Tom Henihan
Express Staff
@SmokyRiverExprs
McLennan and District Chamber of Commerce held its AGM on Wednesday February 10, at McLennan town offices.
At that meeting a new board was appointed with Daniel Labrecque (President), Louis Gagne (Vice President) and Danielle Drouin (Secretary/Treasurer).
The other directors are Avis Gagne, Chris (Christina) Jones, Annette Drouin, Daniel Drouin, John Nairn, Denise Valiquette, Gilbert Valiquette, Louis Sniezek, Jason Doris and Pieter de Wet.
The process of changing the McLennan Chamber’s name from the official “La Chambre de Commerce de McLennan” to “McLennan & District Chamber of Commerce” was initiated at last year’s AGM. However, changing the name of the chamber can be a protracted process as the members, who meet only 4 times a year, must approve these changes.
While following the name change procedure, it was discovered that the chamber was incorporated with Industry Canada in 1946 and the only filed bylaws were from that time and recorded in French. The chamber requested a full bylaw review and that review has been completed and accepted.
While requesting a larger territory, the McLennan and District Chamber discovered that the District of Donnelly Board of Trade and the Guy Chamber of Commerce still technically exist, as does La Chambre de Commerce de Falher. The McLennan Chamber will be requesting a dissolution of the Donnelly and Guy chambers as they have not been active for a great many years.
As Chambers of Commerce are registered federally with Industry Canada, they cannot avail of the same opportunities as other provincially registered societies. To offset this dilemma, McLennan and District Chamber of Commerce has taken steps to acquire dual registration with both the Federal Ministry of Industry Canada and the provincial Ministry of Service Alberta.
While all Chamber meetings are open to the public and members can attend and speak at each meeting, voting at the monthly Executive meetings is restricted to the board members. However, at the quarterly meetings any member can vote.
It is not required that a Chamber member be a business owner. If a person has an interest or concern with business, he or she can also be a member.
Chamber meetings are every second Wednesday of the month and the membership meetings are in February, May, August and November. The next quarterly membership meeting will be on May 11th. All meetings take place at the Town of McLennan Boardroom at 7pm.