Minutes from the general meeting held on February 4, 2021
DVTI Meeting
February 4, 2021
Present: Beth Arman, Jim Blair, Ryan Buckley, Ken Carlson, Nichol Carranza, Paul Crooker, Amalia Cunningham, Ed Del Beccaro, Jeanette Green, Timothy Haile, Joellen Heaney, Olivia Herriford, Jags Krishnamurty, John Matthesen, Brian Nunnally, Carlyn Obringer, Tamer Osman, Marie Suvansin, Walnut Creek Mayor Kevin Wilk, Linsey Willis
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Ryan opened the meeting at 3:04 pm with introductions.
Approval of December 3, 2020 minutes:
Motion: Ken; 2nd: Ed; Unanimous
Standing Items: None
Public Comment:
Amalia shared a link to an open Economic Development Manager position: https://www.governmentjobs.com/careers/contracosta/jobs/2953801/economic-development-manager-exempt.gov
Roster Changes: None
Website Changes: Recovered the Tech directory, added some local tech companies and posted our Workforce Development initiatives
Committee Updates: None
DVTI 2020 Review (Ryan):
Eight meetings held.
Accomplishments:
Mission Statement: Everything we do from here should tie back to the Mission Statement.
Launched Business Survey: Interested in ideas on how to get more people to take the survey.
Drafted a Tech Sales Syllabus: Approved to go live this fall (both for credit and not-for-credit courses).
Partnered with BayICT: Great relationship; Olivia has been very helpful.
2021 Goals: Please provide feedback on other things we can do.
Figure out our organizational structure
Do we need committees?
Do we have the right mix of people?
Do enough people attend meetings?
Are we working on the right things?
Ryan reviewed the structure of Cal Berkeley's Order of the Golden Bear.
Cal Berkeley's "secret society" where students, faculty, and staff can speak candidly to each other.
Value is in sharing information in a useful, constructive environment. Facilitates interactions that wouldn't otherwise occur.
DVTI works in a similar way: the value is getting entrepreneurs, mayors, city council members, and DVC faculty and staff to discuss economic and workforce development issues.
Meetings are useful and we learn from everyone's specific knowledge. Committees may naturally form. The structure will be a work in progress.
Need to get as many people as possible to attend the meetings: 18-20 is the ideal number.
Carlyn: Agendas could include action items that will require assistance, so members know whether they need to attend or not.
Tamer: Need to divvy up work to make progress. Has to be easy to contribute so we don't lose members.
Optimize our marketing
Is "Diablo Valley" the best term to describe this area?
Paul Crooker: If the group is branding itself outside of the Bay Area and California, consider a byline below “Diablo Valley” to connect it to the SF Bay Area.
Beth: Not trying to get out-of-state business at this point. However, local firms may have parent companies that are out of state. May be good to have a tagline.
Drone Technology:
Ryan connected with the CEO of a drone company that fights fires in San Mateo. What is important to him regarding where he is headquartered? They need a relationship with municipal agencies from Federal (FAA) to local (firefighters) in order to fly drones legally. He did not think to look in Contra Costa county
A meeting was set up with him and the head of Contra Costa airports – Byron and Bucannon.
Will connect him to the fire chief in charge of Byron airport to see if they can light fires.
DVTI can help market the Diablo Valley by further promoting our assets and by alerting drone companies to what Supervisor Burgess and directors of airports are doing that is advantageous.
Need to reach out to drone CEO’s and make them aware of unrecognized opportunities.
CEO Outreach:
Brian: add autonomous technologies
Carlyn: there is a company applying to build military drones for the US government based at Bucannon Field
Beth: DVC and LMC have Drone Technology certificates. Please keep both colleges in the loop when talking to companies, because we may have connections and can piggyback on yours.
Connections could be Advisory Board members. We are looking for people to hire our students.
John: should reach out to Google. They are putting money into firefighting drones and will be testing in the Central Valley.
Carlyn, Paul, and Amalia volunteered to help with outreach.
John: should create a Google doc to track who people are going to contact.
Nichol: Need to develop a call script so we are consistent on how we approach the CEO’s.
Tech Sales:
The syllabus is done. We are modeling after the new Hemp courses: not-for-credit and credit courses.
Ryan will keep the group updated. Once the course is live, we will need to drum up attendance and interest since the not-for-credit course won't be in the catalog.
Wrap-Up:
Jim will set the group up in Teams and invite everyone through the Foundation or through WFD.
Ryan will help with drone CEO outreach, organize a call sheet on Google drive & put a tagline under Diablo Valley.
Will reach out for assistance with some Google docs and Google slide templates that need help describing DVTI.
If anyone has experience with SBDC, please let John know. We might want to engage them as a partner.
Adjourned at 4:07
