Sean C. Morgan
Of The New Era
The committees that formed out of the revitalization efforts begun earlier this year are close to completing the process of working out their organization and structure as part of Sweet Home Economic Development Group.
A steering committee has been formed, along with three subcommittees, following two meetings with consultant John Morgan at the beginning of the year. Since then, the committees have formally adopted the name Sweet Home Area Revitalization Effort and merged with the SHEDG organizational structure, with SHEDG President Ron Moore serving as the SHARE steering committee chairman.
The SHEDG board agreed to take SHARE on during its regular meeting on May 21.
SHARE will serve an advisory council to SHEDG, Moore said, and it will handle revitalization efforts in the community, replacing SHEDG’s revitalization committee.
“We’re excited about it,” he said. “We have had an active downtown revitalization committee the last two or three years.” The committee worked on façade improvements, banners and installing benches in the downtown area.
SHARE will control the same budget items and projects that the SHEDG committee was doing, he said.
The SHARE committees will be somewhat autonomous, Moore said. SHEDG will retain veto power over SHARE’s initiatives but definitely doesn’t want to take the role of controlling the group, he said.
“I don’t really anticipate from this group things coming across that table that won’t get approval and move forward,” he said. It will function like other groups that have come under SHEDG’s umbrella, including the Beautification Committee’s craft fair and the Sweet Home Rodeo.
With more than 120 persons attending the initial meetings, more than half signed on to serve on the four SHARE committees, he said. That’s where this idea of multiple committees will be most useful. It would be difficult to organize so many people on a single committee.
The steering committee will report and bring its initiatives to the SHEDG Board, Moore said. The chairman of each subcommittee will serve on the steering committee.
During a monthly meeting, they will attend steering committee meetings and report on what their committees are doing, he said.
“There hasn’t been a clear vision in place yet,” Moore said. That’s where the committees, including steering, finance, planning and programming and marketing, are focusing their attention now.
The next step in the process is to develop a mission statement and plan that blends well with SHEDG’s mission statement: “To effectively lead efforts to enhance and promote thriving, diverse economic development in the community of Sweet Home,” Moore said.
“Right now, each community is continuing to meet,” Moore said. “My hope is we bounce some ideas around to figure out our next plan of attack.”
To that end, Moore wants to hold a strategic planning retreat with Morgan in the near future, he said. There, the committees can develop short- and long-term goals in one- and five-year plans.
At the same time, the committees are working on things that must happen quickly, Moore said, such as an upcoming multiple sclerosis bicycle ride, which will be based in Sweet Home, in July.
The city of Sweet Home has committed upward of $120,000 toward economic development in different areas in the 2008-09 fiscal year and is a partner in the revitalization process. The Chamber of Commerce also is involved, working with business owners and operators to find out what they think.
The next steering committee meeting is June 18. The programming committee meets on June 19.
For more information, contact Carol Lewis at 367-8113 or Craig Martin at 367-8969.