Greetings and welcome to Friday! And welcome to Spring!! It’s been crazy so far – sun! Snow! Hail! Rain! In the 15 dry and sunny moments on Wednesday, I managed to sneak in a car wash!
Here’s our weekly staff update:
Blue Economy::
This week, Mark Farley and I met with Karl Mundorff, of OSU’s Advantage Accelerator, to discuss the logistics of bringing their programmatic services to Blue Economy innovators and entrepreneurs on the coast, as part of our CDS project work. We also had a report that Challenger Biosciences, the consulting company that we’re supporting to do green methanol research. They met with Element 1, a hydrogen fuel cell electric generation company out of Bend. They should be able to check out a working prototype of their technology within the month. Here’s a link to their site: https://www.e1na.com/ – Paul
Business Support::
I spent some time talking to the owner of Depoe Bay start up Kingfisher Pier (it’s a bait and tackle shop and fish processing service). They were having some challenges navigating some zoning definitions with the city (as in, can they do business in the location they want?). I gave her some information on how municipal zoning works and how to approach the city council. I also spoke with her attorney, and it looks like everything is on the path to a positive outcome. – Paul
Communication/Marketing::
I continued to work on the Spring newsletter throughout the week. I posted on the EDALC Facebook page about the Newport Farmers Market opening again this Saturday, an upcoming SBDC course, and a call for volunteers for the Beach, Bike & Blues festival in Waldport on May 6th. – Sarah
Community Connecting::
This week’s excerpt from Leslie’s update focuses on Community Building questions:
What creative Community Building opportunities have you experienced?
Share an enjoyable relationship-building experience that made you think: “That made more networking progress than an average meeting!”
What Lincoln County commutes do you share with others in your professional network?
Do you have unrealized opportunities to carpool to collaborative meetings, chamber events, celebrations, site visits, and other community events?
How can you or your organization organize combined travel opportunities to make sharing rides mutually beneficial to the folks joining your gatherings?
What networking relationships have you built or strengthened through non-agenda-driven shared experiences in Lincoln County?
What are common topics that arise in your relationship-building story sharing?
I’d love to hear any answers you’re inspired to share! Please send them my way: leslie@businesslincolncounty.com
Here’s a link to Leslie’s (always fascinating and informative) full report:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/14Ow4q_ByKKJ_C8QDLceIYHAveh4Bxv99dMLn3RL-or8/edit?usp=sharing
Creative Economies::
On Friday, I updated the community murals page on the ART Toledo website. – Sarah
Data and Demographics::
Over the next few weeks, I’ll be doing a few tweaks to the scope of work narrative for the Lincoln County Economic Report Update project (for the contract with the county). Some of the outcomes need to be brought in alignment with the requirements for the ARPA funding for this project (thanks to Kaety for her help on this!). Sarah and I also spent some time researching some data for Depoe Bay city councilor Fran Recht as they seek funding for their dock improvements. – Paul
Enterprise Zone::
CJ Hurtt (from the county assessor’s office) and I had our required annual meeting to discuss the Enterprise Zone (activity, reporting and filing exemption claims). Currently, we have four active exemptions – I’ve received claim forms for all of them and have them shot off to the assessor’s office – they need to get submitted to the state by April 1st. – Paul
Entrepreneurship and Innovation::
This morning, I was part of a regional cohort (and the only one representing Lincoln County) of innovation stakeholders helping Onward Eugene develop an Innovation Hub business model canvas (which will be used as a foundation for an upcoming proposal to Business Oregon). It was a lively discussion with a number of breakout sessions – they are working with Venn Collective, a DC-based consulting firm specializing in Hub development. If the proposal is successful, the Innovation Hub would serve all of the Cascades West Economic Development District. – Paul
On Wednesday, I reached out to Misty Lambrecht to get some information about the current CO.STARTERS cohort for our spring newsletter. She invited me to come speak at the class that evening in Toledo, so I got the opportunity to speak about our organization and what we offer to entrepreneurs and small businesses. I also thanked them for attending the class and helping to grow our entrepreneurial ecosystem! – Sarah
Organizational Development::
I has conversations this week with prospective board members Gregory Price (new SBDC director) and Jason Holland (Oregon Coast Council for the Arts). Both are excited about the organization and how they can contribute. Gregory and I also talked about putting together a joint pitch competition this winter, which we think is an awesome idea. – Paul
Paul, Leslie and I had our EDALC team meeting Tuesday morning. I started reading the Kauffman foundation’s Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Building playbook on Thursday and Friday. I also updated the information about this year’s farmers markets schedules across the county on our EDALC website. – Sarah
Project Work::
On Monday and Wednesday I updated the opportunities for entrepreneurs slider on the EDALC website. I updated the average rent for commercial buildings in Lincoln County on Friday. I also started putting together a business licensing cheat sheet for each of the cities in the county with their different forms and requirements. On Thursday and Friday, I updated and added new listings on Oregon Prospector. – Sarah
Rural Opportunity Initiative (ROI)::
Leslie and I met with Kristin Monohan today via Zoom – she’s a capacity building consultant who does work for both the Ford Family Foundation and the ROI program. She is working with Leslie on some Newport 2040 annual reports. We’re engaging her (paid for by ROI) to help us put together a value-proposition document for future funding asks – based off of her expertise and some of the documents we’ve already put together. A huge thanks to Leslie for getting this conversation rolling! – Paul
I reserved the Performing Arts Center in Newport for our first entrepreneurial event on Thursday, May 11th at 5:30pm. The event will be a “Fail Fest”, celebrating that failure is a part of entrepreneurship and inviting people to share their lessons and stories only learned from experience. We hope all the board can attend and if you or anyone you know would like to speak about starting a business and getting through failures, please let me know! – Sarah
Supporting and Connecting with Partners::
Yachats Chamber of Commerce – On Tuesday night, the Yachats Chamber held their second business mixer at the Overleaf Lodge event center. It was a solid crowd of 70+ with Gregory Price (new SBDC director) delivering the program. Great networking and so awesome seeing that Chamber come back to life! – Paul
Northwest Coastal Housing – I had several conversations this week with NCH – they are looking for someone to help facilitate a visioning and strategic planning event for them in early April. I’ll be connecting with them again at the first of the month to see if we can nail down the logistics. – Paul
Upcoming::
Thursday, April 6th is our next Board of Directors meeting (at 3:30pm, via Zoom) – we’ll have state economist Erik Knoder as our guest, giving us some insights into our local jobs market and larger economy. Here’s the Zoom link to the BoD meeting:
Topic: EDALC April BoD Meeting
Time: Apr 6, 2023 03:30 PM Pacific Time (US and Canada)
Join Zoom Meeting
https://us06web.zoom.us/j/9178104987?pwd=bVJDN0VlUEM3aG9EaFhJQUZjcDJHUT09
Meeting ID: 917 810 4987
Passcode: 0NyksK
As a reminder – your Board of Directors resource page is here:
FYI, I’ll be off next week for Spring Break. With the OCCC campuses being closed for the week, Sarah will have the helm, but she’ll be working remotely.
Thanks for ALL that you are doing out there! Please reach out to me if you need anything at all. Have a wonderful weekend!
Cheers,
-Paul 🙂