As many of you know, we reached our $100,000 snowplow fundraising goal. We had 79 donors (and checks continue to come in) ranging from $10 to $10,000. THANK YOU to all who gave so generously. You made this happen and we will be recognizing all donors in the future.  

To update you, the Wyoming Department of Transportation will begin plowing through the East Gate this Monday (April 1st). The Park Service will continue their plowing efforts and (weather permitting) the East Gate will open to public traffic May 3. Jackson also raised funds for the South Gate, which will open on its normal schedule May 10. In addition, we continue to be in communication with Cooke City, MT in regards to opening the NE Gate before May 24.

Because of these efforts and the unique partnership between the Park Service, State of Wyoming and our community, there has been a significant amount of press coverage. Articles have appeared in national in publications such as the Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, and closer to home in the Cody Enterprise, Big Horn Radio Network, Powell Tribune, Yellowstone Gate and KURL-8. In addition the LA Times had a reporter in Cody this week and CBS National News is sending a team in next week to tell this story as well.

A final thanks to everyone who worked to make this possible including Cody Mayor Nancy Brown (who worked extensively behind the scenes with the Governor Matt Mead's office to finalize the details of this solution) city administrator Jenni Rosencranse and the Cody City Council, Senator Hank Coe (who was instrumental in getting this in front of Governor Mead), Governor Mead and his staff, Yellowstone Superintendent Dan Wenk and his staff, Diane Shober at the Wyoming Office of Tourism, the Wyoming Department of Transportation, the Cody Chamber board of directors, Chamber staff (especially Cathy Luthy and Liz Stuard), Claudia Wade with Park County Travel Council, the Park County Commissioners and our colleagues in Jackson.

If you missed our 113th Founders Day Fiesta last week, you missed a very nice evening at Olive Glenn. Catering was provided by Stewarts, music by Shuffle Buggy and wine by Buffalo Jump. We presented our annual awards which included:

        -  Co-Businesses of the Year: Webster Motors (Now Denny Menholt) for 75 years in business

and First Bank of Wyoming for 100 years in business

 

        -  Member of Year: Rob and Kelly Garrett, Big Idea Advertising

 

        -  Si & Corky Cathcart "Friend of Business" - Tara Kuipers, UW Extension Educator and

Kathy Crookshanks, Northwest College Training and Development

 

        -  Buffalo Bill Art Show and Sale "Golden Hammer" - outgoing chair Vickery Hall

Thanks to Chamber events coordinator Jill Osiecki Gleich for putting together this special evening.

Thanks to the Irma for Wednesday's Business After Hours. We had a great evening of food, drink and networking.

It's good to hear that the Buffalo Bill Center of the West (formerly the Buffalo Bill Historical Center) will be moving into one of the open downtown locations with a satellite store and information center. Also, congratulations to Wes and Melissa Allen (Sunlight Sports) for preparing to open a new store - SportsHQ (our newest member). We'll have a Business After Hours there next month.

Don't forget our next c2b (Cody Business Breakfast), Friday, April 5th from 7:30-8:30 a.m. at MoJoes. We've got a great core group that comes nearly every month. If you haven't had a chance to attend, please join us!

With snow plowing behind us, we're getting back to summer preparations and the re-launch of our visitor center. I'll have more information about that and a look at our new video in a future newsletter.

Our new event - Spring into Yellowstone, Cody Birding and Wildlife Festival - is really taking flight. We've got great tours, speakers, evening events and a trade show lined up for May 15-19. I'll share more soon, but think about special offers for attendees and help us roll out the red carpet for our guests.

Finally, if you've got news you want to share with the rest of the Cody business community, please send it to me. We want to recognize our members when they're expanding, adding new products, hiring new staff, celebrating promotions or awards or anything else that you think is newsworthy.

Thanks for supporting your Cody Chamber.

Scott Balyo

Executive Director

exec@codychamber.org