By Don Hay

President - Truro and District Chamber of Commerce

I work in the restaurant business with many younger adults and they heard that I was involved in the chamber. However they did not really understand very much about the organization.
One of my staff members congratulated me after seeing my picture in the paper but he did not understand the purpose of the chamber or my role.
I explained that the Truro Chamber is the third largest chamber in the province.  Its primary role is advocacy for the business community and as president I am charged with carrying out this role.
His next question of course was, “what does advocacy mean?”
So I explained the role of the chamber is to work with the three levels of government to promote the needs of the business community.
The chamber is vital. It is not government funded and therefore one of the few organizations that can objectively represent local business interests. The Chamber lobbies governments municipally, provincially and federally with issues such as:
Business Property tax (business owners currently pay rates 2.5 times higher rates than residential home owners), business income taxes, HST, employment insurance premiums, workers compensation rates (Nova Scotia has the second highest rates in Canada), and minimum wage rates.  As well any other issues chamber members need a united voice to represent their views.
I also mentioned to him that we have a board consisting of great local representatives and a staff who work hard on all chamber initiatives. 
Finally I told him the reality is that this chamber exists for its members who fully fund the organization.  We really want feedback to understand member needs so the chamber can function properly. 
This conversation was a real eye-opener for me that we need to be more relevant to young people who are working in our business community. The truth is that before I became a member of the board, if you had asked me, I would not have been able to tell you very much about this chamber or its function. There is a general lack of understanding of what the chamber’s role not just among (YA’s) young adults, but amongst the general population.  The chamber needs to become more relevant to the younger population, and by younger, I don’t just mean kids, but those who will be business owners in the future if not already.
After this conversation, I was optimistic with the local awareness of the Truro and District Chamber of Commerce.  However it is evident we need to present the chamber and its role more clearly.
We are currently working on a new rebranding initiative to address this with a new logo and slogan we hope to launch this spring.  We hope this will make the chambers role more transparent in the community.