November Meeting Not to be Missed

On behalf of the Winthrop Chamber of Commerce, please join us for a special event 6:00 pm, Tuesday November 13^th at the Barn for a “fireside chat.” This event will help kick off Winthrop’s celebration of forty years of western spirit and will continue through Christmas at the End of the Road, where we celebrate and honor the individuals, businesses and organizations that brought “western” to Winthrop. 

At the fireside chat, guests John Lester and Larry Higbee will provide engaging, interesting and informative perspectives on the pivotal chapter forty years ago, that made Winthrop what it is today.

Refreshments will be available beginning at 6pm and the fireside chat will start at 6:30 and conclude at 8:00 pm.

Join us for a celebration and a piece of Winthrop history!

This event will replace our normally scheduled November membership meeting on Thursday morning, November 8.

Meet and Greet Cary Condotta Oct. 24 at Lost River Winery

Lost River Winery will be hosting a meet and greet for State Representative Cary Condotta on Wednesday October 24^th at our tasting room.  The purpose of Cary’s visit is to talk with and hear from local business owners about their concerns.  He has been very helpful to us and our small winery association in Olympia and I am pleased to be able to host the event.

Thanks!

John Morgan

State Representative Cary Condotta meet and greet, October 24th.

Association of Washington Business “Legislator of the year”, 42^nd District State Representative Cary Condotta will be at the Lost River Winery Tasting room, 26 Highway 20 Winthrop, from 6:30 to 8:00 PM Wednesday October 24th. Representative Condotta is particularly interested in hearing from local business owners and discussing their concerns as well as legislative and regulatory policies that affect their businesses. Complimentary refreshments and wine tasting will be provided. Please contact John Morgan (509)429-1834for more information.

Summer! and the momentum keeps on going...

Apparently people of every size are coming to town along with those bikes.....3% Hotel Motel Tax for July was just posted and Winthrop again has broken a record.  This makes at least  4 of the past 9 months Winthrop has set record-breaking hotel motel tax gains.  Year-to-date Winthrop is poised to have it's best accommodation season in history.  3% revenue for Okanogan County hotels was also very strong for July and for the year-to-date.

We've got a good thing going

Our Winthrop Town Planner got this email the other day. It got us thinking...

How many of us really do know the history and events behind the Westernization?
And, it looks like every town struggles with change!  

Here's the email with a photo of our town "before" attached.....

Hi there: 

My husband and I were very fortunate to visit your fantastic town, quite unexpectedly, while driving from Seattle to Christina Lake, British Columbia, to visit our new grandson a couple of weeks ago.  We were very surprised by the fantastic planning and implementation of your Western-themed community, more so because my husband is a town councillor here in Bancroft, Ontario and involved in the active pursuit and often daunting challenge of promoting economic development in a rural area.   We are in a prime tourist area, with spectacular scenery, 100's of clean lakes and many adventure activities, at the crossroads of 2 busy highways leading to "cottage country", just one hour away from the well-renowned Algonquin Park. We have a very expanded population in the summer and on winter weekends (due to the popularity of snowmobiling in the area). Our history is based in mining and lumber, in fact we are the Mineral Capital of Canada, having more indigenous minerals than any other area in the country, so the area is very popular with rockhounds.  We were also voted in a national television contest as Ontario's Most Talented Town, which indicates the variety of artisans and musicians who call this place home. 

Both my husband and I have been actively involved in streetscaping and other projects in our community - as volunteers during an ambitious revitalization program last year and as an ongoing initiative, on the restoration of our historic Train Station (my husband, Don, continues in his role as the Project Manager), and in many other projects and events. 

Don would like to do a presentation to Council next week that would include some photos we have taken of Winthrop, to illustrate what some vision, foresight and hard work on the part of volunteers and administration, can do for a struggling community, with a carefully-planned stategy to effect change. Many of our residents, business owners and even some councillors, are quite averse to change, but that is what is needed in our community to "make the cars stop". We actually have some government funding in place for facade upgrades at 0% interest, but it has been a very difficult task to convince property owners to avail themselves of that opportunity. We know that your model is a bit too ambitious for us right now, but it should serve as an example, along with several other communities that we have researched both here and in the U.S. 

If you have any information that you could provide us with that you think could be helpful in this regard, such as photos of the town just before it's restoration, and the process for revitalizing the town, we would greatly appreciate that.  We did drop into the Town Office and spoke with the Clerk there, who was very helpful, but she wasn't sure of a few facts - such as how the restoration funding and process worked, so if anyone on the volunteer committee is willing to speak with Don, that would be great.  If you let us know by email of a contact phone number, we would be happy to call you; we are 3 hours behind your time.   Thank you so much.  We'll be back to Winthrop soon; an overnight stay and a morning to browse was definitely not enough. 

Victoria Koppin
Marketing and Selections Coordinator
Don Koppin General Contractor