OPINION PIECE- Hillsboro Herald Editor
In a move that has legal implications and is befuddling many locals, the former Hillsboro Chamber of Commerce has officially been rebranded as the Washington County Chamber of Commerce. The Hillsboro New Times ran a story this morning about the change. The Herald reached out to Deanna Palm of the Hillsboro Chamber with the following questions:
1) For the record can you give us a statement about why this is happening and the benefits? Is it a done deal?2) Does the name change need approval from the National Chamber of Commerce?3) Being the Hillsboro nut that I am I do not understand why we want to lose our brand and water it down … this seems like yet another historical revision of the hard-earned Hillsboro brand.Please give me your perspective… I will be posting an article on Wednesday for the Hillsboro Herald.
Palm answered that I could refer to previous statements released. I do not see the answers to my questions in these previous releases. So I consider them unanswered.
The name change is the latest in a disturbing trend of organizations and others trying to use the Hillsboro Brand to further their own agendas. Yes, the budget of the Hillsboro chamber was/is limited by how many members they can generate. The renaming is going to allow this group to grow its membership by up to 6,000 businesses. The statement given to the News-Times indicates that the current members want more regional and state influence, or power as it were.
“The Washington County Chamber says it is seeking to use the new name to amplify members’ voices at the county and state levels, as well as bring in new members from unincorporated Washington County.”
This decision has enraged Chambers of Commerce in Beaverton, Forest Grove, Cornelius, North Plains, Tualatin, and others. Leading up to this unilateral name change there was a failed and rushed move to place DeAnna Palm in the Director’s role at both Beaverton and Hillsboro simultaneously. In what now appears to have been some sort of internal power struggle, the Beaverton Chamber pulled out amid accusations that a hostile work environment and lack of transparency ensued right after Palm arrived.
Here is the definition of a Chamber of Commerce is:
A chamber of commerce is a voluntary partnership of businesses and professionals working together to build a healthy economy and improve the quality of life in a community.
The former Hillsboro Chamber has this mission statement:
To promote business prosperity and a healthy, equitable, inclusive and diverse community by providing information, services and advocacy for our members.
No doubt the Hillsboro Chamber has been known for that. Maybe power and influence and having more of it have become more important than actually serving the people, community, and businesses of Hillsboro? It sure looks like it.
Hillsboro is a fantastic City- a powerful, fun, successful, vibrant City. Our brand is hard work. Honesty. Success. Creativity. It is a brand that begins with the Welcome to Hillsboro sign on the edge of town. It is added to as one sees our parks, and our schools and enhanced when passing by high-tech centers, hospitals, hotels, and the lush fields that surround us. Our historic homes and downtown speak to our days as the County seat and the birthplace of the Pacific NW becoming part of the United States. Yes, thanks to Colonel Joe Meek and others, we now fly the stars and stripes and not the Union Jack. Our brand is a very Hillsboro Brand, and many of you and I will stand and fight to preserve it.
Here is my message to the former Hillsboro Chamber of Commerce. Good Riddance. If all of you good people ( I mean that) do not like our name and affiliation with our City – pack up and move along. If you would rather represent the entire County, then go do that. Washington County as an entity has long tried to take credit for Hillsboro’s successes. In the 40 years I have been in business here, I have seen that again and again. All the while, it was the business people of Hillsboro that earned that brand, did the heavy lifting, and created the success. Yes, the county helped along the way, but it has also profited greatly from tax revenues, etc. I was a member of the Chamber, something that is expected when you are a local Realtor and business person. This name change is not only idiotic; it displays misplaced goals and objectives. If the decades of work promoting Hillsboro were not enough for the staff and supporters, they could have moved on to new positions at the County or State.
Hillsboro and our businesses need a Chamber to represent us. Watering down what we need and how we brand and promote ourselves will not help us. Representation of both the entire County and the City can not be accomplished by this foolish name change. I do not believe it can be accomplished under any circumstances. While a Washington County Chamber seems like a noble and viable thing, don’t try to convince us that it is somehow extra good for Hillsboro. It most certainly can not be.
Let me close with two thoughts. Chambers of Commerce are just one way for businesses to support each other. The Hillsboro Downtown Partnership has been a big help for the businesses in the historic area. It is in a position to grow and to obtain support from the City of Hillsboro. There has already been talk of HDP growing City wide, but this move will really make some waves, and I welcome that. That group is all about Hillsboro and only Hillsboro. That is what a Chamber of Commerce should do- carry the flag for the City they represent.
Lastly, there is a nifty 11 Step Guide of how to start a Chamber of Commerce. Maybe it is time for a new group or splinter group to form the Greater Hillsboro Chamber of Commerce or the Real Hillsboro Chamber of Commerce. Looks easy enough to do, that is for sure. So what the hell, who wants to take that up?
This is a foolish move- it really is. And to all of your other towns with local Chambers promoting your brands, I say God Speed. I apologize to you as well, on behalf of our City. This is not fair to you, and I encourage you to do what you must to protect your memberships and organizations. In the end, I believe that the VERY fine people who led the Hillsboro Chamber forward these past many years have simply made a mistake. Dropping the name of our fine City is a choice you made, and while I am only one person, I think many agree with my sentiments. This is a very un-Hillsboro thing you have done and only time will tell if you will have to answer for it.
