A Whole Lotta Building

4th Quarter 2009

The Pasco Chamber of Commerce will hold itsmonthly luncheon meetingon

Monday, October 12th

Carl Gipson

, Director of the Center for Small Busi-ness, will be the speaker.Gipson is the formerDirector of Communica-tions and Operations forthe Washington PolicyCenter. He regularly writesopinion pieces, legislativememos and policy notesfocusing on smallbusiness issues.His work has appeared inthe

Puget Sound Business Journal, Seattle P-I, TacomaNews Tribune, Tri-City Area Journal of Business,Washington CEO

and othermagazines. Carl holds adegree in Political Sciencefrom Western WashingtonUniversity.Call 547-9755 or emailadmin@pascochamber.orgto RSVP—

October 12th,11:30AM, at the PascoRed Lion Inn.

October Luncheon

A bit back, before the reces-sion hit hard, the Chambernewsletter ran an article thatreviewed recent growth inPasco and Franklin County.Now, many months intoone of the steepest reces-sions in decades, a quicklook around still showssomething under construc-tion, recently completedor being planned almostanywhere you look!

Chiawana High School

—one of the biggest localeducational building projectsin a few years — opened to

its rst Freshman class this

autumn. Beyond that, thePasco School District spenta good sum upgrading

PascoHigh School

and

McLoughlinMiddle School

.The

Franklin Public UtilityDistrict

has been carryingout its duties in the middle of a construction zone for sometime now. Its downtownPasco headquarters upgradeis taking place literally acrossthe street from the recentlyremodeled and reopenedPasco branch of the

Mid-Columbia Library

.At the far end of town,there’s a much-improved

Interstate 182 on-ramp

atRoad 100.

Lourdes’ new clinic

is open at Road 68 and

Is Still Going On!

. Chiawana High School

. Students enjoying the remodeled Pasco Library

. LourdesHealth Network Clinic off Road 68

. Franklin PUD Administration Building remodel

October/November/December

(Continued, Page 5)

Benjamin Behen, PresidentPasco Chamber of Commerce

A SEASON FOR CHANGE AND THANK YOUS

Welcome to Autumn!My name is Ben Behen and I’m not anew face at the Pasco Chamber. I am ina new position as Board President. Soare new board members

Rich Cummins

(Columbia Basin College),

Lori Lancaster

(Benton Franklin Fair),

Britta Thompson

(Tri-City Journal of Business) and

MitchRoach

(Baker Boyer Bank).To introduce myself, my wife, Melissa,and I own and operate

Lucky Flowers

, a

retail ower shop. We’ve been Pasco

business owners for years and wehave two children — Hayden andBenson. Like many of youwho also have business andfamily in Pasco, we are com-mitted to this community.

The rst thing I want to

do is thank those mem-bers of the board whoare completingterms of service.Their efforts have been verymuch appreciated. Those step-ping down include

MissyNeff-Hill, Darrick Dietrick

and

Courtney Stenson.

Next, thanks to

RyanBrault

, the (now) Past Presidentof the Pasco Chamber for his service. Itwas a challenging year for the Chamber,the community and the country as awhole. I look forward to having hisexperience available to call on thisnext year.There is one other person that I won’tlet slip quietly away.

Darrick Dietrich

was the Chamber President two yearsback. This last year, as Past President,he was actively supportive behind the

scenes. This new year, Darrick is nally

off the hook in terms of attending meet-ings. But we will probably never stopcalling him for calm, sound, reliableadvice.There is one more change to mention.For years the Pasco Chamber has hada monthly newsletter. It is one of theprimary ways that the Chamber hascommunicated with you. It has served toinform members about the community —business and otherwise — and acted

as a calendar and tickler le to remind

members of meetings or special events.The Pasco Chamber of Commercebelieves that a traditional newsletter isimportant, but effective with this issue,our printed newsletter will come outonce per quarter — in January, April, July and October — rather than monthly.Between newsletters members willreceive e-mailed updates about once aweek; more frequently if events warrant.We appreciate the work that

SaraNelson Design

has put into making ournewsletter something to be proud of thislast couple of years. We hope to con-tinue to enjoy their talents in developingthis quarterly version of the newsletter,as well as in other areas and with otherprojects.If you have ideas, concerns, complaints,suggestions or anything else that comesunder the heading of “feedback,” pleaseknow that I care. I want to hear fromyou about the way things are and theway you want things to be. I didn’tpursue this position in order to put mystamp on things; I came here to serve.You can contact me at ben@pascochamber.orgWhat can the Chamber do for you?How can I help?I’ll see you at our next monthly lun-cheon meeting, October 12th, 11:30

at the Pasco Red Lion Inn.Thanks!

