Council Mulls City’s Role With Chamber Of Commerce
By Kevin Gray
Contract content and what the Osawatomie City Council would like to see in a Chamber of Commerce and city of Osawatomie legal document bounced back and forth during the council’s work session Thursday evening. The big question appeared to be how much money out of $30,000 budgeted for the chamber should go to the chamber without strings attached and how much should be held accountable?
Yet, the council did not want to dictate what exactly the chamber would do. “My intent,” said City Manager Bret Glendening, “is not necessarily to provide all of the $30,000, but we should find some number to divvy out each quarter and, then, a portion should be tied to something. What this is should be the consensus of this body.”
Council members reviewed a contract the city of Leawood has with its chamber. City Attorney Richard Wetzler said, “The Leawood chamber had been started by a few businesses, including both individuals and small businesses. After three to four years, they came to the city and asked for help.” A full-time director was eventually hired, and the city still funds the chamber at about the same level.
The Leawood City Council, Wetzler said, expected the chamber to be a big part in attracting businesses and providing unity. “The chamber looked at themselves as a partner with the city of Leawood, and the city expected the chamber to be actively promoting the city and business,” he said.
Councilman Mike Moon said he would like to see the city and chamber relationship move forward, as well as having an exit strategy concerning the contract. “Are we going to be paying out $30,000 for ever and ever or will we develop some kind of matching funds held to what the chamber can do with their matching funds.” Moon also said he knew it would be difficult to have a performance-based criteria included.
Mayor Philip Dudley opposed such language. “We need some kind of accountability,” Dudley said, and Moon said, “We need to see if our investment is used, but we do not want to a fuse to terminate the chamber. I am opposed to that kind of language,” Moon said.
Strings could be attached to fund salary and benefits, said Glendening. “But the rest could be tied to performance. They will get to where they need to recruit more businesses. I remind you, the city wants to have a chamber of commerce,” Glendening said.
Chamber President Donna Darner, said the chamber membership has grown since she became a member. “It has come a long way in a year.”
Community development, said council member Ted Hunter, is important. “You can’t have community development without economic development. Shelagh Wright is doing this as our new director. Our chamber is building a fellowship and sense of unity among themselves and this will feed and enhance the economic development,” Hunter said.
Darner said Wright has a lot of enthusiasm. “She lives here in Osawatomie, and she shops here. I firmly believe this chamber will make progress,” Darner said.
Glendening said he would draft a contract for council members to review at their Nov. 18 meeting. “I have enough information from tonight to get started on a good contract,” Glendening said.
Mayor Dudley asked Darner to have as many chamber members as possible attend that meeting. “It is important for the chamber members to participate in the discussion, as well as getting the membership numbers to Bret,” Dudley said.
Glendening reminded the council again how he feels council should decide this contract. “You don’t have to have this decided by the 10th or 18th. Our goal is to decide how much of the $30,000 is guaranteed to the chamber and how much of the other portion they have to earn. Ultimately, it is your money and our decision how to release the funds,” he said.
Moon said he saw this as very preliminary. “We don’t have to have anything done until second quarter next year, anyway. This is just a fact finding,” Moon said.
In a separate item, council member Moon asked about the purpose of scheduling a regular council meeting during work sessions. “We need to build more flexibility in, and this is not as flexible as it could be,” he said. With one item on Thursday evening’s schedule, he was wanting to know why they could not have scheduled discussion for another work session. Glendening said he would work on a policy revision and present it to council at a later meeting.
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on Nov 3 2010. Filed under News and Updates.
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