October 2022 Minutes

Baker Chamber of Commerce and Agriculture General Meeting

Thursday October 6th, 2022 at the Fallon County Fairgrounds at NOON.

Members present: Alissa Miller (President), Shyla Hadley (Vice-President), Karol Zachmann (Treasurer), Tammy O’Donnell (Secretary), Melissa Rost, Roy Rost, Beth Epley, Kelly Graham, Josey Madler, Linda Howard, Jamie Holliday, Steve Zachmann, Timberly Kelly and Vaughn Zenko.

Staff Present:  Melissa Higbee, Executive Director and Kassidee Downing, Chamber Assistant

Alissa called meeting to order at 12:02pm.

Jamie made a motion to approve the minutes with Steve Zachmann’s corrections being noted to change one sentence in his report from last month and Steve 2nd the motion. All in favor. Motion carried.

Executive Director Report: Melissa reported people have been asking about how to become a Chamber member.  3 new businesses asked the Chamber how to become a member. Melissa went to the first meeting for Christmas in the Park. Melissa will be helping with contacting vendors for this event. I have been invited to attend a training in Miles City on October 17th for Lean 101 training. This training will be put on by the Montana Manufacturing Extension Center which are housed under MSU’s College of Engineering. This training will teach what Lean Manufacturing is and how to use it. Other Chamber Directors from the surrounding areas have been invited. The board agreed that the training would be a good idea and I could ride with Alissa to the training. Sign-up sheet for the Customer Appreciation dinner will be passed around. I will not be able to attend this. I signed up and paid for a conference before getting this job. I helped with Flag Football and Preschool Sports last week. Also, the Bank of Baker is donating a nice printer/copier machine to the Chamber. I am looking for some hands to help get it moved to our office.

Rec Director Report: Kassidee stated that Football, Soccer and Preschool sports have started.

Every program is going well.  On 10/13, we are moving the 2-6th grade practice to the High School football field. We are looking for refs and play callers for the kids. Please let me know if you are interested in helping out, I will let Casey know. On 10/14, our 2-6th graders are playing at halftime at the High School football game. Casey is doing a wonderful job and has a great team working with him. I am really proud of how well they are doing. Soccer ends on 10/15. I am going to be cleaning up the field/facility on 10/14 and returning equipment on the 17th. As a thank you to our sponsors Bohle is donating a team picture to each business that they can display.  Our next program is basketball which starts the week of the 24th. Kassidee let the members know about her expectation for parents to be at the Preschool Arts and Crafts program to help with the activities.

Old Business:

Fall Festival Recap:  Melissa stated the Duck Races went well this year. It brought in about $685. Still that all goes to paying off the Duck Track. Kassidee stated the dunk tank was a blast and it was a good fundraiser for the Rec Department.

Lucas Meschke Golf Tournament Recap: Melissa stated the event went well. We are still waiting on invoices to pay before I have a total for the event.  

Calcutta Recap: Melissa stated she is still waiting on invoices for this event as well to get a bigger picture how this event faired.

Moonlight Madness: Will be on October 13th from 4:30 to 7pm for the Customer Appreciation supper. The running candidates Roy Rost and Deanna Herbst will be serving the meal that night. The stores will be open until 8pm Downtown. In conjunction with this, the Strawbale Contest will be voted on that night so get your votes in on Facebook or in person at the Customer Appreciation Supper at Thee Garage Showroom.

Trick or Treating: Will be on Monday October 31st Downtown from 3-6pm.

Other Old Business: None.

New Business:

Chamber Executive Director Position Fulltime:  Melissa was voted in to become fulltime with the chamber by the board at yesterday’s board meeting.  Starting Monday Melissa will be the fulltime Chamber Director Alissa stated.

Rec Director Position Job Title: Alissa stated she would like to see the Rec Director title switched to the Chamber Assistant title. The reason for this is people are thinking the Rec is not apart of the Chamber. The board voted to change the Rec Director’s job title to the Chamber Assistant.

Office Rental Ideas: Alissa stated we are looking at different options for the new office for the Chamber. We will hopefully get one of them and move into our new space soon.

Baker Bucks Stamp (No Cash Back): Melissa stated she would like to purchase a stamp for the Baker Buck checks to put in the memo No Cash Back. The idea of a gift card was brought up in yesterday’s meeting so Melissa will be seeing if the bank can provide that and if not, we will continue to purchase the stamp and put on the Baker Bucks in the memo No Cash Back.

Strawbale Trail: This idea through town has been a hit. I have been getting a lot of positive feedback how great the downtown is looking due to this event. The Strawbales will be voted on the night of Moonlight Madness.

Christmas Stroll: The Date will be December 8th. The timeline for festivities will be 4-6 Santa Pictures at Fire Hall bring can good for a photo with Santa. FMC will be serving soup and bread from 5-7 for the Festival of Trees at Thee Garage Showroom. The parade will start at 7pm. Stores will be open late until 7pm as well.

