2021
MARCH
NEWSLETTER
Photo by Kelsey Ball
POINTS TO PONDER
From the Executive Director
E
ach winter, the Lander Chamber of Commerce hosts EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE our Community Awards Luncheon. A celebration of the Lander business community and the individuals within Jonathan Tonkowich, it, it is an annual opportunity to come together in one place to President recognize in a public way the efforts of the men and women Wyoming Catholic College who put so much time and effort into building their businesses, creating jobs for Fremont County’s residents, supporting the Eric Andrews, Vice President community, and in general making Lander a great place to live, Fagnant, Lewis & Brinda P.C. work, and play. In 2021, due to the ongoing COVID-19 situation, we won’t be gathering as we’ve done in years gone by. Instead, we’ll be announcing the winners and presenting the awards through a series of videos we will share over the course of several weeks through local and regional news outlets and social media channels. (Learn more on the next page.) We’re excited about this new way of celebrating and promoting the business community. These videos will be easy to link to and share on social media, and they will help introduce the great businesses here in Lander to more people than ever before. Indeed, we foresee these videos becoming an integral part of future Community Awards Luncheons and the Chamber’s ongoing efforts to promote our businesses, not just here in Lander, but all across Fremont County and beyond. Lander Brewfest - August 13-14 Speaking of getting together in person to celebrate, we are in close contact with our friends at the Wyoming Craft Brewers Guild and are planning to host Brewfest a bit later this year, in August rather than June. We are grateful to our friends at Fremont Toyota who once again will be Title Sponsor of Lander Brewfest! Coming Soon - The Chamber’s Own Zoom Room - For You! Through our partnership with the Wind River Visitors Council and available CARES Act funding, we have acquired two 55” DTEN video conferencing boards for our ACFCU Conference Room. We have installed a dual board set up, which includes a responsive, multi-touch video display alongside a digital whiteboard that allows live on-screen annotation of documents and content sharing. Can’t travel? Don’t want to travel? Sick of meeting on your laptop and need more real estate? Meet here at the Chamber! Stay tuned for details on member-only pricing!
Owen Sweeney Executive Director Lander Chamber of Commerce
John Ferrelli, Treasurer
SageWest Healthcare
Michelle Mazur, Past President Elevate Rehab
BOARD OF DIRECTORS Ann Espinosa Home Source Realty Inc. Inter Mountain Builders
Dave Fehringer Strike Consulting Group
Suzanne Norris Wyoming Life Resource Center
Rick Bestul NAPA Auto Parts
James Whiting Whiting Law PC
Chris VonHoltum Central Bank & Trust
Alyssa Lozier Edward Jones
PROFESSIONAL STAFF Owen Sweeney Executive Director
Carol King Associate Director
An Annual Celebration of the Business Community
WHEN: Spring 2021
The Community Awards Video Series is a weeks-long online celebration of business leaders, recognizing their most notable accomplishments of the previous year.
WHERE: Online WHAT: A celebration of the Lander business community
To submit your nominations online and learn about sponsorship opportunities, visit the Chamber’s website at landerchamber.org, hover over “EVENTS” on the main menu, and click on “Community Awards.”
SPONSORSHIPS: 5 packages available
As tradition holds, the award categories are:
ANCHOR
Survived the challenge of time (business)
BEAUTIFICATION
Outstanding storefront appearance
ROOKIE OF THE YEAR
Innovation, enthusiasm and creativity (business)
SPIRIT OF LANDER
Ignites enthusiasm with their participation (business)
COMMUNITY AWARDS
2021 Community Awards Video Series
LIFETIME CONTRIBUTION
Long-standing community commitment (individual) 2020
2019
2018 2017
Anchor Lander Lander Medical Reed’s Moghaun Lander Journal Children’s Museum Clinic Office Supply __________________________________________________________________________________________ Beautification Gannett Peak Sports Whiskey Cuts Bar-Ber Bhava Shala Hello...The House __________________________________________________________________________________________ Rookie Alpha Rec. Center Pingora Yarns The Mill House Alchemy __________________________________________________________________________________________ Spirit Paul Guschewsky Home Source Realty Western Printing Gambles __________________________________________________________________________________________ Lifetime
Bill Sniffin
Doug Anesi
Joe Kenney
Marlene Young
Love your password? Change it!
