By Dewey Terrill
JC Post
The Junction City Area Chamber of Commerce Board of Directors on Monday voted to remove Mickey Fornaro-Dean from the President of Operations post for the Chamber. The vote was nine in favor, three opposed with one member, Ron Johnson, abstaining. Mark Powers, Matt Junghans and Jim Schmidt voted no. Fornaro-Dean remains in a seperate economic development director's post. There was no action taken on that topic by the Board.
Board Chair Ashley King will serve as the Interim President of Operations, but will not receive any compensation.
Numerous ideas were produced for a future structure for the Chamber during a joint city-county-Chamber Board meeting that was also held Monday evening. King said before that session that they had some ideas "of what this looks like going down the road and I think this is what is best for the community moving forward and making sure we're good stewards of taxpayer dollars."
The current structure where the Military Affairs Council, Economic Development Commission and Chamber Membership Division are under the Chamber umbrella will continue until at least the end of the year.
"I feel good. I feel like we're going to get a fresh start and kind of figure out where we want to do things. King stated she thought that having a dual role director of economic development and president of operations was a confict of interest and Fornaro-Dean could concentrate on economic development.
Fornaro-Dean did not make any comment.