{"id":72941,"date":"2017-01-13T19:51:55","date_gmt":"2017-01-14T02:51:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/mceda-announces-business-and-at-large-members\/"},"modified":"2017-01-14T02:51:55","modified_gmt":"2017-01-14T02:51:55","slug":"mceda-announces-business-and-at-large-members","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/mceda-announces-business-and-at-large-members\/","title":{"rendered":"MCEDA announces business and at-large members"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

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The Montezuma Community Economic Development Association added two business and one individual representative to its board of directors on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

Empire Electric Association and KSJD Radio, represented by Clint Rapier and Rob Dobry, filled the two open business positions in the association. Greg Kemp joined as an individual.<\/p>\n

The board discussed several projects they plan to be involved in this year, including collaborating with the county in its efforts to provide internet services.<\/p>\n

MCEDA\u2019s board of directors has 15 seats, which must be filled by seven business representatives, representatives from the county\u2019s five governments and three individual citizens. Two business seats and two at-large seats were open at the beginning of this year. A business application by Colleen Donley, representing The Journal, was delayed because she was absent, and so board members picked Rapier and Dobry. Because an individual applicant dropped out, the board still has one position left to fill.<\/p>\n

Kemp previously served the board, and has attended MCEDA meetings since the organization formed in 2007.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m interested enough to be a regular attendee, and so having status as a board member, I feel, would be something I\u2019d be very proud of,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Rapier, who represents Empire, has been with the company for about two years. On Tuesday, he emphasized his experience operating small businesses.<\/p>\n

\u201cI understand the ups and downs of small businesses and startups,\u201d Rapier said. \u201cI\u2019m interested not only in my occupation at Empire, but also what we have in new opportunities for businesses here.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dobry, director of corporate support at KSJD, said he believes becoming a board member will benefit his company and MCEDA.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think I could definitely help some with growth in membership of the organization,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd I think MCEDA, especially with the internet, has a lot of options to do a lot of good in Montezuma County in the next few years, so I want to be a part of that.\u201d<\/p>\n

One of MCEDA\u2019s biggest undertakings this year will be helping the county\u2019s fiber project, which is designed to provide more reliable internet services to homes and businesses. Chelsea Jones, the organization\u2019s part-time economic development specialist, is also a member of Connect 4, which is working on the broadband project.<\/p>\n

The board also voted to approve MCEDA\u2019s official status as a program of the Region 9 Economic Development District of Southwest Colorado. Becoming a Region 9 program will allow MCEDA to hire employees and provide insurance through the nonprofit organization. Chairman Dave Hart said this is the next step toward achieving nonprofit status for MCEDA.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis allows us to move forward without having to put a lot more administrative stuff on our already strapped part-time person,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Electric and KSJD Radio join board<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":72942,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[431,21,13,1269],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-72941","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-business-general","tag-cortez","tag-frontpage-lead","tag-nonprofits"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72941","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=72941"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72941\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/72942"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=72941"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=72941"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=72941"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=72941"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}