SBDC TIPS
by Jim Drever, SBDC Regional Director Poor password management is probably the cause of most of my calls and emails that begin with the phrase “I think I’ve been hacked…”. There is a wonderful darkweb site (pwndb) that has a searchable database of email logins with passwords in plain text from a number of breaches. Worse, if you do a Google search of the pastebin website for ‘password’ or similar terms, you will find large username and password dumps on the regular internet. This is why you are repeatedly told to not reuse passwords and to change them every so often because some company will be breached and your favorite password will be leaked. Assume it already has or check https://haveibeenpwned.com to see the known password breaches for confirmation. You are also told to use complex and unique passwords. There are enormous free “dictionaries” of used passwords and phrases in multiple languages that hackers download and will have programs test on a variety of different websites, online apps and other areas like maybe your WordPress website login page (yes, this is very common). They can even figure out character substitutions to catch those who cleverly use P@$$word instead of password. In some cases they will brute force a password using a program, which speaks to why you are told to have long passwords as those programs are making an attempt with various characters until they can get in, but if you have a long password it takes many more attempts and much more time to try to get in. How to Manage Your Passwords So how do you manage to have many passwords that are long, random and complex? The answer is to use a password
manager. Some systems have them built in, especially in browsers. These have not been the best for a couple of reasons, but they are much better than what you are probably doing now. There are several on the market, probably the most common are Dashlane and Lastpass, but there are many more. Apple’s built-in keychain with Safari is fairly good for Apple users. To use one, I recommend looking at a few and choosing one. Install it and come up with your new complex password that will become the only one you need. Then, start small. Start with one or two websites, like maybe Pandora or Instagram and change those passwords letting the password manager create its giant meaningless sets of characters. Then try it out for a few days and see. As you get the hang of it, start changing your more important passwords with the manager and soon you will have secure passwords everywhere you go online that will be very difficult for anyone to hack. It must be noted that there are lists of default manufacturer passwords for routers, thermostats and everything else online, so please change those passwords as soon as you turn on any new internet connected device. This all said, whenever you can, use twofactor authentication and if it gives you the option, choose to use the cell phone app, such as Authy and Authenticator, as it can protect you from an attack called SIM swapping, which I explained in a previous article. Help is Available If you have any concerns about your businesses cybersecurity, don’t hesitate to reach out to your local Wyoming SBDC Network advisor for no-cost, confidential assistance.
The Wyoming SBDC Network offers no-cost advising and technical assistance to help Wyoming entrepreneurs think about, launch, grow, reinvent or exit their business. The SBDC Network is hosted by the University of Wyoming with state funds from the Wyoming Business Council. Funded in part through a Cooperative Agreement with the U.S. Small Business Administration.
EVERY 1ST & 3RD MONDAY Shoshoni Local Foods Market 5-7pm, Shoshoni Fire Hall, 104 E. 2nd St. SECOND THURSDAY Monthly Education Series via Zoom, 5 pm
1-6 Red Desert Audubon Show Lander Art Center, TuTh 10-6, Fr-Sa 10-4 1-31 Native Americans of Wyoming’s Wind River Country western art exhibit Pioneer Museum
5 Abraham: Out of One, Many - an artistic exploration Register on Zoom rb.gy/zffopp 7 Beginning Farmer Info Workshop Zoom, register online, 6-8 pm
1-31 Guided Bighorn Sheep 12 Student Select Show THIRD THURSDAY Tour National Bighorn Sheep - Soft Opening: Meet the Foot Care Clinic, 8-noon, Center, Dubois Artists Lander Art Center, Lander Senior Center 4-6 pm 3 Women in Wyoming EVERY SATURDAY Riverton Museum, 6 pm 19 Met Opera: Madama Winter Local Foods Market Butterfly Lander Library 1-3 pm, Lander VFW, 11 4, 11, 18, 25 WY Small Carnegie Room, 5:30 pm Tweed Lane Business Development Center Profit Mastery Course 22-26 Fremont County Riverton Local Foods 2-3 pm Virtual Employment Expo Market 9-11 am, 1010 register online Fairgrounds Drive
THINK LANDER SHOP LOCAL
MORE MONEY CIRCULATES BACK INTO LOCAL HANDS HEN YOU SHOP CLOSE TO HOME AS OPPOSED TO ONLINE.
SUPPORT LOCAL JOBS
WHERE YOU SPEND MATTERS
CALENDAR
March Calendar of Events
PUBLIC ADVOCACY
Chamber urges approval of grant for Central Wyoming Regional Airport The Lander Chamber of Commerce has submitted a letter in support of Central Wyoming Regional Airport’s (RIW) application for a Small Community Air Service Development Program Grant (SCASDP). Managed under the Office of Aviation Analysis within the U.S. Department of Transportation, the SCASDP grant program is designed to help small communities address air service and airfare issues.
