; instead it wants to uphold the driving idea that the council is principally volunteer driven, represents both the private and community interests of the region, and works as much as possible through private initiatives; any paid position, if adopted, should therefore receive explicit direction from the council, report to the council, and be held accountable by the council with these directives in mind.

Judy Anderson will continue the project to organize a business plan contest. Other business plan contest held in Idaho were held in Rexburg (eastern Idaho), Blaine County (supported by Blaine Economic Development group) and an annual state-wide contest  by Idaho TechConnect. The University of Idaho Business School does an annual contest as well.

The project team will add fundraising to the team’s responsibility since community funds cannot be used to sponsor prize monies.  Karla Miller and Willem Braak have volunteered to participate in the team and in that capacity represent the council on the team.

  Don Baily felt that, in spite of the council’s decision to not take on regional branding at this point in time, the council should still inspire some effort to more effectively promote the region. He specifically referred to suggestion like the one from Robert Lyon’s to create a general publication that could be used by all organizations and communities. Support for this idea and subsequent discussion led to the idea of inviting the department of tourism to have a dialogue on possibilities and potential collaboration.