Welcome to the Business Voice - the monthly newsletter for Portland's Business District Associations. To unsubscribe, use the link at the bottom of the page or use the Send-A-Friend link to forward it.

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APNBA Officers
Officers elected at the April 24th annual meeting for 2006 - 2007 are:

President	Patrick Donaldson	Hollywood Boosters
Vice President/Treasurer	Jean Baker	Division/Clinton
Secretary	Joice Taylor	North/Northeast

Executive Committee The executive committee transacts business during the months there is no board meeting. The committee consists of the officers and those elected for 2006 - 2007. They are Past President Rob Mawson, Peggy Anderson of Nob Hill, Ken Turner of 82nd (Avenue of Roses) and Roger Jones.

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VISIONPDX
The APNBA is contacting business associations to schedule focus groups to discuss the mayor's visioning questions. The meeting takes about an hour and poses four questions. Members who cannot attend the focus meetings will be able to respond through the Internet or through a 4-page form, which will be available to business associations. For more information, contact info@apnba.com or VISIONPDX.

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Marketing Grant
East Portland Chamber of Commerce was awarded $2,000 for a direct mail project introducing community businesses to EPCC and asking for membership. The chamber had the postcards professionally prepared and printed, purchased mailing addresses and phone numbers for over 4,000 businesses in North, Northeast, East, and Southeast Portland. The postcards were bulk mailed the third week of November and followup phone calls in January. Positive results were presenting a professional image to over 4,000 small businesses, and demonstrating that professionalism to the EPCC members. EPCC received five responses to the mailing.

East Portland Chamber of Commerce carefully analyzed the project and came to these conclusions:

• Relying on volunteers on a project where timing is critical is probably not a good approach. Using volunteers to design the postcard and make the followup calls made it difficult to control project timing. Delays caused the mailing to go out just before Thanksgiving and followup calls were delayed a further six weeks because of the holidays.
• The project should have been done in a series of small mailings so followup calls could be made promptly. A 4,000 item mailing made it impossible to make timely followup calls with volunteer help.
• Over printing is not a bad thing. The chamber's membership committee is using the final 1,000 postcards for a series of direct sales calls in specific business districts.

Coming Events
May 11: Second Thursday Music Walk on Mississippi Avenue between Skidmore and Fremont. Music, entertainment and open houses.

May 12: Party On...Hawthorne, Chelsea Ballroom, 9th and Hawthorne. Reese Prouty, 503.236.8878

May 13: St. Johns Parade, Lombard Avenue in St. Johns, Gary Boehm, 503.286.1312.

May 20: Gateway Community Fair and Parade, NE 111th and Halsey, Fred Sanchez, 503.256.3910.

May 20 - 21: Alberta Art Hop, Alberta Street from MLK JR to 33rd, Donna Gaurdino, 503.281.9048.

May 25: Last Thursday on Alberta Street.

Check the Events page on for others.

Mention your event here - Contact the Editor for more information.

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Photo credits:
Nancy Chapin, The Support Group