As you can imagine, it has been a pretty busy nine weeks since myself and BJ Beaver landed on the scene to begin working on the PGS initiatives. If we haven’t met yet, I look forward to getting the opportunity to do so. I could not be more delighted to have the great opportunity to lead this amazing team and learn from all of you (our true partners).In the first few weeks, we have written a strategic plan for the foundation and executed sub-committee meetings to refine those plans by focus area (pillars as we call them). Once the board has endorsed the finished strategic plan, we will be sure all investors get a copy of it to review.

We have met with our economic development partners from the City of Myrtle Beach, Horry county, State legislators, NESA, and our new Congressman, Russell Fry. We have forged a partnership with Horry County Schools, Coastal Carolina University and Horry Georgetown Technical College. We have already partnered with the HTC eMYRge Hub and are working closely with the Downtown Alliance team. We have met with multiple employers to hear their workforce challenges, business owners to understand their headwinds and local talent development teams to identify their needs. We are also partnering with the SC Department of Commerce on multiple fronts.

I would call these first few weeks “boot camp”. The opportunities to learn are endless and the needs of the Grand Strand community are beginning to become clearer every day.

Through it all, one thing has been made crystal clear to me. This is an incredibly hopeful time for the Grand Strand. We should all feel good about the way our county, city, state and local leadership are all working together to advance the prosperity of our community.

A Little Bit About Our Team:         

Partnership Grand Strand is a small but “mighty” team. We will be a team of 5 individuals when we are complete, but as of today we have BJ Beaver (responsible for our Workforce / Talent Development), James Toy (Responsible for our Policy and Infrastructure Pillar) and Marianne Joy (Our Administrative Assistant who hold all things together for us). We hope to hire for our final position in the next few weeks. This new person will lead our Prosperity pillar that will focus on small business retention/growth and building entrepreneurial strength in the Grand Strand.

Marketing News:

We are super excited to share that PGS had a wonderful article written about us in the Grand Strand Magazine in February. 

This article does a wonderful job of describing our Foundation initiatives as well as the impact we will have on the community. https://grandstrandmag.com/feature/transformative_growth

We are working on some marketing campaigns to help drive increased awareness. Our marketing message will center around the notion that “You can build a life you’ll love right here in the Grand Strand”.  This fundamental idea will be at the core of multiple campaign initiatives that are currently in the works. 

If you have not yet discovered our Facebook and LinkedIn pages, please do so via the links at the bottom of this newsletter. These will serve to keep you updated on all current information surrounding our foundation. 

Our communication plans include publishing this newsletter at least every other month. We will always include mini updates from each pillar, as well as upcoming events and initiatives that we want you to be sure to attend.

eMYRge Epic Evening Events Series

Welcome to the HustleBeach Podcast



Hosts Neil Willis & Barb Royal recorded the podcast from the HTC Aspire Hub in Myrtle Beach's brand new Arts and Innovation District. HustleBeach interviews some of the most successful and interesting founders and leaders and those moving to the Grand Strand. Join Barb and Neil for fun, informative interviews with the area's biggest go-getters who are hustling every day to make Myrtle Beach a thriving, innovative business community. 

The first two episodes drop on Friday, March 24th with interviews featuring Paul Reynolds, the Godfather of the Scalable Startup Ecosystem in Myrtle Beach and Myrtle Beach Mayor Brenda Bethune.

Here is the spotify link with the intro episode:

https://open.spotify.com/show/6TiizE1QyOkLSQIZ1Wc7ss?si=a46ffac3a5434ceb

BJ Beaver, Workforce Talent Manager



Workforce Trends

Myrtle Beach is currently seeing higher unemployment rates (4.9%) than comparable cities Charleston (2.8%) and Greenville (3%). While the Grand Strand is known for its cyclical employability trends, we are currently facing an interesting metric of only .45 jobs available for unemployed job seekers. What is most fascinating is the number of women who are currently not in the workforce. Current analytics show that 56.25% of unemployed workers in Horry county, Georgetown county, and Williamsburg county are women. Theories that are contributing to this increase are the increasing cost of childcare, and lack of flexibility with employment schedules.

We’re excited to Announce our New Youth Employability Skills Program

in partnership with the SC Dept. of Commerce

Youth Employability Skills Program (Y.E.S.) - The Y.E.S. program will consist of an employability workshop that will cover topics such as soft skills, resume/application building, and mock interviews for youth participants. The goal is to upskill youth participants and have a group of employer partners committed to guest speak and/or provide a guaranteed interview for the participants who complete the workshop. This strategy will be tactical in the sense of the workshops will be delivered in the neighborhoods where the participants live and the job opportunities from the employer partners will be in relative walking distance or short commute to the participant's home. Students will receive a certificate of completion that they can add to their resume or highlight on a job application.



