 Welcome to the Portland Regional Chamber's video newsletter, Portland Region's Community News. This segment will give insight into what's happening in our communities and how you can get involved. Don't miss Propel Eats, tonight, October 15th, at the Little Taphouse in Portland. Details are on their Facebook page, just search for Propel. If you missed tonight's event, you can plan to join Propel for their upcoming lunch and learns, with the winners of the Entreverge Awards, taking place at the Portland Regional Chamber of Commerce offices on Congress Street. For October, they will welcome Michelle Niger of SMCC on October 23rd and Garbage to Garden on October 30th. There's lots more information on propelportland.org. Found this, Route 1 Project is underway, and the next information session for the public will take place on October 17th at the Falmouth Memorial Library at 7pm. For more information, please visit the town of Falmouth's webpage. The Cumberland Wood Bank now has a Facebook page, offering heating assistance to those in need in the area through a growing effort that pairs surplus and donated firewood with the heating needs of those less fortunate. The Cumberland Wood Bank is doing great things. They're actively looking for both wood donations and volunteers to help build the program, so be sure to find Cumberland Main Wood Bank today on Facebook to help. The next Falmouth Cumberland Community Chamber Business After Hours is coming up on October 30th from 5pm to 7pm at Bangor Savings Bank. Come on down and join us for great giveaways, food and networking. The November elections are coming. On October 16th, the Portland Community Chamber will hold a lunch and learn to welcome the Portland City Council candidates and hear them express their views on the issues. This November, two candidates are running for the at-large seat that is now held by Councillor John Anton, who is not seeking re-election. This event will be held at the Portland Regional Chamber offices, and lunch will be served. Please register by October 15th at noon. The City Council held a public hearing on the proposed polystyrene ordinance, and even after hearing dozens of concerns, they voted 8-1 to send it back to the committee for further consideration. Thank you to all who came to see Suzanne McCormick of the United Way of Greater Portland speak at our recent exit issues. Our next exit issues will be on November 6th with John Leonard of Memic, so be sure to register on our website soon. On October 8th, the Frog and Turtle held their annual Fund a Kid Gala to benefit Westbrook's My Place Teen Center. In total, they raised over $4,000 for My Place Teen Center. Great job, Frog and Turtle. Join the Westbrook Gorum Community Chamber and the Scarborough Community Chamber for a fun and informative membership meeting at Haven's Candies Factory Store in Westbrook on October 16th. Join us for juice, coffee, and chocolate. There'll be a hands-on demonstration of how some of Maine's finest candies are made, and you will have the opportunity to make some, too. Registration for the event is open online at portlandregion.com. On October 1st, the Scarborough Community Chamber welcomed the public for an open house at their new location in Scarborough, located in Willowdale Place. Maine Indoor Karting in Scarborough is celebrating 10 years of racing. For the entire month of October, each race is only $10. While you're there celebrating their birthday, you can also enter their door prize drawing for a seven-day Norwegian cruise for two from Boston to Bermuda. Contact Maine Indoor Karting for more details. Have you heard the buzz? The trivia bee is back. The sixth annual trivia bee to benefit Project Grace is Scarborough's funniest fundraiser and the place to be on October 24th at the landing. You can create a team, sponsor an event, volunteer, or come to the landing to enjoy the show. Tickets are just $5. This is an important fundraiser for Project Grace, and with calls for help on the rise, they really need your support to continue to help our neighbors in need. On September 19th, the South Portland-Capelizabeth Community Chamber Board held its annual retreat at the Perpetut Club in Capelizabeth. Almost every member was present, and everyone contributed to a lively discussion about goals, priorities, and future board agendas. The SPCE is in the process of restructuring and revitalizing their subcommittees, making them more relevant and reflective of what they're actually trying to achieve. One of their priorities for the future is to strengthen ties with community partners like the Land Trust, Long Creek Watershed, South Portland-Capelizabeth Bilocal, the municipalities, and the schools, as well as any other partners identified as having similar goals of making our region the best it can be. The SPCE will be inviting a guest to speak at most board meetings, and all committee reports will be submitted in writing, making that information more available. They'll continue to promote SPCE Community Chamber through their Facebook page, including all Business After Five events, and their emphasis will be on supporting all businesses and partners in their community. If you have not yet liked the South Portland-Capelizabeth Community Chamber page on Facebook, please do. The SPCE board meets the second Thursday of each month at noon at Evergreen Credit Union on Broadway in South Portland. There are a few vacancies on the board, so if you're interested in serving, please contact Linda Cohen. The South Portland-Capelizabeth's next Business After Five will take place on Thursday, November 7th, at SIA, a coffee, ice cream, and art shop located at 72 Ocean Street in South Portland. We hope you can all come and network and check out this creative, unique business. As you know, a lot has changed at the Portland Regional Chamber in the last few months. Hopefully, you've had a chance to see an introduction to that change at our annual Community Leadership Awards at the State Theater last month. But if you didn't, you can check out the photos and videos from the event on Facebook and YouTube. A special thank you to Standard Issue, the USM Jazz Ensemble, Mecca, and all of the local chefs and sponsors who helped to make this event a success. The Portland Regional Chamber is now offering a new program for members called Capitalizing on Connections. This program is a series of four sessions aimed at members to ensure that they have a positive membership experience by optimizing themselves and their businesses professionally. Here to speak with us today about this new program is our Vice President of Membership and Marketing, Marsha Hart. Hi Marsha, thanks for being here today. Hi Abby, thanks so much for having me. It's a joy to be here. Sure. Can you tell us a little bit about Capitalizing on Connections, this new program? Absolutely. Well, as you know, we've had a very large influx of new members, and the members that we currently have have been with us for quite some time, both of which want to really become engaged in what we are doing, and they really want to optimize their member benefits. Capitalizing on Connections is another way we can show real value to our members. With a program like Capitalizing on Connections, we can use the resources that we have within our membership to not only showcase who they are, but take the value that they bring to the table and share it with all the members at large. And they're going to really augment their own business by doing so. Great. What are some of the topics that you'll be discussing? Yeah, so great topics actually, everyone can benefit from the business aspect of the topics that we're about to talk about. So we have themes like marketing, SWOT analysis, what do you do? What are the best practices for optimizing your business in terms of marketing? And then we have some executive coaching techniques where it can really enhance yourself professionally and individually. And then we're going to talk about the different ways that you can access the staff. You're going to hear from our own Chris Hall, who will talk about the resources that you have within our chamber office. And then we're going to talk about selling techniques, the best way to use all of those business cards that you collected at the night before at the event, the BA5s and what not, where you can really take the business cards back with you and really think about how you're going to use them with a good strategy. Well it sounds like that program will really benefit a lot of our members. Absolutely, we have some great presenters in mind. Paula Mahoney, Words at Work, Mandy Shoemaker is going to be one of our presenters and our own Chris Hall again. Oh great, and they're going to be starting soon? Absolutely, they're going to be starting October 31st as the launch and it will be held at Orange Leaf Frozen Yoga, again a member, so we're going to really showcase who they are. And again, it's Paula Mahoney, Words at Work, who will be our presenter. And then the next one will be December and then we'll do another February and another one in April. Great, we'll definitely keep an eye on the website for some more information about capitalizing on connections. Absolutely, take a look at the landing page. I'm sure you're going to see a lot of great things happening there and we're trying to make sure that everyone is optimizing their member benefit. Wonderful, thanks a lot for being here Marcia. You bet, thanks. Thank you for watching today. We hope to see you again next month.