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Brandon Burton 0:00
This is the Chamber Chat Podcast, the show dedicated to chamber professionals to spark ideas and to get actionable tips and strategies to better serve your members and community.
Hello, Chamber Champions. Welcome to Chamber Chat Podcast. I’m your host, Brandon Burton, and you’re joining us for a special podcast episode as we are interviewing the 2023 ACCE Chamber of the Year finalists.
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Becki Womble 1:03
I’ve been using Community Matters for probably six or seven years now. And in a previous life, I sold commercial printing so I can highly recommend Community Matters because it’s a complete turnkey job for any busy chamber exec and it’s a wonderful, beautiful printed product whenever you’re finished. And I just I’m very sold on Community Matters. And with a printing background I just big endorsement from me.
Brandon Burton 1:44
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Our guest for this episode is hope Kennedy Hope is the President and CEO of the North Tampa Bay Chamber of Commerce, and she assumed this role in July of 2012 and as a Florida certified chamber professional. Since this time, she’s led the organization through two chamber acquisitions and name change, a brand change and a stringent certification process. You may remember hearing hope on the podcast last year is episode 178 as the North Tampa Bay Chamber was a 2022 Chamber of the Year finalist for ACCE as well. In 2019, the North Tampa Bay Chamber was recognized as Chamber of the Year by the Florida Association of Chamber Professionals hopes work to support businesses of all sizes spans her entire career before joining the Wesley Chapel chamber in 2012. She served Pensacola Chamber members as the organization’s vice president and membership. In 2017. The tampa bay business journal named Hope is one of Tampa Bay’s most 100 influential business people. In 2005, the Mississippi Business Journal recognized hope as a top 40 under 40 for the state of Mississippi in 2008. ACCE awarded her for outstanding membership and in 2010, the independent news and Pensacola named Hope a rising star. Hope we’re excited to have you back on chamber tap podcast as a chamber the year finalist again back to back years. Welcome back. We’d love to give you an opportunity to say hello to all the chamber chamber, my goodness. And thank you share something interesting about yourself too. And we can all get to know
Hope Kennedy 3:40
oh my gosh, oh yeah, interesting is I gotta totally update that bio. So it’s out of chronological order, and it’s not important anymore. Our most important is what we’re doing right here right now. So I am so thankful for you for having me back again. This year. We are delighted to be a finalist again, back to back years for ACCE Chamber of the Year. It is definitely a labor of love. We can I can tell you all this stuff about it. But we’re here to just talk about chamber and how we got here. So thank you.
Brandon Burton 4:20
Yes, absolutely. So I didn’t catch any something interesting about yourself. We’re throwing
Hope Kennedy 4:28
interesting yeah, about myself. Oh gosh, that is on the spot. I I love to cook and make things out of nothing. I guess it’s a chamber thing that we you know, we make something out of nothing all the time. So that is that is what I love to do. I
Brandon Burton 4:49
love to create. That’s awesome. I love to create Yes. Well as a chamber that you’re finalists, I think everybody would be curious to know a little bit more about the North Tampa Bay chamber just to give some size, scope of work prospective budget just to kind of set that table your discussion and know where you’re coming. So
Hope Kennedy 5:09
we are, yeah, we’re in category one. So it’s under $500,000 annual budget. Our chamber is a two County Regional Chamber. Our our demographics are very interesting for a Chamber of Commerce in our community. We are for all intensive purposes, a bedroom community of the Greater Tampa Bay region. So we are just north of the bay, our main industries in our community, our medical and medical professionals. So our demographics are very, very different. Our average age in our community is 37 and a half with 97,000 annual household income, dual educated, dual working families. So we have a very unique chamber demographics are we have a lot of small businesses with about 75% being small, classified are small was under 10 employees. And then we’ve got our key industries, again, if the medical professionals so we have a lot of service industry, we have a lot of restaurants, we have a lot of shopping, the ancillary benefits of being a growing very growing community.