Job Fair 101- Employer Training

Join us at the Chamber on April 11 at 9 a.m. for Job Fair 101. We will discuss best practices for recruiting and engaging talent during a job fair.



Arts and Innovation District in the News!

The Sun News posted an article this week about Myrtle Beach's Art District. Read on why the city expects the Arts and Innovation District to reposition Myrtle Beach as a center of culture and commerce. Click here to read more: https://www.myrtlebeachonline.com/news/local/article272977725.html#storylink=cpy

Affordable Housing Goals

The City of Myrtle Beach has "set a goal to build 5,670 new housing units — about half being rentals — through 2033 and recently inked a first-of-its kind deal with Habitat for Humanity of Horry County. The agency will spend the next 18 months developing a workforce housing program expected to include the creation of a local trust fund to encourage residential construction."

Read more at: https://www.myrtlebeachonline.com/news/local/article272637738.html#storylink=cpy

News from Myrtle Beach Downtown Alliance

James Toy, Public Policy Manager

Bits and Pieces

Wrapping-up this month’s legislative update, here’s a few more highlights from the proposed budget: $261 million in funding to boost teacher pay and aid classrooms, $84 million to freeze tuition rates at South Carolina colleges and universities, and a phased-in cut to the state’s top income tax rate.

BRITTAIN RESORTS

Clay Brittain, Chairman of the Board, Brittain Resorts

In early 2022, Brittain Resorts & Hotels was happy the join the Myrtle Beach Area Chamber of Commerce (the “MBACC”), the City of Myrtle Beach, and Coastal Carolina University in leading an effort to identify and address critical issues facing the greater Myrtle Beach area.

Our decision to make that commitment grew out of the MBACC’s sustained efforts, beginning in 2018, to identify and tackle important community wide issues that were limiting the financial success and prosperity of its members, as well as negatively impacting communities in the Myrtle Beach Area. Basing its plan on collection of good data, the MBACC launched an effort to conduct more than 100 one-on-one interviews with local business and community leaders and subject matter experts. The MBACC commissioned area surveys and group studies. It analyzed and combined the best recommendations from more than 35 existing reports, studies, and plans, including hundreds of pages of solid data and research. Our Chamber reviewed five of the nation’s best peer chambers with plans tackling similar problems in their own communities; and it conducted 12 program refinement meetings and 36 additional one-on-one feasibility study interviews to get feedback on the plan and test community financial support.

The result was the decision to create, fund and launch a new MBACC Foundation – Partnership Grand Strand. One of the critical issues identified by the MBACC was the decades of disinvestment in Myrtle Beach’s downtown and oceanfront. The heart of our city has aged and needs revitalization and redevelopment. Five years ago, recognizing the same problem, the City of Myrtle Beach proactively launched its “Arts and Innovation District”, efforts that are now turning the tide on disinvestment and underperformance in our downtown. The decision by the City to face these issues head on gave us the courage to begin to think proactively about our prospects downtown.

It became clear the continued success and growth of our Company was tied to the City’s efforts to revitalize downtown. We learned that healthy downtowns drive city economies, that they make an outsized contribution to tax revenue, and that downtowns are central to a city’s identity, image, and brand. Taking a hard look at our long range plan for continued success, we saw how closely our success was tied to the giving our downtown its proper identity, image, and brand. As we were making our final plans to support Partnership Grand Strand, Coastal Carolina University, a regional leader in research and learning, lent its support to the campaign. That was all that was needed to lead us to conclude that our Company should be an early and strong supporter of the effort. We are in for Partnership Grand Strand and very happy with its progress to date. 

MBACC ANNUAL MEETING

The Myrtle Beach Area Chamber of Commerce is celebrating 85 years of serving the Grand Strand at the Annual Meeting on April 13.

MBACC will honor distinguished businesses and individuals for their accomplishments over the last year. These awards recognize community efforts that reflect the mission of the chamber of commerce, which is to promote, protect and improve the business community.

Silver investors and above will receive a VIP invitation as part of your sponsorship. All other investors, please click here to order your tickets: https://web.myrtlebeachareachamber.com/events/2023Annual%20Meeting-7501/details

Check out these new businesses now open!

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