General notes: So far this month, I have been getting by about as well as can be expected. We are properly prepared for First Friday now, as I have hired Aubrey as a consultant for one day to help me tie up all of the loose ends with this event. She was able to catch about a half-dozen minor errors of mine, and was instrumental in getting materials distributed to the participants, leaving me to work on higher level details like the beer garden at Chariteas (all set up) and working on getting Crawlers/Mad Dogz to participate (can’t do it this year, but next year for sure). I will hire her for one more day during the week that Jennifer starts so Aubrey can help train her from the front line perspective. And for the record, Aubrey was offered and has accepted a position with the Nature Conservancy in Portland, although rumor has it that another prolific Sandy resident is in the running for the Executive Director position with the Estacada Downtown Association. I can’t tell you who it is yet as the position has yet to be offered, but it’s someone you all know and respect. Watch this space…
Commercial Properties (vacancies, new businesses, etc.):
Ox & Marley: If you haven’t heard yet, Ox & Marley has departed Sandy. They have relocated to the Monticello Antique mall in SE Portland where they will share a space with 4 other antique dealers. This was a pure business decision that was based primarily on the fact that the walk-up business that they were projecting at their Pioneer Boulevard location simply didn’t materialize, whereas they will have orders of magnitude more customers at their new location by default. The only real complaint they voiced to me was the choice of businesses that their building owner occupied the rest of the building with….they got along with most of their neighbors but frankly were somewhat frightened by what they saw happening in the parking lot behind the building after hours. This was not a deal-breaker though – they just found a better retail space for their business and took it.
Thrifty Dollar: Just had an informal chat with Will Runnels (one of the owners), and business seems to be going OK. Not making a lot of money, but they are profitable. They would be interested in expanding into the shop next door if it becomes available and is currently keeping an eye on the possibility (neighbor’s lease runs out in Oct, but no idea if he plans to move on or not). The fact that the SCAC is expanding their food bank capacity at the expense of the second hand store seems to be helping business at the TD, but it’s hard to say how much.
Dolly’s Pet Shoppe: The latest: Marlene is now out of the hospital and in an assisted-living arrangement for the time being as she begins what is sure to be a grueling physical therapy regiment for the next several months. We at the Chamber have been keeping close touch, and several directors have been out to see her over the last couple of weeks. Anna (aka “Dolly”) wanted me to let everyone know that our visits and cards are helping Marlene to maintain her sanity, and she is very grateful for that.
Jack in the Box/Starbucks: I’m sure you’ve noticed by now that JITB is gone, and that a “coming soon” sign with the Starbucks logo is up at this property. Local Starbucks management tells me that an early-October grand opening is being planned, and that the current location will close a week early so that they may properly prepare. SACC has been notified of a potential ribbon-cutting opportunity here as well. Get ready for the coolest Starbucks in the county!
Barbara Sah Properties: 2014 façade program improvements to this building are complete and looking fantastic. Kudos to Tracy for getting this property on the façade program list – I’m told that the overall cost to do this was fairly low, but the end result is a huge improvement. If that doesn’t help some of these properties fill up, I don’t know what will.
Wheatland Building: 2014 façade program improvements to this building are also mostly complete. It looks like the only thing that remains to be done is the finish painting, which is happening as I type this. Again, a huge upgrade, and one that Dominic Giusto is very happy with. With the rental of the old Peak Trophy office by a medical products distributor, this building is mostly occupied – only a couple of the Jackson-Hewitt-owned offices in the front are available.
Tamale Factory: The turf war between Clackamas County Health and the Oregon Department of Agriculture has reached a conclusion. Antonio has told me that he intends to switch over to ClackCo Health because their regulations are a little less burdensome on his operation. He also let me know that he is doing quite well in this location, and is astounded that the local restaurant community is doing so little to promote their respective businesses (preachin’ to the choir, buddy). He is currently keeping an eye out for a location with a kitchen as he may want to expand sometime in the near future, and is also a little concerned that the Muffs have put his building up for sale and that he may be forced to move soon. I let him know that, while it’s good to keep those things in mind, the chances that the Muff properties will sell immediately are pretty low.
Crawlers: Finally, this business is up and operational. Terre completed his final inspection on Friday, and they were waiting for the ClackCo health inspector to show for their final with her, which I’m told went well. They did have quite a few questions for me when I stopped in to check on them, most of which were around signage. I told them that the SACC was doing a brown bag later in the month specifically on signage, and asked Khrys over at SACC to send them an email invitation to that meeting, which she did. Looking forward to getting a lot of input about signs from a new business…
Sandy Main Street: While waiting for Jennifer Marks to arrive, I have hired Aubrey as a consultant to get a few things done. She has committed to one day here to help me with the final arrangements for the September First Friday (which I desperately needed to insure that the event goes off smoothly) and one day in the second week of September to help me with training Jennifer (she will be able to train Jennifer on the specifics of website maintenance and event publicity better than I as she was the one who managed the day-to-day operations of SMS). At $12/hr, this should be a fairly modest expense since the total number of hours should not exceed 20. However, Aubrey’s help will keep me from going mental as I try to run Main Street and the Ec Dev office by myself this month… 🙂
First Friday: Gearing up for the September FF, and with Aubrey’s help it is coming together. Preliminary reports on the weather look promising (preliminary reports say mid-80’s and clear with a low of 56), and we are promoting our Safari Bingo! contest a little more heavily than the Poker Hand contest last month. This month’s event of note: Chariteas will be hosting home-town brewery Bunsenbrewer for an outdoor biergarten in her side yard complete with finger food. Stop by and meet Aaron Hanson (owner of Bunsenbrewer), learn everything you ever wanted to know about the brewing process and sample some local suds!
Project work:
Nothing at the moment
Conferences/training: [IEDC Training Course – Economic Development: Marketing & Attraction – Atlanta, GA – 8/13-15] – after-action report: This course was as advertised. I am very impressed with the IEDC so far, as this course covered business recruitment quite well. I have 2 two-inch 3 ring binders full of course material that I will need to revisit and condense into a more usable format in the near future. However, this will have to wait until my new RARE is settled in and trained and I return to a more normal schedule. Expect to see a more detailed report of what I learned in September or October’s departmental report.
As I told you last month, the IEDC (Intl Economic Devl Council) is the professional organization that certifies economic developers, and I’m not exactly sure that I want to go the certification route just yet. However, there are a few more courses that they offer that would be beneficial to my continuing education. We’ll see how the rest of the year (and my budget) pans out.
[ELGL#14 Planning Meeting – June] Did the walk-through at Kennedy School for the 2014 ELGL Annual Conference, and it looks like we’re on target for our October 17th conference date. Planning meetings have been happening fairly regularly via teleconference. Kelly O’Neill attended this with me last year, and I will be encouraging other city staff to get involved with this organization by attending this conference. It is open to anyone who is in the beginning stages of their local government career, and is a great way to network with other staffers in the same stage of professional development in other cities and counties. More on this event as we get closer.