Brandon Burton 6:36
Yeah, there’s a lot of excitement and being part of a growing community. And I know there’s communities out there that may be a little jealous that you guys are growing and other parts and may be shrinking. So mean a lot of that has to do with the work that you guys are doing. So I’m I’m excited to get into some of that work is and really highlight what you guys are doing there at the North Tampa Bay chamber. And typically what we like to do on these chamber the year finalist interviews, I like to highlight the two programs these submit on your chamber the your application. So for those who may not be familiar as you submit the application to the chamber the year to be considered for for chamber the year, you submit to programs of work that you guys have focused on, I believe within the last two years if that’s correct. So it needs to be something relevant and making an impact in your community. So we will dive into what those two programs are and the impact that the North Tampa Bay chamber is making in their community as soon as we get back from this quick break.
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Raquel Borges 9:36
Hi, I’m Raquel I work with Yiftee to help over 500 chambers cities and downtown’s across the US keep local dollars local and support their small businesses. Our CEO Donna Novitsky and I will be at the ACCE Conference in Salt Lake City from July 31 to August 3, and we would love to meet you swing by our booth to say hi and learn about our community gift card program, Community cards are custom branded for your community, and can only be used at your Chamber members businesses, plus the program is free. You can learn more by visiting yiftee.com. That’s yiftee.com or emailing us at sales@yiftee.com. See you at the ACCE Conference.
Brandon Burton 10:24
All right, hope we’re back. So as I mentioned before the break, we’re we’re gonna be highlighting the two programs of work you guys submitted in your chamber, that your application, maybe just at a high level, tell us what the two programs are kind of what they focus on, and then we can go in a little deeper on both of them.
Hope Kennedy 10:44
So when it came time when we were invited to submit, so you have to fill out the benchmarking application or survey to even be invited to submit. I’ve struggled a little bit with what our programs synopsis, we were going to present. Because we did not go into this year with the mindset of presenting this as chamber of the year, both of these programs came out of an immediate need. So a quick action response. So we kind of had to do some inventory when when we started looking at what we were going to do. But what we submitted was the employee retention tax credit, we did a campaign around that to inform and educate our members of their potential eligibility to receive those tax credit dollars back. Our second program was advocacy for affordable housing. And that came out of a obviously, those are both topics of interest. But that particular one came out of a conversation with with our local sheriff’s office about the he was understaffed, and he couldn’t afford or he couldn’t bring on new staff people because they couldn’t afford to live in the community in which they served. So that started the conversation. So both of those items were topics that just kind of percolated because the employee retention tax credit language changed back in October, which gave more people eligibility. And so it again, it was something that just came up and we we picked it up and ran with.
Brandon Burton 12:30
Very good. So what let’s maybe focus on that first to integrate retention tax credits. So I’m curious, I have heard of a few chambers that have kind of dabbled in this or maybe partnered with another business in the community to to share, you know, what those benefits are, as people try to, you know, claim those tax credits. So how did you take that approach to educating your members and getting that information out there?
Hope Kennedy 13:01
Well, first, you have to be educated yourself. So I had to educate myself, I found a an attorney who is a tax attorney. So obviously she was in the state of Mississippi and we had some mutual friends and got really educated on the the topic. As the chamber, we are the leading voice of business and we became a trusted voice during the pandemic. And so our members knew that they could trust what information we provided to them, but it was imperative for myself to learn about the program, what is available, how you qualify, who qualifies? What are what are the stipulations and then how to avoid being scammed because obviously when there’s money floating around there scammers no matter what. So the employee retention tax credit, ERC is part of the Cares Act. And the legislation that was written for that was was pretty vague in the beginning, and they buttoned it up a little bit in October, which gave a lot of businesses the opportunity to apply for that. So the campaign around that is we did a very similar video. It was called chamber in the know. And we brought the tax attorney on to talk us through the process what ERC is where it came from a few of the FAQs. After we published that we put together a whole web page on our website that has FAQs from leading tax attorneys, obviously at the very top of it. It’s our legal statement that says this is not intended to be actual advice, please do your own research to find out but we were able to put links to the IRS we were able to link to we put out an email to our members in the financial sector, asking if they were filing these employee retention tax credits so that we could have a direct on our website of our members that were that were doing the filing for them. So it was really an educational component and a resource component that we that we wanted. In addition to that we did a survey of our membership to find out had people did people know about it? If so, did they get any funds, we were able to trace back in our community $3.5 million in returned funds from our efforts as the chamber. And we have members that were able to speak to that that said, if not for the chamber, we would not have received this 90 $1,000 That’s going to save us save our business for this year allow us to give those employees an increase. So it was an education, and it had dividends coming back.