Fremont County is well positioned to benefit from such a campaign, as local tourism marketing efforts implemented early last year by the Wind River Visitors Council in response to COVID-19 saw Fremont County experience among the lowest percentage of total decreases in lodging tax receipts in the entire state. Such foresight has Wind River Country primed for a strong 2021 tourist season, and this SCASDP grant for Central Wyoming Regional Airport would go a long Central Wyoming Regional Airport (former- way toward building on that notable success. ly Riverton Regional) has joined with the Wyoming Department of Transportation Building An Advanced Rural Economy (WYDOT) and a consortium of Wyoming air- The Chamber pointed out further that ports to seek funding to market United Ex- many local businesses and organizapress service to encourage local use of the tions recognize commercial air service airport as well as to stimulate inbound tour- at Central Wyoming Regional as a critical ism traffic to RIW and of Wyoming’s airports. component of their success and the economic development of the entire region, esAttracting Tourists to Wind River Country pecially one as remote and rural as ours. The Chamber noted that the airport is centrally situated within our increasingly pop- Notable among these are the National ular tourism corridor known as “Wyoming’s Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS) and Wind River Country” that connects Inter- Wyoming Catholic College (WCC), two state 80 to Yellowstone and Grand Teton educational institutions that rely heavnational parks. In 2018, international and ily on Central Wyoming Regional for both domestic visitors spent more than $136 student and employee travel and that of million here in Fremont County, generating potential students and their families, as $44.6 million in earnings, supporting more well as visits from donors and dignitaries. than 1,400 jobs, and resulting in just shy of $7 million in state and local taxes collected. We highlighted also the new presence of Western Wyoming Medical and the Wind As air passenger traffic begins to recover River Heart Clinic, which have brought not post COVID-19, the aforementioned con- only world-class cardiovascular and outpasortium of Wyoming airports intends to tient surgical services to Lander, but also use this SCASDP grant to implement a technological advancements through the comprehensive marketing and awareness Pulsario remote heart management system. campaign with the purpose of bringing both local awareness back to air travel and Access to nearby, reliable commercial also marketing to tourists Wyoming’s much air service is critical to facilitating the develsought-after open spaces and recreational opment and growth of a thriving advanced ruopportunities. The Chamber noted that ral economy in Lander and Fremont County.
Owned by Barry & Bonnie Tippy, Red White Buffalo at 215 Lincoln Street is a family and veteran operated business for whom “American made” has always been near and dear to its heart. They love picking up something in a store and seeing “Made in the USA.” So, when it came time for them to open their first store in Green River, of course it had to be American made products. But they took it one step further by offering only products made here in Wyoming. Now here in Lander, too, Red White Buffalo offers art, bath products, apparel, books and metal work just to name a few; even their coffee is Wyoming roasted! In-store highlights include: Sip n Shop Wednesday, Wyoming roasted coffee, home decor, jewelry, lotion, and soaps. Stop by 215 Lincoln Street or visit redwhitebuffalowyo.com!
Renewing and New Members! Budget Blinds of Fremont County LLC Pam Peterson 769 S 3rd St., Lander
Help For Health Hospice Kelly Wicks Executive Director 716 College View Dr., Ste B, Riverton
DAPCPA Riverton LLC Carmen Milbury Lander Community 320 S Federal Blvd., Riverton Foundation MJ Greene Elks Lodge BPOE 2317 Executive Director 492 Lincoln St., Lander PO Box 1131, Lander
Whiting Law PC James Whiting 277 Main St., Suite 3, Lander Wyoming Catholic College 306 Main St., Lander Wyoming Family Sonography, LLC Faith Hamilton PO Box 1827, Lander NEW MEMBERS!
Family Chiropractic PLLC Vince Irene 8135 Highway 789, Lander
LEADER Corporation Dave Kellogg, President 185 S 5th St., Lander
Fremont County Fair 1010 Fairground Road, Riverton
Teton Therapy 425 Lincoln, Lander
Blakemore’s Powder Coating & Laser Engraving LLC Jay & Cindy Blakemore 297 Main St., Lander
Trinity Episcopal Church Walt & Janet Seeley, Pastors 860 S. 3rd St., Lander
Red White Buffalo Barry & Bonnie Tippy 215 Lincoln St., Lander
Fremont Communications Doug Thompson 925 Lincoln St., Lander Hayden Outdoors Bill Vacek Responsible Broker 204 Main St., Lander
Water for Wildlife Foundation Vickie Hutchinson-Renkert Executive Director 545 Main St., Lander
NEW & RENEWING MEMBERS
Welcome to Our New Member!
Convener Investors
________________________________________________________________________________________ Collaborator Investors
Special thanks to Western Printing for printing the monthly newsletter.
PRESORTED STANDARD U.S. Postage Paid LANDER, WY PERMIT NO. 78
RENEWING MEMBERS
________________________________________________________________________________________
NEWSLETTER SPONSORS
Catalyst Investor