Month of December: Alissa stated that we are going to be having a lighting contest again this year and we will be doing the “be a winner shop in Baker” again this year.

Board Member Election: Melissa was asked to form a committee for the board member elections. If anyone is interested on serving on the board let one of us know.

Other Announcements:   We are forming a Rec Dept Committee to create a full year plan. Let Melissa know if anyone would like to be a part of this committee.

Reports from Members: 

Plevna School- Timberly Kelly is excited to be on staff at the Plevna School as the new Superintendent. Plevna Schools will be incorporating a new mentoring program that instills 7 habits as the foundation for the program. This will help students work on goals and accomplishing them.

Fallon County- Roy Rost stated the storm drainage project is coming to an end.

O’Fallon Historical Museum- Melissa Rost reported that the Night at the Museum will be coming up Sunday October 23rd with 3 stories and 3 different actors. Starts at 5:30pm with free will donation chili feed then performances start at 6pm to 8:30pm and go on every ½ hour.

City of Baker- Mayor Steve Zachmann stated he would like to thank Kassidee for cleaning up the bathroom situation at the ball fields. The Rec Dept is a good thing and Kassidee took care of the bathrooms while the soccer players used the fields. City Council approved the purchase of a new score board for the baseball field and talking about maybe in the future purchasing a PA System. If Kassidee needs something please have her start a Christmas list like wish list. The city committed to buying a new garbage truck, looking at different trucks now to buy which are running around $390,000. Also, approved the shrub maintenance in the right of way. Homeowners will be receiving a letter from the city if their shrubs are needing attending to. Water, sewer, and garbage rates will be increasing to pay for the new garbage truck. Approved drafting a new agreement with the rural fire department. Flu shots were approved for city employees. ARPA budget was changed with adding another $5,000 to the budget for the grant to go through. Planning board is looking at the renewal of the growth policy.

FMC- Karol Zachmann stated the Holiday Bazaar will be Nov. 20th from 10am-4pm. Looking for concession stand volunteers. Festival of Trees will be on Nov. 21st thru Dec. 8th at Thee Garage Showroom. Trees will go to highest bidder on Dec. 8th at 6pm. Proceeds will go to a brand-new Whirlpool bathtub for the Long-Term Care Unit.  Health Fair is happening this year. See Karol for sign-up sheets.

Classy Cactus- Josey Madler stated her store will have a 20% off sale on Moonlight Madness to get ready for new holiday inventory.

KFLN- Linda Howard stated she is the new sales manager and is lives in Golva. This is her 3rd week with the station. She wants to come up with ideas that will help businesses, support Baker, and support surrounding areas.

EPEDC- Beth Epley stated she has been busy. The placemaking grant was awarded to SMART for the Wild Roots Community Forest project in the amount of $4,000. This will be located next to the Mangold Baseball Field. We helped SMART apply for the MDU grant. Feds gave Montana 60 million dollars for the local economic developments to loan this money out. This is where our revolving loan can help small businesses get access to this money. EPEDC will be hosting an Excel Training on the 11th and 13th of this month at 5:30pm. This is a free training. There will be a Quick Books training on the 20th and 21st of this month at Dawson Community College. FADA- Alissa stated the Eastern Montana Ag Summit will be in Circle MT on Wednesday October 26th for value-added Ag this one time. Department of Ag will be there. Meeting will have topics like sending Montana beef to Argentina and flax products coming out of Canada. There will be a free lunch, hands on beef cattle working company, and ag lenders.

Christmas in the Park committee is meeting October 11th at noon at Compass Coffee. We need vendors, carolers, businesses to decorate a tree, lights to be donated and we will have a bucket to accept donations of lights at the Moonlight Madness Customer Appreciation supper. Investment Co-Op is working hard to get the by-laws done.

SMART/EMEDA- Vaughn stated EPEDC’s Placemaking Grant was funded by the Red Ants Pants Community Foundation. Applied for an MDU grant for the Community Theater. Applied for the Montana Tourism Grant for a visitor center. SMART received the Otto Bremer that Beth and Melissa worked on for a general operating grant. Junction 39 will be opening as soon as we can find someone to build the ramp needed to be ADA compliant. The Haunted House will be happening again this year on Oct 13th, 15th, 20th, and 27th. It will be a sequel to last year’s event. The O’Fallon Historical Society is donating money to help restore the BSB Clock. Vaughn stated he was a keynote speaker at the MNA Conference. He will be speaking tonight at the Re-Imagining Rural event on the Investment Co-Op model Baker is using. District Volleyball is coming to Baker at the end of this month.  

Adjournment: Steve made a motion to adjourn at 1:00pm and Tammy 2nd the motion. All in favor. Motion carried.

**Next Meeting Thursday November 3nd, 2022 at NOON at the Baker Bowling Center**