The Chamber of Commerce is focusing on getting business owners to connect more frequently with City staff. (battlefordsNOW Staff)

By battlefordsNOW Staff

Growth ideas

Battlefords Chamber meets with North Battleford Administration

Jun 22, 2022 | 5:00 AM

As economic forecasts remain uncertain, the Battlefords Chamber of Commerce is focused on making improvements at home with local government.

During Tuesday’s meeting, the Chamber welcomed Jennifer Neisink, Director of Corporate Services from the City of North Battleford. Neisink outlined a number of issues related to growing the economy in the Battlefords and what the City’s focuses are.

“In the past, we had a poor reputation on helping businesses locally,” she said. “While we’re still operating from a reactionary perspective, we’re doing much better, with a number of successful projects like the Armoury.”

The biggest obstacle for the City has been on attracting new businesses, with inquiries having slowed down during this year. Neisink noted that the supply of building materials has stalled some of the interest in various projects, but added that there are other factors as well. In manufacturing, there are several challenges for cultivating that industry here, including costs, proximity to other municipalities and the number of available workers.

She also discussed the City’s efforts in addressing buildings that have deteriorated in sections where they hope to attract new investment.

PUBLIC SERVANTS

Flying Dust, Prince Albert CSOs honoured for dedication to community safety

51m ago

Student art

Grad uses student life to create 36-panel artwork of school experience

6h ago

Community safety

Landlords Association responds to P.A. shooting, suggests changes needed to Tenancies Act

19h ago

“The longer derelict buildings sit in the industrial area puts people off,” Niesink said. “Some have been brought back, but we need to keep our backyard clean

One item of discussion that both sides were passionate about was advocacy for bringing back the public position of an Economic Development Officer. The purpose would be to help with efforts to attract new businesses to the area.

Chamber COO Linda Machniak said she’s encouraged to hear that the potential exists to bring back that position and added that the Chamber will write a letter of support for having someone in that role in North Battleford.

“Certainly there’s potential to have it come back to the table for discussion during their budget deliberations,” she said.

Machniak said many of the issues discussed are ones that members of the business community have discussed before, but added that it helped to provide clarity on how to focus their efforts.

“It was good to be able to ask those questions and Jennifer is very detailed,” she said.

Machniak added that the Chamber and its members will really focus on moving forward is making sure anything worth sharing gets to the City, as Niesink noted that potential projects from businesses frequently don’t make it to City Hall.

“Get those discussions going and then let’s all work together to promote the community as a great place to do business.”

—

cjnbnews@pattisonmedia.com

On Twitter: @battlefordsNOW