Brandon Burton 16:11
Yeah, no, that is that is huge. So I really like how you guys reached out to some of those financial professionals members in your, in your organization to be able to see are you guys helping people navigate through, you know, reading these tax credits? Because I know there is there has been a lot of scams out there, right? Like you said, money’s flowing. People are out there trying to be opportunistic, and not good ways. So being able to have a trusted partner of sorts to be able to refer people to is huge. I’m curious, just for other chambers listening, as you reached out to those accounting professionals, what kind of response did you get were several of them already involved in helping with that. And
Hope Kennedy 16:55
they were there, there’s a few companies that that now we’re focusing on it, because it is the topic du jour, it does have a shelf life. So I would tell everybody, if you’re going to promote this in your community, get to it right now. You feel free to use our website and use our information. It’s there for anybody to r&d, rip off and duplicate. Because it is something for the business community, our our tax professionals, some were only doing it for their current clients. Some were because they already had their books, it’s a little bit of a process, you’re filing an amendment on your employment taxes from 20, sir to q3, and four of 20. And then 2021. So it’s, it’s a little bit of a process. One of our members focus specifically on that. And so they were they’ve been able to make some proprietary systems back office systems where it’s pretty streamlined. So in addition to that information, we gave those members a platform to talk face to face with our members to educate them and inform them. So essentially, we somewhat endorsed the these folks to to do to get their money back. Yeah. From from the government. It’s a it’s not a fast process. No, by no means but government process it is, but it’s there. And you know, we became a trusted source with that information.
Brandon Burton 18:36
Yeah, I like that. You do the due diligence, you get all the information, you find those trusted resources, you make those connections, you’re doing the things that a chamber does, right to a trusted source, make those connections be the convener. So I think that’s awesome, that three and a half million dollars coming back to the community is a huge benefit as well, I would say windfall, but I know that spread throughout the community, but it’s still it’s keeping that dollars in the community. It is. So any idea and you may or may not know numbers, but I’m curious of how many businesses participated in, you know, applying for the retention, credit and play retention. I.
Hope Kennedy 19:16
So it was hard for us to kind of quantify that. So we just took the list that we know about and took out just geographically. So I would say we probably had about 35 Okay, members that we know about that that did the application and that are receiving funds back there were some that still didn’t qualify. Some that were told that they didn’t qualify in the beginning, but they did after. And so that’s, you know, something we’re very proud of. So even if it was just $100 or whatever the case may be, we didn’t have any financial output whatsoever. It was just my staff time and it’s our website. So there was nothing for us to lose. And everything to game.
Brandon Burton 20:07
Yeah, no, that’s, that’s awesome. And I’ve heard that a lot as people go to apply, they either they may not think that they qualify, and then they ended up getting a good chunk of change back or the other way to where they go to apply and find out they don’t, they don’t qualify. But either way until you talk to that tax professional who can help you navigate through it, you don’t really know for sure. You don’t
Hope Kennedy 20:31
know. And there’s a few, you know, a few stipulations that you can do like a self assessment real quick. As long as you have w two employees, and they were on the payroll during that time. Even if you got PPP funds, you still qualify. So, you know, we it’s just an educational process and getting people informed. And I think that that’s what the Chamber’s can do. You don’t have to have a lot of money. You don’t have to have a big budget to make an impact. Yeah, listen, we’re staffing. We’re a staff of two. So we just say we have three and a half million dollars coming back to our community from maybe a couple hours worth of work. It’s a really big return on investment.
Brandon Burton 21:12
Absolutely. So let’s shift gears a little bit into the other program that you guys submitted on your applications about advocating for affordable housing. So you kind of talked a little bit about the origins of that, is there always departments looking to hire they can’t they don’t have the affordable housing to be able to bring people on. So how do you? What was your approach to attacking the big problem?