Ben

WORTH MENTIONING

Britta Thompson

wasappointed to a vacantseat on the

PascoChamber of Commerce

board for the remainderof a one-year term.The

Port of Pasco

is constructing a

22,000-square foot ofce building,scheduled for completion the rst

quarter of 2010.

Parsons

, which cur-

rently leases ofce space from thePort, will relocate their ofces there.

The local

Habitat for Humanity

afliatewas picked as one of 123 Habitat afli

-ates to participate in a national greenbuilding initiative.

Max Faulkner

is the new manager atAtomic Bowl in Richland.

IsoRay

of Richland has received clear-ance from the

Food and Drug Adminis-tration

to market Proxcelan Cesium-131brachytherapy seeds for implants tohelp treat cancer.

Brittney Dugger

is thenew Marketing Directorof the YMCA of theGreater Tri-Cities.

Imageworks

receivedtwo Aster Awards andtwo Horizon InteractiveMedia Awards for its work on medicalmarketing projects.

Michael Pettyjohn

has been appointedVice-President and Regional Managerof Tri-Cities Wealth Management andBusiness Banking for

Baker Boyer Bank

P.S. Media

celebrated its 10th anniver-sary in September.

Diane Turney

has joined

ParagonCorporate Housing

as Vice-President of Marketing and PublicRelations.

Matthew Riesenweber

CFP, CMFC, nancial advisor with

Waddell & Reed,

is a recipient of the

rm’s Crest Award honoring the rm’stop nancial advisors.

Debbie Bone-Harris

Franklin PUD

hasa new job title: PublicAffairs Manager.

Scott Musser

waselected President of the

National Auctioneers Association

.Scott is the owner of

United Country-Musser Bros. Auctions and Real Estate

Allegiant Airlines

has announced roundtrip fairs to Phoenix-Mesa as low as$79.00 one way!

Lockheed Martin’s Creative and Stra-tegic Service

team in Richland received17 Silver and 47 Bronze

Telly Awards

for excellence in video production.Volunteers contributed $831,595 indonated time (40,824 hours) to

LourdesHealth Network

in Fiscal Year 2009.

Bone-Harris

New Members

IRZ Consulting LLC

, Irrigation SystemManagement Services, helps clients

maximize resource efency, sustain

ability and protability through the use

of technology. IRZ Consulting is locatedin Hermiston.

Lori Rodriquez

is theircontact.

www.irz.comCastle Event Catering

, owned by

Katy Craig

, has been in business since1996. They are located in Richland.

www.castlehospitality.com

Wenatchee-based

Interwest Commu-nications

provides business telephonesystems, structured cabling and datanetworking services. The contact is

Jon Fox

www.interwestcorp.netFranklin Conservation District

is agrant-funded, non-regulatory agencythat matches local resource needs

to technical and nancial assistance.

Mark Nielson

is the District Manager.

www.franklincd.orgWilson Irrigation & Orchard Supply

islocated in Yakima and is owned by

EricWilson

. They specialize in orchard andvineyard products.

www.wilsonirr.com

Moses Lak-based

Columbia Bean &Produce

is the oldest bean processor inWashington State. They work with upto 200 Washington farmers to bring the

“nest beans to the marketplace.”

www.columbiabean.comColumbia Basin College Foundation

was established in 1984 to give indi-viduals, organizations, and businessesan opportunity to directly invest in theeducational mission of the College.

www.columbiabasin.edu/foundation

Hermiston-based

Third Day Creations

has over 650,000 products available toput your logo on. They also have asingle-head embroidery machine on sitefor low-minimum-order embroideredgarments.

www.thirddaycreations.netDan Blasdel

Franklin CountyCoroner

, is a new member of thePasco Chamber.

Dugger

To contribute an item to this column please email the information to

admin@pascochamber.org

or call 547-9755.