Finding Ways to Create Jobs

Find Local Jobs at CulpeperJobs.com

Published in the Culpeper Star Exponent on October 25, 2010


McDonnell Announces 240 New Jobs in Pulaski County May 06, 2010. Governor McDonnell Announces 300 New Jobs in City of Radford May 11, 2010. McDonnell Announces MeadWestvaco to Move to Virginia May 24, 2010. Va. officials welcome Northrop Grumman to Falls Church Jul 12, 2010. McDonnell Announces Microsoft to Locate Major Data Center in Mecklenburg Aug 27, 2010. Governor McDonnell Announces 174 New Jobs in Winchester Sep 10, 2010.


These are a few of the announcements on Governor Bob McDonnell’s website that describe the jobs introduced so far this year in Virginia. It is great to see jobs in other areas of Virginia since we all benefit from the jobs in our Commonwealth. We are fortunate to have major employers in Culpeper that have weathered the economic storm and preserved many jobs. It is also very good to see the Terremark / Verizon development unveiled. However, we have some work to do in supporting more job creation.


Jobs in my view are the foundation of economic recovery in our community. With unemployment bordering 10%, and probably more unofficially, the cost to our community is significant in government financial support. The potential for a reemployed workforce to buy houses and liquidate our abundance of foreclosures could firm up real estate price levels. Newly employed workers could thus increase the much needed tax revenue into the Town and County. Tax revenues that are desperately needed for school teacher raises, emergency services funding, and investment in maintaining our roads.


Creating local jobs for the approximately 40% of our workforce that commute out of Culpeper would be one of the best “Buy Local” programs that we could implement. Four hours of commuter time per day could be replaced with time and energy invested in local shopping and local community support.


We have heard it through the news cycles, the election speak, the rhetoric of elected leaders - jobs should be our priority. There are no projections for a quick economic recovery. Our policy decisions need to be driven by job creation potential. What are our immediate opportunities?


It is time for Water and Sewer to be negotiated and resolved between the Town and the County. There is every reason that this issue can be resolved and put into the DONE column with a big sign – JOBS WELCOME. We are close, and yet there are a few “Hypothetical’s” and “What If’s” that attempt to make “Water and Sewer Progress” oxymoronic…. Our legacy for 2010 should be Leadership, Statesmanship, and Vision.

What impact would Traffic Impact Fees (TIF’s) have on job creation? We need revenue for road maintenance. We need to have projects funded for our roadway infrastructure. Would TIF’s discourage new businesses to locate in Culpeper? Would TIF’s discourage local businesses to grow and add locations? Are there any other sources for transportation revenue to fund road work? There are no easy answers, and yet right now, we need jobs and we need to find ways to encourage job growth.


Our public policies can lead the way in setting the table for job creation. We can choose not to participate in the “Jobless Recovery”.


Best Regards


Jim Charapich
President / CEO
Culpeper Chamber of Commerce



Foundation Center offers help for nonprofits

Published in the Culpeper Star Exponent on October 11, 2010 

The Foundation Center is known in the Non-Profit community as “The” resource for funding, grants, and grant writing resources. I have been attending free webinars at the Culpeper County Library which are offered by the Foundation Center. The topics for the webinars were Grant Writing Basics, Online Grantseeker Resources, Proposal Writing Basics, and Grant Database Navigation.

The Online Grantseeker Resources webinar covered questions like: 1) I’m new to the field. How do I begin? 2) How can I find information on the Grant makers that will fund me? 3) How can I grow my knowledge of nonprofits and philanthropy today? 4) I’m looking for a job in the nonprofit sector. What resources do you have for job seekers?

There are several new additions to the Foundation Center website. For example, the new TRASI section provides Tools and Resources for Affecting Social Impact. This database of tools allows one to develop strategies in measuring the social impact and the social change of your program. Thus allowing for better support in grant and funding recruitment.

