BY MELINDA J. OVERSTREET
GLASGOW NEWS 1
Members of the Cave City Chamber of Commerce had the opportunity Tuesday to learn more about some of the work being done around the county in terms of planning and economic development.
Maureen Carpenter, president and CEO of Barren Inc., and Kevin Myatt, planning director for the Joint City-County Planning Commission of Barren County, were the guest speakers for the chamber’s quarterly luncheon at the Cave City Convention Center, with roughly 50 people in attendance. Each highlighted what their respective organizations do in general and specific items on their horizons.
Myatt’s message is reported separately at this link.
In Carpenter’s case, many changes have taken place over the past 18 or so months that she reviewed as well, the primary ones being the rebranding of what had been the Glasgow-Barren County Chamber of Commerce, now known as Barren Inc., the Barren County Chamber of Commerce, and bringing the Barren County Economic Authority under the Barren Inc. umbrella. The latter, which had been under discussion for quite some time before that, was finalized with an agreement Aug. 13, 2021. All BCEA staff, including Carpenter, who is also president and CEO of that organization, are employees of Barren Inc., but the publicly funded economic authority provides a specified amount of funding to cover certain personnel and administrative costs to forward its goals.
“2022 was really a transformational year for us,” she told the gathered group. “We had a new name, a new brand, and we changed the way that we carried out our vision and our mission.”
Barren Inc. set a new-member goal of 100 for the year during this time of so many changes and questions.
“People thought we were crazy, but we did it,” Carpenter said. “So now we have 100 new members in our chamber family. We now are over 440 members strong, representing over 10,300 employees in our community. With each new member, it provides the chamber with a stronger voice to further the interests of the business community and provide a common vision for economic prosperity.”
Transformation and new ideas
She said they realized they needed to enhance their image and reach out into the community more. Barren Inc.’s Facebook page grew 150 percent, she said, and the organization also launched a new website – barreninc.com – both of which increased exposure for its members and its brand. The site includes a member directory and a calendar of events, among other features. She discussed the “sizzle” video produced for use in marketing the community to visitors and potential businesses, which begins playing on the website as soon as it’s accessed and highlights more than 20 locations in the county.
Part of the rebranding also involved revamping the annual magazine publication, member benefits and some long-standing events, and some new events were added, Carpenter said.
Barren Inc. hosted 65 events in 2022 that included, 36 of which were member celebrations. Ten were annual events, and it hosted nine professional development trainings, eight quarterly networking opportunities and two were young-professional events, she said.
It has added a chamber lunch club, virtual business-to-business best practices seminars, action-in-leadership workshops and a young professionals group. Some of the awards that had formerly been presented during the annual dinner banquet now take place at smaller, separate events and are separated into categories such as volunteerism and achievement in business.
In talking with members, it was clear that workforce development needed to be even more of a focus, and a Workforce and Talent Committee was created, as well as other initiatives.
“Last year, we were fully funded with a grant award to launch a new program called the Barren County Resources for Relaunch. This program is designed for individuals that have been out of the workforce for two or more years. That could be through incarceration, a stay-at-home mom who stayed home to raise the kids and now they’re in school; it could be a caregiver or it could have been somebody impacted by COVID,” Carpenter said. “But our goal is to get these people comfortable to go back into the workforce and use their talents and skills to serve the business needs.”
Educator Externships are being launched this summer, she said, and those will allow educators to job shadow individuals in high-demand positions within the community.
“We also started a process called Experience the Barrens, and this is going to be a big one,” Carpenter said. “This is a highly interactive career expo for every single eighth-grader in Barren County. The eighth-grade students will come to a showcase of career opportunities available in the region, and students will experience careers available in the high-demand sectors with interactive exhibits, so it’s all hands-on experience for them to see all the things that are available here as they get ready to make decisions on their career pathways for high school.”
Economic development
Circling back to the economic development aspect, she said they had completed the 100,000-square-foot speculative building, which they ended up selling before it was actually finished, and they completed the second phase of the South Cooper Industrial Park, which included two graded sites, each roughly 23 acres. New Bowling Green Road (U.S. 68-Ky. 80) was widened along the entrance to the park to add turning lanes to Beltline Boulevard, the new access road there, she said.
They are in the process of moving forward with Phase 3, including utility extensions, preliminary building designs for two new spec buildings and additional grading of that park.
Funding was received for further work on the Chapatcha industrial park, adjacent to the property where this meeting was taking place, and she offered reassurance to those present that it would happen but receipt of the money was delayed by federal government processing. The said the funding is for the development of three graded sites there, and it’s about 60 percent done now.
“Once that’s done, we’ll have three sites to promote, about 50,000 square foot each,” Carpenter said. “We’ve all heard about the two big projects to the north and south of us, and this really sets us up to be a place for those suppliers to locate.”
She also told them about the housing study completed by the organization.
“So, as you can tell, 2022 was pretty busy. 2023 is proving to be just as busy. We are not slowing down,” she said, noting that 23 new members have joined this year and in January, Barren Inc. launched its strategic plan. The plan focuses on five key priority areas – industry retention, expansion and recruitment; improving our community’s competitiveness; cultivating entrepreneurship and business success; culture of engagement and communication; and organizational sustainability, she said, elaborating briefly on each.
“We have a bright future ahead,” Carpenter said. “There’s still a lot of work to do. I do see our communities, our elected officials, our different departments working more closely together than we ever have before.”
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