A new organizational structure for a new Greater Parker Chamber?

We did have our breakfast meeting and came up with several ideas, areas of consensus, and assignments. Here's mine: to propose an early draft of an organizational structure for a new, expanded and unified organization serving Parker area businesses.

All ideas are open for discussion. Do feel free to leave comments here.

MISSION/PURPOSE: to build a strong and successful business community in and around the greater Parker area.

GOVERNING STRUCTURE: a board of 7 directors. The first board will probably be recruited, not "elected." But see below under "Elections" for more thoughts.

COMMITTEES. I would propose the following Standing Committees, each with its own leader or chair, and a vice or chair-elect. The idea here is to grow leadership capacity.

* Advocacy. This includes the monitoring of and participation in legislative and town council initiatives, procedures, and elections.
* Continuing Education and Networking. This highlights topics of interest to the membership, focusing on developing opportunities, trends, and challenges. It also provides the opportunity for members to promote their services to each other.
* Membership Development. This committee focuses on the recruitment, orientation, and management (in the sense of creating a directory, annually billing, tracking sponsorships, etc.) of potential members. This includes the Board.
* Marketing and Communications. This committee focuses on getting the news about Parker area businesses to outlying areas, either through direct advertising/promotion, and communicating regularly with existing members.
* Events. This is a significant volunteer management effort to staff various events outside continuing education.
* Mainstreet. While there are many commercial districts in the Parker area, "downtown" is one of the areas that has unique marketing appeal. This committee represents the interests and issues of historic Parker.
* Large scale initiatives. I'm not sure what best describes this one. The idea is that this group works with big developers to "package" major development initiatives, liable to significantly effect business growth.

ELECTIONS: elections sometimes do not result in the most qualified leaders. A suggestion: the board is composed of the chairs of the committees listed above. Those chairs are elected by members of the committees; all members must belong to at least one committee. This enables the Board to have direct understanding of key strategic efforts, and gain expertise on the issue. Since each committee should also have a board vice chair, or chair elect, the new Chamber builds mentoring into its structure. The second idea is that Boards are past chairs of the committees (not at first, obviously, but in the future).

FUNDING: the funding for most such organizations comes from...

* Membership dues. There could be a sliding scale based on the size of membership, or a negotiated contribution based on the perceived value. Thoughts?
* Government sponsorship. Historically, both the town and the county have contributed to either the chamber or the PEDC.
* Sponsorship. Many non-profits depends on the underwriting or sponsorship of some services from its members, in exchange for advertising.
* Events. Events provide funds. They also require a lot of manpower. I'd like to hear more about this; what's a sustainable level of unique events?
* Grants. To my knowledge, none of the organizations has pursued this much. But it might generate some additional revenue.

STAFF: lean times call for streamlined staff. In resetting the organization, it might be wise to limit the staff to executive director and clerical assistance.