When a local business needs help, it goes to the Louisa County Chamber of Commerce. The Chamber of Commerce is a nonprofit organization, headed by executive director Tracy Hale Clark and a board of directors. The Chamber of Commerce works to promote and protect local businesses and plays a considerable part in regulating Louisa’s economy.
“Our purpose is to advocate and ensure that government regulations and legislative actions are not impeding, causing harsh difficulties, or causing challenges for businesses,” Clark said. “We aim to discuss, negotiate, and work with community governments to ensure that they know what they’re doing and how it’s impacting Louisa’s business community.”
The Chamber of Commerce is funded entirely by local businesses that engage in memberships. These businesses must initiate contact with the Chamber of Commerce and purchase a membership to reap the benefits. Benefits include business training, webinars, and education. The Chamber of Commerce generally utilizes spokespeople and advertising to reach out to a variety of different organizations, businesses, and collaborators to promote its resources.
“Our membership benefits really run the gamut on why a business would be involved,” Clark said. “We do our best to reach out to everybody, but I don’t always know the new businesses. They’ll pop up and I’ll be like, ‘Oh, that’s a new business.’ So we can only do our best to spread the word as much as possible.”
As Louisa County’s economy grows, so does the population. Within the past year, Louisa County Middle School has been expanded, and the high school has begun construction of a new CTE building. This year, the Chamber of Commerce has become involved in a job fair, promoting local jobs related to the many CTE courses available at the high school.
“There are a lot of job opportunities, and there are a lot of job seekers, but they don’t always know where to go and how to connect,” Clark said. “The biggest thing that we’re launching in partnership with the county right now is a job fair coming up on Nov. 5, the fair is at the high school, and it is open to job seekers who are 16 years old and above from 4:30 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. There’s going to be construction, welding, plumbers, linemen, and manufacturing opportunities, and we’re also going to have resources there such as Piedmont Virginia Community College, Reynolds Community College, and Virginia Career Works.”
According to The Global Industrial, only 4% of skilled tradesmen are women, while men compose the other 96%. Clark herself believes that there are not enough women in the workforce, but some organizations have made programs promoting women in trades.
“There aren’t enough women in the trades, because I think that there’s just not enough awareness,” Clark said. “Rappahannock Electric has been deeply involved in advocating for women in trades. They created a program called Girl Power, and they bring you on site where women can learn all about what it’s like to work for a power company and skills related to that.”
Another large part of the increasing population in Louisa County is the new data center developments throughout the economy, opening a surplus of new job opportunities, bringing individuals from surrounding urban counties such as Henrico and Charlottesville to Louisa.
“Dominion Energy, in specific, is always at the forefront of trying to power large infrastructure such as the data centers, and it does take a lot of power and water,” Clark said. “Dominion Energy also announced that they’re working on what they call SMRs, which are small modular reactors. It’s basically another way to provide energy in these SMRs, and so they’re exploring, and that’s in development in terms of a project. There’s a whole lot of jobs happening with all the development, and the tax revenue that comes in from those plays a significant role in the county government and supporting growth and development with school and infrastructure and things like that that’s needed to run the county.”
Clark stated that new infrastructure has led to a rapid economic growth in Louisa County, making it the third fastest growing county in Virginia in terms of residential and population growth. This influx has led to an increase in opportunities for businesses to bring in consumers and skilled trades workers for those businesses. As the career opportunities broaden, the technologies in the area have advanced.
“A lot of initiatives that are infrastructure-related have development plans around Lake Anna, such as a possible shopping center,” Clark said. “With the developments and businesses coming into the area, commercial tax revenues are increasing at a substantial rate, as well as tax dollars related to tourism. Visitors who stay in Louisa pay what they call the transient occupancy tax, which technically is paid by the hotel or the place of business where they stay.They also pay a sales tax on anything that they buy in local stores, keeping the economic flow in Louisa.”
When asked about the best part of her job, Clark took moments to gather her thoughts, as to her. She also took time to reflect on her impact on the community as well as the community’s affect on her.
“It’s very rewarding to be part of something bigger than myself and to just sit here and talk with you guys and see the excitement about what’s going on and see it just kind of click with you,” Clark said. “I just like the experience of sharing and helping people to gain a better understanding of how everything works together to have a thriving community, and for me personally, it’s really the service and helping others that is the most rewarding part.”
Clark maintains a certain philosophy about how to promote the success of everyone in a community.
“I think it’s all about relationships,” Clark said. “In a world where everything is driven digitally, I cannot stress enough to you how valuable relationships are in all parts of life. Good relationships are what make a business or organization successful. I facilitate a class on entrepreneurship, and I always say to them that it’s about the trust others have in you, which can be determined largely from the first time you meet them. Are you sincere? Are you authentic? People need to be able to know and trust you rather quickly, and that gives a building point to grow that trust.”
