Commercial Properties (vacancies, new businesses, etc.):  Sadly, after a very short run, it looks like the Coffee Station has closed its doors.  They currently have a sign on their door that says “closed temporarily”, but that sign has been there now for a week and a half.  My sources say that they will not be opening up again anytime soon, although a formal request for information has so far gone unanswered…

Building activity is in full swing at the former Priester’s location.  We have confirmed that this is actually Stephanie’s Restaurant moving back to their old location.  I attended a primary health and safety inspection with Terre, and there is plenty of work to do to get this location up and running.  The new owner, Carlos, has run into some financial difficulties working with Stephanie, and claims that there was some fraud involved in the sale of the business.  This may impact the timeliness, and ultimately even the feasibility of the project.  No word yet on what becomes of Stephanie’s current location once it becomes vacant – it has been speculated that Ria’s Bar might be interested in expanding, but I have not been able to confirm this yet.

I have attended a number of health and safety inspections with Terre in the last couple of weeks, and this is improving my understanding of building code immensely.  I will continue to do this until I am intimately familiar with the main sticking points of these inspections so I can help advise businesses prior to being inspected on what the building inspector will be looking for.

Tickle Creek Antiques (a consignment antique store):  This business (Paola properties) is now licensed and operational.  Kjersti (owner) is quite energetic and full of ideas, so it will be interesting to see how this business grows.

Sandy Gold Swap:  This business (Paola properties) is now licensed and operational.

Sweet Cakes by Melissa:  Unfortunately, this move has been postponed indefinitely due to the media circus surrounding this business.  Since Sweet Cakes made national news a few weeks ago by denying service to a same sex couple, they have been receiving an outpouring of support from like-minded patrons.  The increase in business has resulted in an increased demand on their time and energy, and they have determined that they simply do not have the available time to consider a move at the moment.  The Kleins told me that once things get back to normal, they will re-evaluate their situation and contact me if they are still interested in moving to Sandy.

Ray Custom Services LLC:  Yet another business that flew in under the radar, located at 35900 Industrial Way #400.  This is a mom ‘n pop shop that manufactures food carts.  They have submitted for a business license and had their initial health and safety inspection.  Waiting on a few repairs before Building Dept. will give the go-ahead to open up shop…

Kimberley Brown, Attorney at Law:  This business (Schuler Building) is now licensed and operational.

Public Information:

• Social media:  Facebook followers = 3,064 // Twitter followers: 118 // only two posts that generated any traffic last month – the log truck accident on 362^nd & Skogan, and the gas leak at Fred Meyer (18 and 31 comments respectively).  Slow month.
• Other outlets:  n/a
• Current copy of Sandy Business Insider – G:\Economic Development\PIO duties\Sandy Business Insider\previous issues\2013\Sandy Business Insider – Feb 2013.pdf
• Current copy of H2O bill newsletter – G:\Economic Development\PIO duties\Water bill newsletter\Feb 2013.pdf

ED Committee:  January 15^th, 2013 – A short, half-meeting (only 6 members showed up), but a robust discussion.  We discussed the perception that Sandy is “bad for business” and determined that, while some of this perception is from days past, there are examples from recent builds where business owners felt they were given bad information, or asked to make expensive changes to their designs based on speculative reasoning.  In addition, the mayor has heard several complaints of shortcomings in customer service skills and a lack of empathy from planning department personnel.  I feel it would be appropriate to talk with these business owners and get their direct feedback, and have added this to my “to do” list.

We also discussed whether or not Sandy commercial property owners are charging reasonable rates for their properties, and I was strongly encouraged to let the Chamber take the lead there.  It would be reasonable to collect that information on surrounding communities for business recruiting purposes down the road, but any mention of this subject by local government would likely be taken poorly by property owners (the term “strong-arm tactics” came up a lot).  Finally, we discussed the idea of a rapid response team as presented by Catherine Comer, and the group strongly encouraged me to continue down this path.

George Hoyt has been trying to convince Alan Fleischman to join this committee to represent commercial property owners, as we have no representation from that sector.  Alan and I recently discussed this, and while he’s not exactly sure why we need to have an ED Committee “now that I’m here full time”, he doesn’t seem opposed to the idea either.

Project work: 

• destination hotel – still in holding pattern – remaining in the loop as to status updates on this project – now that elephants at Rosalyn Lake have been confirmed, it might be wise to mention to Wendy that pachyderms should be visible from the planned hotel site…
• i3 fiber project – nothing going on with this project in February – all sector meeting scheduled for March 10^th at the Community Center
• PPLIP – Same as last month …nothing really to report here until the weather improves.

Conferences/training:  Training classes for the Ford Institute Leadership Program are now complete, having finished the 4^th and final one on January 11^th and 12^th.  Our project is unofficially entitled “Extreme Makeover:  Sandy Action Center Edition”, and we are planning to actually have a bus parked outside of the SCAC’s front door upon completion so we can yell “Move! That! Bus!” when we’re done (if you’re familiar with the show).  We are planning to use some of the bookshelves from the old library for the interior makeover, saving the project money as well as getting those things out of storage.  Seth is also going to set up the City to be the “bank” for the project, as Ford requires us to use a not-for-profit organization as the financial go-between for their projects.  Project is looking to be completed by June 30^th.

Next conference is the Broadband Communities conference in Dallas in April (the follow up to the one I missed in VA because of my sleepover at JFK), although I plan to check the OLLI schedule as soon as I get a free moment to see if there’s anything coming up that I might benefit from.