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At the decommissioned James River Power Station, the city's Tim Rosenbury leads a presentation about placemaking and strategic planning efforts.
Provided by Springfield Area Chamber of Commerce
At the decommissioned James River Power Station, the city's Tim Rosenbury leads a presentation about placemaking and strategic planning efforts.

Chamber group keeps it local for annual trip

Posted online

After canceling its Community Leadership Visit in 2020, Springfield Area Chamber of Commerce officials decided to stay close to home this year for the annual program.

An all-time high of 88 Springfield area businesspeople attended the multiday program Sept. 15-17. Chamber officials say the intent this year was to look inward and review progress in the Springfield region over the last 10-plus years, as well as examine opportunities for future economic growth.

It’s the second such local community examination for the chamber in the nearly 30 years of the CLV program. The 2010 visit was held in Springfield at a time when the country was coming out of an economic recession, said chamber President Matt Morrow.

“There’s different circumstances this time, but I will say that if a community is serious about really gaining progress from these trips, you really have to be intentional about looking at yourself from time to time, too,” he said, noting a local focus was under consideration even before the coronavirus pandemic. “The timing was right for us to do it again.”

Most of the CLV agenda was covered Sept. 15-16, with panel discussions as a large focus, covering topics including community building, workforce development and entrepreneurship. Morrow said the range of costs for participants was $850-$1,200, depending on what opt-outs individuals chose, such as lodging. The costs covered the chamber’s expense to organize the program.

“We did treat it just like we treat our trip when we’re going to another community in the sense that we encouraged everyone to be fully present for the whole time, as if we were out of town,” he said.

Attendee Rachel Anderson took that to heart. The executive director of Missouri State University’s Efactory business incubator said she fully participated in the program, which was her second time to attend the chamber’s CLV. Her first was in 2018, when the chamber visited Chattanooga, Tennessee.

“It was very timely to do a visit here in Springfield. There’s a lot of what I’m going to say are transformational things going on in our community right now,” she said, pointing to the city’s Forward SGF comprehensive plan, Grant Avenue Parkway project and Renew Jordan Creek, an effort to daylight the creek for economic development as well as stormwater and flooding improvements.

Context setting
Anderson, who moderated a panel discussion at the Efactory on entrepreneurship and innovation, said this CLV was “really good for context setting.”

“We can take leadership from our community and really take a look at and celebrate what has been accomplished over the previous few years and where we need to go,” she said.

This year’s CLV also provided an opportunity for longtime residents to see new places or learn more about those they have previously viewed. Locations visited included Finley Farms in Ozark, Boyd Elementary School and James River Power Station, which was decommissioned earlier this year.

“The sessions themselves were definitely informative, and I learned something new at each one,” she said. “But a big takeaway is just the opportunity to be with 90 community leaders for a few days instead of just a five-minute conversation. We really could connect about shared interests, shared goals and collaboration.”

At Finley Farms, a pair of panel discussions were held, Morrow said. One focused on community building, as panelists including Hotel Vandivort’s John McQueary and Jeff Houghton of The Mystery Hour shared about their entrepreneurial efforts. A second conversation centered on the community of food and its connection to the economy. Lyle Foster of Big Momma’s Coffee and Espresso Bar and Mother’s Brewing Co.’s Jeff Schrag were among the speakers.

Like Anderson, Republic City Administrator David Cameron attended the entirety of the program. It was his third chamber CLV, after previously attending trips to Chattanooga and Boise, Idaho.

Cameron said the chamber program provided an opportunity to stop and reflect on what the Springfield area is doing well but have the frank conversations about ways to improve.

“To me, that’s where true change happens, is through honesty and courageous conversations,” he said.

Shared strengths
Morrow said the trip was meant to get a sense of where the common language and common themes are in terms of opportunities. One of those shared strengths and opportunities in the Springfield region is the outdoors, he said, noting that needs to be stressed more. He said it can be leveraged in different ways such as retaining or attracting talent, as well as bolstering the workforce participation rate.

“Building on those assets can help grow that pie and help attract people to a community that they might not otherwise be aware of or think about,” Morrow said.

The outdoors was the focus of a panel discussion with representatives from Ozark Greenways, outdoor tour guide company 37 North Expeditions LLC and the Springfield-Greene County Park Board. Cameron said it taught him the importance of the area’s overall trail system and the need to continue putting in work to improve it.

Morrow said another community strength is the ability to collaborate.

“That means doubling down on marketing the area as a whole region and not just a group of cities,” Morrow said. “It’s really important, and each of the communities in the Springfield region bring different strengths and assets to the table.”

Cameron agreed there needs to be a mindset among the cities in Greene and surrounding counties to not be in competition with one another. Regionalism was a topic he discussed on a CLV panel in which he and Tom Rankin of Rankin Development LLC shared about how the Amazon project and others in Republic came to fruition.

“When you’re doing economic development, people don’t see city limit signs. They just see this is a developable property,” Cameron said. “We’ve got to continue to break down silos, and even though we have city limit signs and city limits themselves, that term should not limit us from being a region that operates as one with what we want to have.

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