Dear Members,
Happy New Year! Thank you to all our members that attended the State of the State Breakfast this morning at SUNY Oneonta, a great way to start our new year as a business community. We are grateful to our main sponsor of this special breakfast for 22 years Community Bank and for the excellent remarks and leadership shared this morning by Jeff Lord ,Community Bank, Vice President here in Oneonta. We are also grateful for our distinguished elected officials as our guests that were in attendance this morning which included, Senator James Seward, Mayor of Cooperstown, Ellen Tillapaugh and Mayor of The City of Oneonta, Gary Herzig. We are also grateful to Ken Pokalsky, Vice President of Government Affairs of the Business Council of New York State for facilitating our panel discussion and laying out some priorities for 2019 the Business Council will be working on. The Business Council of New York State works with hundreds of chambers across New York State and we are grateful for their partnership with our Chamber in providing valuable resources and information to share with our membership. This next year, I have the honor to serve as the Board President of The Chamber Alliance of New York State for which I have been a board member of for the past 7 years. The work of the Chamber Alliance of New York State adds to bringing hundreds of Chamber Executives together across the state all working together to overcome challenges for our businesses and to be a collective voice of bringing our business needs forward as we work with our elected officials across New York State.
Senator Seward shared with the Chamber membership this following statement from our State of the State breakfast this morning with photo provided by Jeff Bishop, Communications Director for Senator Seward:
“As we embark on a new legislative session I stand ready to address the many challenges we face. Too many people are leaving the state, and that is a trend we need to reverse. I will be working to create new opportunities, making sure businesses can afford to grow, and families and individuals can succeed here at home.
“The political landscape in the senate has changed, but my first priority remains the same – to represent the people of the 51st Senate District and fight for our core values and our way of life.”
The Otsego County Chamber looks forward to working with all our elected officials in 2019 and will continue to bring forward our business members needs, priorities and opportunities to attract new investment and retain a strong economy for Otsego County. We will continue to implement vital workforce development and educational training programs helping to develop the community and create and retain jobs. We invite interested business leaders to be part of the Otsego County Chamber workforce task group and education committee to advance this work. We are excited for our partnerships between Hartwick College & SUNY Oneonta in working with the college students by connecting them to internship opportunities and ways we can engage students with career explorations with local businesses. We are excited to be working with our manufacturers, health care system, small business owners, our school districts and the hundreds of organizations across Otsego County as we work collectively to develop this critical workforce pipeline. We look forward to partnering with ONC BOCES on a Career Fair/Open House in February, inviting parents to explore with their children our future workforce the hundreds of opportunities of good paying jobs right here in Otsego County. We will continue to develop an Energy Infrastructure roadmap by hosting an Energy Infrastructure & Economy Summit on Thursday, January 31, 2019 . Details are attached to register for this event along with sponsorship and exhibitor information. We are also actively accepting proposals for presenters from our members that wish to present at the Summit that have factual information to share on the different forms of energy. Presentations will be 15 minutes and we encourage opportunities to be interactive with the audience to allow Q & A. If interested in presenting please submit a proposal no later than Friday, January 11, 2019 to info@otsegocc.com.
Suggested Energy topics include but not limited to:
- Energy Innovative financing solutions (case studies and resources)
- Measuring and monitoring building performance outcomes
- Deep energy retrofits to zero energy
- Design and construction best practices
- Hydro Power
- Energy Efficiency
- Natural Gas Accessibility
- Energy codes
- Net-zero energy (the business case and value proposition for owners/developers; case studies; carbon impacts)
- Communicating your green building/sustainability success story
- Emerging technologies
- Resiliency and climate adaption in buildings
The Otsego County Chamber board of directors and I look forward to another successful year in building new partnerships and advancing the needs of all our businesses for your continued growth and success here in Otsego County. Wishing you all great success in 2019!
Respectfully,
Barbara Ann Heegan
President/CEO
Energy-Summit-Flyer.pdf