Hope Kennedy 21:36
Well, you know, it, it’s my approach to for everything is I need to educate myself, I’m definitely want to be able to speak intelligently on the topic or the subject. What what’s happening in our community is we are rapidly growing, we have so much coming so much under construction, our permitting department is six months behind because they can’t keep up with it. There’s a lot of rezoning that has to take place to be able to accommodate the rapid growth. The sheriff’s office liaison came to us and said we’ve got a problem. And we don’t know how to fix this. And if we don’t start thinking about it now, we’re we’re going to it’s going to be a housing crisis. Right now. It’s just an issue, but it’s going to be a crisis. At the same time, simultaneously, our county commission was putting a moratorium on multifamily housing units, which was extraordinarily counterproductive. So, again, this was not something that was on our radar as far as needing to take quick action. But we did, we took quick action, we went to the County Commission, we informed them of the unintended consequences of a moratorium. And what a moratorium actually says to developers and the outside world about your community is you don’t have it together. You put a moratorium on something and the big box stores, they’re going to pump the brakes, if not do a complete U turn and head for the hills. So we were fortunate enough to have some developers at our fingertips that could come and help us speak to it. They were simultaneously having issues with the county with their projects with their development. And so it just didn’t seem to be a cohesive understanding in our area of what comes first the the housing and the infrastructure and those those tax dollars to create the infrastructure. We’re at a 95% occupancy rate of our of all of our homes, all of our multifamily homes. So my message and I will tell you, it was not a pleasant experience doing this. I pretty much got got handed on a silver platter. I went to the commission and said that moratoriums were lazy. It was not a way to show the nation what we have going on here. A developer is not going to spend their millions of dollars coming into an oversaturated market. So let’s take the politics out of this and let’s let the market decide what it is we need. The Urban Land Institute stood up next to me and said, You are not an oversaturated market. In fact, you need X amount more than what you already have on the docket to be able to keep up with your growth. So again, it came back to being an edge Keishon and being an advocate for the developers and educating the community to, because the community was very much ill informed on multifamily housing units, multifamily housing units are vertical. So they’re not taking up all the land that these massive neighborhoods have that seem to be so appealing to everybody. And the demographics of our world are changing to where not everybody wants to have a great big, huge house and a pool and all of this to take care of. So, you know, we can’t cut off our nose to spite our face. And so educating the community about multifamily it’s not a bad word, it is not. And so we took that we took that ball and we ran with it. The The results were the moratorium was eventually lifted. We are back on track building more. And so will most certainly and it also elevated our chamber status for in the community, with with the elected officials on we will not sit by and let us make terrible mistakes that are going to have more consequences later and create a bigger problem.
Brandon Burton 26:20
Yeah, I love how you guys approach this before became a crisis. So you took it as an issue before it became a big problem in a crisis. But so I also I live in a fast growing community right now too. And so I see a lot of the same things that you’re identifying in the community that they’re seeing, and maybe getting a little worried that the multifamily housing comes and, you know, what do you do with the school district we can’t keep up or what to do with our roads or all these different there are issues that you need to address for sure. But multifamily housing is is a sure way to be able to help provide some affordable housing, and there’s always the people that don’t want it in their backyard. Right. So I like to know more how you educated the community.
Hope Kennedy 27:05
Honestly, it’s all about conversation. And it’s it’s the it’s the it’s the old adage of playing telephone or gossiping or somebody I spoke at a Rotary Club, and I said, I need y’all to calm down about this multifamily housing. Somebody had called me from the crowded said, they’re gonna turn into section eight housing. I was like, they are not going to turn it into section eight housing was like, do you just educate yourself Be informed before you open your mouth? To talk about things I say the the, the most dangerous people are the uninformed, the ones that just felt out opinions, and we all have them. We all have them. But it honestly was just conversational. And starting to get that, that turn that shift in thinking of? Hey, did you guys know that the majority of nurses that serve at the hospital live in apartments? Right? So it’s just that, you know, they don’t, they’re very busy, they don’t want to keep a house, they want to have access to our shopping in our restaurants. It’s not turning into section eight.
Brandon Burton 28:27
They want to spend money here and your businesses. Yeah,
Hope Kennedy 28:30
that’s right. And but they don’t want to live in their house. So the times are changing?
