Valley County Economic Development Council
Monthly Meeting: February 4, 2016
Idaho First Bank, McCall
Members present: Sherry Maupin, Scotty Davenport, Jonne Hower, Don Bailey, Cynda Herrick, Karla Miller
Sherry called the meeting to order at 4:00 p.m. Scotty was wearing shorts, despite the blizzard outside.
Jonne made a motion to delete the “Vision Statement” appearing at the beginning of last month’s minutes. Seconded by Scotty and approved by all. Minutes were passed after the correction, presumably with the same vote. The process prompted us to consider if we ought to create a vision statement, discussion ensued.
Treasurer/Treasury report: We have $1,893.30, and with the $1,000.00 coming in from Donnelly’s LOT fund, we’ll have a total of $2,893.30.
Time has not allowed for the creation of the 2016 budget, but time will allow this month and we’ll have it next time. Don B. plans to send some numbers to the executive committee to add to the budget.
Executive Committee:
Grant Writing: Select Health grant may be a possibility for funding the recreation district effort.
Economic Development Professional: We still need to write a job description for the position. Hopefully, Bob can put together what he’s researched with blending from Sherry. With precarious funding, this person may be hard to find. We still wonder how we’ll pay for him or her. Though the county commissioners and the cities all want to help fund this position, they need to create their budgets soon. Maybe the role of the ED professional could be merged with some other city or county role—or a person working on the housing trust project, or someone connected to the Payette Lakes Land Trust. Side note – still waiting to receive a report of findings from the Payette Lakes Land Trust and we should find out what their geographic area contains.
Sherry informed us that the Department of Commerce has lots of information, and many tools we could use. The Northwest Community Development Institute takes place July 18-22. Cynda says she’s gone and that it’s a blast as well as informative and valuable.
ASAP– We still need help funding ASAP, which is described at length in the January minutes if you need a review. This is a “one-time” opportunity as it turns out. So we’d have to figure out funding ASAP. Midas Gold is interested in helping.
Discussion ensued concerning the update of the VCEDC Strategic Plan and the demographic statistics in the appendix. Some would like the appendix as a link and some believe it should be a fixed moment in time. We discussed apples and oranges. We wondered if ABC could be a sub-committee, under the umbrella of the VCEDC, then we would do all the re-writing at the same time as the inclusion of the West Central Mountains Economic Development Strategy.
Subcommittee updates:
Strategy #1: Sector Development (Cynda suggested “sectors” be called “strategies” on the agenda and minutes since that is how they are presented in the Strategic Plan – “sectors” were defined.)
No newsletter update.
Sherry suggested we have an email database, a Facebook page, tweets, and twitter for communication dissemination in today’s world. Everyone was excited – we need someone to give us lessons. Our website has been infected – it will cost $86.00/year to protect from malware.
We discussed the possibility of the annual business planning summit being a combination of business, recreation and economic development factions. The event could encompass all these inter-related groups in one summit. The end of October or middle of September was suggested as a vague date. Cynda will start polling participants for a date and speak with the county commissioners.
The West Central Mountains Recreation District could be on the November ballot, though it won’t be on the ballot this spring. Many signatures have been gathered, but not enough to meet that date. So far, the response has been positive, according to Sherry. She gave us a handout. We all liked the blue line on the side, but Cynda has suggestions for improving it and will work on it. Don insisted that the city parks need to continue to be maintained by the City.
The marketing campaign—a committee needs to get together to figure out what kind of marketing is best for the communities included in the West Central Mountains. The towns involved need first of all to agree to be called or branded the West Central Mountains. Discussion ensued about the name and why it was chosen. The Idaho Transportation Department grant for marketing is due in April.
Strategy #2: Local Entrepreneurship
Mike was not present, but plans are imminent for classes and job fairs. Sherry will join him in this work.
Strategy #3: Asset Development
The next meeting for the Housing Trust has been set for February 19th, from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. at Midas Gold in Donnelly. Thanks to Don for taking the lead. Eric Kingston from the Idaho Housing Finance Association may attend. Blaine County has a similar trust in place. Between their model and that of Jackson Hole, we could get ideas on how to structure ours. We need a piece of property. Some of the funding can come from federal grants and loans. Eventually, projects must create income to pay staff. The organization has to fund itself. Don is going to get advice from Steve the Lawyer on combining the trust with our council (“seeding it”) or whether it’s better to create a separate 501(c)3.
Strategy #4: Import Substitution
No update today.
ABC Update—Woop! Woop! Going to the next level!!! St. Luke’s, the Chamber, and multiple individuals donated money so an alternate (fourth person) could attend the summit from April 25 – April 27th in North Carolina. They announce the top 8 after all of the pitches.
Sherry adjourned the meeting at 5:45.