{"id":13290,"date":"2016-02-03T16:58:43","date_gmt":"2016-02-03T21:58:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=13290"},"modified":"2016-02-03T16:58:43","modified_gmt":"2016-02-03T21:58:43","slug":"chamber-members-seek-accountability-in-new-path-forward","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/chamber-members-seek-accountability-in-new-path-forward\/","title":{"rendered":"Chamber members seek “accountability” in new path forward"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n

As they continue their efforts to get \u201cback to business\u201d, the Aurora Chamber of Commerce is placing an increased emphasis on being advocates for local businesses.<\/p>\n

Members, however, said they want to see action \u2013 and soon.<\/p>\n

Chamber members had their first chance to weigh in on the organization\u2019s future last Wednesday as Board Chair Javed Khan laid out their strategic plan for the next few years.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur mission now is to be a progressive community leader,\u201d Mr. Khan told the packed house. \u201cWe want to be engaged, we definitely want to focus on community prosperity, and we want to focus on everyone in this room [to] move your business forward.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen it comes to re-establishing the value and visibility of the Aurora Chamber of Commerce brand, first we need to strengthen our relationship with the Town of Aurora. We firmly believe that it is the number one priority for us as a Chamber. We need to get back to really being a strong partner with the Town of Aurora, with the Mayor\u2019s office, with the new CAO\u2019s office, and with staff.\u201d<\/p>\n

To this end, the Chamber said they will be working to have a member of their Board on hand to participate in as many municipal meetings as possible to weigh in on local business decisions as they progress, rather than reacting to them after they are done deals.<\/p>\n

In addition, a revitalized Chamber means a revitalized sense of relevance amongst members, Mr. Khan added. At this point, plans to realise that goal are still being looked at, but plans are underway to bring in 84 new members by the end of June, reaching out to 800 area businesses, putting a renewed focus on young professionals, coordinating economic roundtables within the Region, and forming partnerships among stakeholders and all levels of government.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo longer will be the Chamber you don\u2019t hear from,\u201d said Patricia Poulin-Ulbricht, Past Chair of the Chamber. <\/p>\n

Added Mr. Khan: \u201cWe want to demonstrate being more proactive when it comes to your success as a business in our community.\u201d<\/p>\n

But many of those in the room, however, stepped up to say they wanted less talk and more action. <\/p>\n

One member, for instance, questioned the Chamber\u2019s relationships with landlords with an eye on what can be done to get businesses to move into the vacant storefronts in Aurora\u2019s Downtown Core.<\/p>\n

That, said Mr. Khan, is something the Chamber needs to work for and that could stem from a strengthened new relationship with the Town of Aurora.
\nAnother said he heard a \u201clot of buzzwords and it was like sitting in an MBA program at York University.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou hit all the words, but they are shallow,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Following these comments, Mr. Khan said input from the members on the plan \u2013 which he characterised as a \u201cliving, fluid document\u201d at the outset of the meeting \u2013 made the issue of accountability shoot up to the top of their priority list.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe number one thing after today is accountability,\u201d he said. \u201cWe have to deliver. We can all say this stuff, but if we\u2019re not accountable and we don\u2019t deliver, it is exactly what you said: it\u2019s shallow. That is where the hole has been dug. We do a lot of great social events, but when it comes to advocacy and representing the business community in front of individuals in this Town who are the decision-makers, we have been absent.\u201d<\/p>\n

Others, such as former councillor Bill Hogg, said what was presented to the membership last week seemed like a \u201claundry list\u201d without \u201ccritical priorities\u201d being identified. Without that being done, it will be hard to get a buy-in from Chamber members.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe leadership of this organization needs to reach out and identify what the priorities are first and then clarify what those three to five are,\u201d said Mr. Hogg, responding to a questionnaire on feedback circulated to each table. \u201cWe can\u2019t do it all. When you know what you are going to do, I either buy into the vision and get on board, or I don\u2019t. Right now I have no vision. What I have right now is a boiler-plate strategic plan that you can slug in virtually any Town\u2019s name into the vision, mission and strategies. I am not saying they are bad, but there is more work to be done before you start asking me to get involved.\u201d<\/p>\n

But this is just the beginning, according to Mr. Khan.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a first step and we\u2019re not necessarily asking everyone to get involved,\u201d he said. \u201cWhen we want to get certain things done, we need a collective. This is phase 1-A. We need to keep going. This is not the end.\u201d<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As they continue their efforts to get \u201cback to business\u201d, the Aurora Chamber of Commerce is placing an increased emphasis on being advocates for local businesses.<\/p>\n

Members, however, said they want to see action \u2013 and soon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":13274,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13290","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/2016-02-04-03.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-3sm","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-17 21:00:14","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13290","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13290"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13290\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13274"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13290"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13290"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13290"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}