2023-05-01 Economic Alliance updateEconomic Alliance update
May 1, 2023
1:31 p.m.
Present: Commissioner Swope, Commissioner Brummer, Commissioner Pollock, Richard DeBolt, Todd
Chaput, Amy Buzzard
Guest(s): Elizabeth Rohr
Recorder: Rieva Lester
Public comment: None.
Legislative: Richard DeBolt discussed bills that passed the state Legislature. He talked about Economic
Alliance’s (EA) work with the Dig Once project.
ARPA: Richard said EA will provide a stakeholders’ update during the May 5 Mayors’ Meeting.
Grants: Richard DeBolt and Amy Buzzard discussed EA’s efforts to secure grants for small businesses.
Richard said EA is working on an agriculture analysis to determine how to best help agriculture in the
region. Richard said EA is pursuing Bioeconomy Development Opportunity (BDO) Zone rating and is
working to draw an ingot manufacturer and a forest woods group to the area.
Tourism: Todd Chaput said the state tourism group gave a presentation the previous week about
partnering to develop destination marketing locally. Todd said the tourism website is being finalized and
that the Discover Lewis County is reaching out to Chehalis and Centralia regarding efforts to increase
tourism.
Events: Richard said Economist William Conerly will give a presentation at 1 p.m. May 17 at the Juice
Box in Centralia. Richard said a real estate forum is planned for Oct. 15 and a Hispanic Business forum is
planned for September.
The group discussed water rights and proposals being discussed regarding flood mitigation.
Meeting ended at 2:02 p.m.