People will often ask me, what does the Chamber of Commerce do? As a member of the community, why should I care if we have a chamber of commerce? Let me dispel some myths. There is a saying that if you have seen one chamber of commerce you have seen one chamber of commerce, which simply means that there are a lot of different chamber’s throughout our region and country. All chambers have some basic functions but no two are identical, just like there are similarities between communities, but they all have differences, it is the differences we usually highlight and celebrate. At the heart of the local economy and the backbone of the nation's economy, you will find a chamber of commerce.
Chambers of commerce are funded by membership dues as well as non-dues items such as events, sponsorships, contracts, and sales of various products and services. The vast majority of chamber membership is small businesses. Chambers of commerce are not part of government, though chambers do often partner with government to accomplish the chamber mission.
Today’s chamber of commerce, rather than being narrowly focused on one particular industry, issue, cause, or activity, focuses on a broad range of activities and support for both businesses and communities. Chambers of commerce come in all sizes, and there are approximately 7,800 chambers of commerce in the United States.
A strong dynamic business community benefits the entire community. Chambers of commerce directly involves themselves in the community to create the environment where people want to live and work.
So who is the Federal Way Chamber of Commerce? The Federal Way Chamber is not your father’s chamber, even though we might be old enough. We were incorporated in 1953; we have a total operating budget of nearly $1 million, 8 professional staff, 500 members, and 172 volunteers. We have three affiliate programs: Advancing Leadership, Communities in Schools of Federal Way, and Safe City Federal Way. The vision of the Federal Way Chamber of Commerce is to create a strong local economy through business advocacy in the South Sound region.
This year we have started some new programs, such as ‘Federal Way First’ whose mission is to support local businesses in the Federal Way Area, to maintain our unique community character, provide continuing opportunities for entrepreneurs and build community economic strength. Another new program is the ‘South Sound Young Professionals’ connecting younger business owners and employees to get connected with the community. We also have created seminars helping businesses get up in a down economy.
Currently, we, as a nation, are facing historic times, times that many of us have never seen. We are experiencing a 9.5% unemployment rate, which, we can predict, will continue to rise before year end. Consumer credit is tight, business credit is tight, commercial real estate condition is poor, housing market show signs of a bottom, and we are looking at low growth and a fragile, slow recovery.
The Federal Way Chamber of Commerce believes this means that, as a community, we need to be more collaborative, more innovative, and more focused on growing our local economy than ever before. The Chamber believes that we need to look at economic development differently than we have in the past. We cannot succeed by following the same processes as we have in the past. Tomorrow we will be successful if we make a paradigm shift today!
Therefore we are focusing more than ever on growing the local economy by working on new initiatives, whether by creating or enhancing partnerships to strengthen our region. Here are a few of the items we are working on: creating a facility that will be a ‘New Business Incubator’ to put people back to work who have been victims of this economy; we are looking at new economic growth sectors such as the possibility to have a ‘Center for Healthcare Innovation’ that enterpriseSeattle is exploring in Federal Way; and we are looking at attracting people to Federal Way with a possibility of having an annual International Sand Castle event.
I invite you to get to know your chamber of commerce. One way is you can attend an ‘End of the Year Block Party’ which will be help at Gateway Center, highlighting the center and the many businesses that make this area home. We will have $1,500 worth of prizes to give away; the party will run on Thursday, August 27th from 5pm to 7pm. For more information see our website:
www.federalwaychamber.com
