Fort Collins chamber sets goal for Northern Colorado Prospers 2.0 campaign

FORT COLLINS — The Fort Collins Area Chamber of Commerce has launched Northern Colorado Prospers 2.0, a major fund drive to support a series of overarching goals for the community and its businesses.

As announced Wednesday at a kickoff event — an event that also celebrated the contributions of about 50 investors so far — the campaign has a $4 million goal. And $2.9 million is already committed from community investors, said Kevin Unger, president and CEO of UCHealth in Northern Colorado. Unger is among the campaign leadership council. And like vaccinating the remaining adults in the community, the hard part of the fundraising campaign remains to be accomplished, he said.

Goals of the campaign are:

1. Reigniting and rebuilding a local economy damaged by the COVID-19 pandemic. 
2. Attracting, retaining and aligning talent with the needs of the business community.
3. Finishing the widening of Interstate 25 and improving key regional feeder roads.
4. Advancing a business-friendly environment.

The economic rebuilding goal will include implementing an economic-development plan that includes communities and counties throughout the region. Chamber president Ann Hutchison said that plan is almost ready for public review. Target industries will be a part of the plan, according to literature distributed at the Wednesday event.

The chamber and its partners in the region have worked for multiple years on plans to improve the availability of talent necessary to build tomorrow’s businesses, and that will continue with Talent 3.0, according to the plan.

While much has been done to widen I-25 in the region, a five-mile gap remains to be funded, and feeder roads also need consideration, the plan said.

Finally, the organization wants to ramp up its role in the political realm to support candidates who support business, to communicate the implications of legislative initiatives on business and to create a scorecard to help identify public actions that fit within the chamber’s policy priorities.

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