Grantspace.org is another new addition to the Foundation Center resources. The website will include much of the current Foundation Center training resources. In addition, it will allow the Non-Profit grant seeking community to collaborate in efforts to achieve their missions.

Glasspockets.org is an interesting part of the Foundation Center resource. The site allows us to track giving and special opportunities available from philanthropists. One of my favorite aspects of this site is that it aggregates the foundations that push information out thru Facebook and Twitter. It is easy to find the foundations that you are interested in and then tune into their style of giving. They call this Foundation Transparency 2.0 – very cool!!

The map on the front of the Foundation Center website shows the areas of the country where some $450 million has been distributed to help those affected in the downturn by Foundation Grants. The map allows detailed drill downs by state and by date range. It reports that Virginia recipients have received over $16 million for 2009 and 2010.

The Foundation Center database is carefully controlled allowing access at special Foundation Center locations throughout the US. Our Culpeper County Library is one of those locations thanks to support from many local Non-Profit groups such as Healthy Culpeper, Non-Profit Council of the Culpeper Chamber of Commerce, Private Donors, and the Culpeper County Library.

We have the opportunity to bring funds into our community organizations, create jobs, and strengthen our local economy one grant at a time… The database is free, the opportunity is powerful, and the results can mean everything.

Best Regards

Jim Charapich
President / CEO
Culpeper Chamber of Commerce

How to make "us" better

Published in the Culpeper Star Exponent on October 4th, 2010

Real estate values are low. There are high numbers of foreclosures. There is high unemployment. Some of our critical services are stretched to a very thin line. County and State budgets are very lean. And the news seems to be more challenging than assuring for economic improvement.

That is until we look at Culpeper and what we are doing to strengthen our local economy. One of my favorite quotes from Brian Tracy a motivational speaker is that “If it is going to be, it is up to me”. “ME” meaning as a community it is up to “US” to find ways to bring economic prosperity to our community.

What are we doing / can we do to set the stage for this transition to the “next economy”? First, the Town Council and the Board of Supervisors are working in historically significant unity. They plan to resolve the water and sewer issues that have consumed time and resources for decades with little progress. In addition to the many attributes that we have for job creation, optimizing our water and sewer resources leads “US” toward a stronger economic foundation.

Next, we know that a large percentage of our workforce travels north everyday from Culpeper. It is important to know what the job skills for that work force are. We need to focus on finding grants or resources to identify this information in order to show new and relocating companies what the local workforce skills are. We know that most commuters would prefer to work where they live. Please contact the Culpeper Chamber if you are interested in working on grant sourcing for this mission. Our Technology Council will be working on this in the coming months. This also helps Germanna in planning for curriculum for the local workforce. It would be great if our commuters used Germanna for their training rather than staying in NOVA to take classes.

The retail numbers for Culpeper were up 8% thru July over last year. Though this is good news, it is over last year, which was a tough year. This does indicate that there are more dollars being spent in Culpeper. We need to continue to find ways to invite visitors to come to Culpeper and enjoy our retail, restaurants, and hospitality businesses. We have strategic opportunities this autumn time of year. However, we need to focus on the tougher months of January thru March for this segment of our economy. Culpeper would be a great location for small 25 to 100 person conferences, tournaments, church programs, and association meetings…. We can all work together to pull this economy forward. Every event makes a difference. Bring your friends and associates to discover Culpeper. They will thank you.

Though we are making progress, we have some work to do…We need to stimulate our home sales, bring our real estate values up, thus, brining more tax revenue into the Town and County, eliminate the foreclosure problem, and get our building community back to work. We need to stimulate our retail / hospitality businesses with a strong buy local focus to support the businesses during the slower sales days of the mid week (see CulpeperChamber.com for Hot Deals). We need to bring visitors here for meetings and on the weekends to discover our quality of life. “If it is going to be it is up to US”

Best Regards

Jim Charapich
President / CEO
Culpeper Chamber of Commerce