Archive for March 7th, 2010

From Rhonda Bodfield – AZ Star -A group formed to oust the president of the Tucson Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce circulated survey results to the chamber’s board last week, showing 21 percent of respondents said being a member helped their business.

The survey, which went out to the chamber’s 1,500 members, received roughly 140 responses.

Among the findings:

• 75 percent said the chamber didn’t promote their business;

• 23 percent felt the membership fee was a good value;

• 57 percent felt the chamber did not have strong political influence in local government; and

• 27 percent rated the Tucson business climate as good or fair.

Eric Ruden, owner of Essential Pest Management, is the founder of the Tucson First Coalition, which was formed to demand new leadership at the chamber.

He said packets were mailed Tuesday to the executive committee and the board of directors. The group is asking the board for a face-to-face meeting in the next two weeks to air grievances about President Jack Camper and the business climate in general.

Camper countered that the group should have done more to work out its grievances before its splashy public opposition campaign. “It’s a shame they decided to attack the chamber and its leadership before asking for an audience with our board of directors,” Camper said. “We’re just going to continue to run our chamber. We think we’re doing well and we’re continuing on.”

Ruden said he was a chamber member for two years until he gave up his membership in December. Other members of the opposition group’s steering committee are Christine Glanz of Computers, Etc.; Jesse Lugo of Lugo Enterprises; Keith Cooper of AlphaGraphics; former City Council candidate Shaun McClusky of Rincon Ventures; and Gene Hildreth of Allen & Young.

“You join the chamber because you feel you might have networking opportunities, establish contacts and help grow your business,” Ruden said. “But it’s a waste of time. The feedback I’ve got is you don’t get anything out of it.”

He said Albuquerque, Las Vegas and Salt Lake City have more active chambers with more political involvement. Tucson’s chamber, he said, seems more focused on social networking. And while his group lauds the charitable activities conducted by the chamber, it says those should be secondary to fulfilling the needs of the business community.

Ruden said the effort has already produced some results, with the chamber taking a “more active interest” in tackling the city’s sign code regulations, and the board now meeting more often. “That’s starting to show more involvement by the board, so even if we don’t get everything we want, at least they’re doing some of the things we want,” he said.

Camper said his organization has been working on the sign code for a year. “It’s just disingenuous, what they’re doing. They just say whatever they want,” he said.

Chamber board members reached for comment had not yet received the information packets.

Sundt Construction’s Ray Bargull, a member of the executive committee, said he couldn’t comment on the substance, “but in general, I think we’re interested in hearing any information that would help us do a better job.”

Richard Underwood, of AAA Landscape and a member of the board of directors, said he’d be willing to sit down with the group as well. “The first salvo from those guys was a good thing because it made us look at what we’re doing,” he said. “You can always learn from criticism. So yeah, I’m glad they’ve done the survey and I welcome seeing the results. I’m not going to reject it out of hand.”

Contact reporter Rhonda Bodfield at 573-4243 or rbodfield@azstarnet.