As a long time Forest Grove Business person I also have wondered what the Hillsboro Chamber was thinking. I served as the President of the Forest Grove Chamber many years ago and would have written a strongly worded letter to the Hillsboro chamber had this happened on my watch. I think it is presumptuous to assume this chamber can speak for all the other cities in Washington County. And if the plan is to attempt to cherry pick members from Beaverton, Forest Grove, Cornelius, Tigard, Gaston and Banks then I think the reach must be to stroke someone’s ego.
I was happy to be part of transferring parts of Pacific University to Hillsboro while I was Chairmen of the Board. The combining of Tuality/OHSU the City of Hillsboro and Pacific has helped all three achieve successes that would not have been possible without working together. But this “Washington County Chamber” has none of that feel of working together.
I would hope saner heads prevail.
Seems to me, if the Hillsboro Chamber of Commerce renaming itself for “Washington Country” is rather misguided. If the members that voted for rename really want to help other non-incorporated areas, I would suggest they look at the model Washington County Cooperative Library Services. Perhaps a “Washington County Cooperative Chamber of Commerce” might be in order.
Agreed that renaming local Chambers into a County wide entity is very misguided. Local chambers speak for the local residents and for people visiting, and new residents to know the town or city.
Let’s keep our individual Chambers intact.
Thanks, Lissa for your comments. The decision has been made. Maybe things will change –
We appreciate your reading and hope you will continue to do so.
Dirk
I agree with the above comments. Hillsboro has a unique history and heritage. We need to have our own distinct Hillsboro Chamber of Commerce to continue to support our business community, and all of the residents.
What’s the difference between the Hillsboro chamber grabbing for more leverage county wide and the Downtown partnership grabbing for more leverage city wide? You said you condemned one while encouraging the other. Isn’t that the same move just on different scales?
After spending a few days in Downtown Beaverton, I reached some conclusions about Hillsboro and its now-departed Chamber of Commerce. Hillsboro’s neighboring communities view their relationships with Hillsboro as symbiotic. Small businesses like Crystal Heart, Insomnia Coffee, Retro Game Trader, and AVA Roasteria see the relationship between their Beaverton and Hillsboro locations as symbiotic. The same can be said for Pacific University’s campuses here and in Forest Grove. The locations exist to benefit multiple communities, and each community “wins” by welcoming them in.
Hillsboro has developed a winner-take-all attitude that encompasses both downtown businesses and uptown industry. It treated Reser’s move here as a “win” for Hillsboro, when it was simply a means of preserving local jobs. It isn’t happy that Beaverton small business opens locations here: It wants those places all to itself. Hillsboro wants to create a rat race where there isn’t one and desperately craves importance, as if it isn’t already the county seat. There’s a deeply ingrained inferiority complex among certain members of its hierarchy that don’t allow for rational, long-term thinking.
It wants its version of Decarli, but does nothing to woo chefs. It wants a cohesive, walkable downtown with closed-off dining plazas and anchor businesses, but doesn’t do the small things that help Beaverton and Forest Grove attract those businesses. It wants to be a college town, but doesn’t want to share the credit with an actual college town.
Forest Grove and Beaverton’s downtowns are still very much works in progress, but they’re attracting the kind of businesses (cart pods, food halls, tasting rooms, breweries… even tourist shops) that will make them well-trod finished products. The Hillsboro Chamber of Commerce not only failed to do that downtown (despite help from the HDP and numerous heavily invested business owners), but created commerce without cohesion. Downtown and Orenco may as well be on different planets. Much of the metro area thinks the 185th Street businesses are in Beaverton. Commerce on TVH is walled off from the rest of the city by unwalkable distance, poorly developed roadways, and acres of ill-placed auto dealerships.
The Hillsboro Chamber failed because it had no idea how to conduct urban commerce. It did a little happy dance when there was empty acreage near nothing else that it could plunk an island of amenities on, and perhaps that’s what makes the shift to “Washington County” so appealing. That isn’t great for the little commercial fiefdoms it left behind, but perhaps smaller groups downtown, in Orenco, along 185th, in Amberglen, in South Hillsboro, etc. can better help their areas grow without declaring war on neighboring areas just looking to help.
I have to applaud this. You are a wonderful and accomplished writer. Anyone can learn to tap the keys and craft sentences and grammar. But you are so in tune with what I am sensing- you are a relative newcomer and I am a part of the now “old guard”. But you are right! The people at the top of our power structures are winner take all, and they do that while they smile and pretend we are all part of some warm and fuzzy neighborly city. We are not- well some of us (the real people who live here) are in touch. But as a City, we are not. I agree- Hillsboro is losing ground on the livability front to Forest Grove and ceding some hard-earned credits back to good old Beaverton. It is like watching a passive-aggressive bully walk down the halls and pretend he loves everyone even as he plots to crush them. That stench rises no matter how hard that bully tries to hide it.
The other thing is that I was applauded for my article by many Hillsboro-centric businesses. But some of the those you mentioned who loved the move, told me I was wrong. They all have businesses in both Hillsboro and Beaverton and are not specifically loyal to either.
It is time for the real of people to stand up and defend her, lest she become an extension of METRO and not a city at all.
Thanks, Jason
Dirk