Brandon Burton 28:36
Yeah, that’s good. I think you guys have taken a great approach on that. And it’s it’s a topic that I know a lot of communities struggle with, and being able to have those those conversations and you guys, you know, may very well set another template here that other communities could look at and see. How did how did the North Tampa Bay chamber address this issue? And how can we adapt this to our own community.
Hope Kennedy 28:59
But one thing I just want to reiterate brainon is we don’t have to have a lot of money to make a difference. Yes, any programs that you’re doing at your chamber, they do not have to be expensive, they don’t have to be put on a slick sheet of paper and you check it off and all your metrics, all of that. No, the the the, the chambers that are so effective, are those that can see what their community needs and and make things happen and you gather a few like minded people, and you can most certainly move at all. Without having a lot of money or a lot of staff. You can be influential as a chamber.
Brandon Burton 29:43
Absolutely. That is such a an important key to hammer home. And as we start to wrap things up here and maybe that plays into this, but I was going to ask if you have any tip or action item for listeners who would like to take their chamber up to the next level. What might You I have to offer that
Hope Kennedy 30:03
might my tip would be inform yourself of what the process is. Because it is. So doing it two years in a row, I’m now going to carve out the whole month of May, or actually yes, May to take No, actually it was April, the whole month of April, because you have to submit by May to work on this project, it is very rewarding. But look at the finalists, or I think they’ll put the winners application up on ACC review that look at the application itself. And see if you want to start putting yourself in that that position to be able to apply, understand the the Horizon Report from ACC, and how that that report now I think is probably seven or eight years old, at least, and how futuristic it was, then it’s spot on for the times now and the changing of our, our demographics as a community or as a nation as a whole, to just really be in the know about your chamber, and how you make a difference within your community. My programs and events are not going to look like anybody else’s programs and events. So don’t don’t compare yourself or try to emulate anybody else. Just do what’s right for your community.
Brandon Burton 31:30
Yeah, no, that’s that is a great tip. I like asking everyone, as we look to the future of chambers, how do you see the futures of chambers of commerce and their purpose going forward?
Hope Kennedy 31:43
Well, if you don’t adapt and evolve, you’re going to die. Quite frankly, I’m seeing a lot of chambers that are losing their, their their luster and their gusto because they’re not changing and adapting to their, the needs of their community with technology with ease of access to information, it chambers are the future, they’ll they’ll be the same at the core of of promoting a thriving community. But it, you have to change, you have to change and adapt, also showing your businesses that they can to just being that leader in that space and the business community is vital. And chambers are needed. Now more than ever, it’s not that we’re not gonna, that we’re not needed, we must certainly have a place in every single community. It’s just figuring out what your your niche is going to be. But if you do not evolve and adopt and kill those sacred cows, you’re you’re gonna be spinning your wheels and not moving that needle.
Brandon Burton 32:52
That’s right. I think that’s a great vision of the future. And I think I see you applying that counsel as well as I can see chambers who get hyper focus on the next event, the next luncheon or whatever that that big event is, if you’re too hyper focused, you may miss these bigger things that need attention, like helping your your businesses get this employee retention credit or to focus on the housing issues in your community. So keep an open mind and be willing to adapt and not be so hyper focused on what you’ve always done. Very good.
Hope Kennedy 33:30
Yep. Great words. Great words.
Brandon Burton 33:33
So I hope I like given you have an opportunity to share any contact information for listeners who may want to reach out and connect with you, it’d be the best the best way for them to do that.
Hope Kennedy 33:46
Our website has every piece of information on there, it’s NorthTampaBayChamber.com case, it couldn’t be any longer. My I’m right there on the below the fold, and you can reach out to me there directly. I’m very active on the social media Facebook chamber page. There. I like to pay it forward and give out advice. I’ve asked questions there as well. But you know, we’re all we’re all here together. So please feel free to call (813-994-8534) me. And I’m happy to help.
Brandon Burton 34:27
All right, well, I will get your information in the show notes for this episode and make it nice and easy to find. But again, help I just I wanted to congratulate you and your team and the work that you guys are doing and being selected as a chamber they are finalists for two years in a row. So best of luck to you guys and look forward to seeing what happens.
Hope Kennedy 34:50
Thank you so much. I look forward to seeing you in Salt Lake City.
Brandon Burton 34:54
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