Tama-Toledo Area Chamber of Commerce Coordinator Janet Busch Chronicle/John Speer

Community members are now being invited to become members of the Tama-Toledo Area Chamber of Commerce which will allow them to more directly add their ideas and support for the organization.

Janet Busch, Chamber coordinator, said they will be able to join in planning and activities. This will make them feel more welcome to take part in helping with events and in fulfilling “the mission of the Chamber of Commerce to provide support and encouragement to local businesses,” Busch said.

The membership fee is $30 annually.

Busch, who took over the coordinator position in January, has just completed the relocation of Chamber office from the Toledo Community Building to 110 East High, a space most recently occupied by Steph’s Head to Toe Massage.

The narrow building can be remembered as the longtime headquarters of the Beauty Cove operated by Vera Hruby and Gail Weidner, and before that the dental office of Dr. M.H. Hoffer.

The history of the space goes back to a book store serving Western-Leander Clark College.

Janet Busch is the T-T area Chamber of Commerce’s only paid employe. She is part-time at 20 hours a week but notes seasonal activities often require her to devote much more time to a job she enjoys.

In addition to day-to-day office work there’s the major Chamber events with the annual Car Show coming up on Sept.16 in downtown Tama and planning is getting underway for the Christmas holiday season she said.

The Chamber office is open Monday-Thursday from 9 a.m. – 4 .m. The telephone number is 641-484-6661, mailing address: P.O. box 367, Toledo IA 52342, email: tama.toledochamber@gmail.com; website: tamatoledochamber.com

Janet has brought years o business and public contact experience to the position along with education. A Marshalltown Lenihan High School graduate she says she first intended to enter into the dietician field after completing courses Marshalltown Community College and working at Mercy Hospital while in school.

But after going to Iowa State University she quickly changed her mind and ended up working in marketing and public relations.

This was in a banking career where she worked for Commercial Bank in Marshalltown from 1972-90, obtained a degree form the university of Northern Iowa, Cedar Falls, worked for Lincoln Savings Bank, Reinbeck from 1992-2000 and for Great Western Banks, Leon, Iowa, from 2000-2008 with marketing duties for 36 midwestern banks.

From 2000-05 she served as executive director for the Central Iowa Art Association.

She and her husband, Ron, live on his family farm at rural Toledo. Ron is well-known having served twice as president of the Tama County Farm Bureau and currently is Tama County and Gladbrook American Legion commander.

They have two daughters, Jamie Busch-Upah, Toledo, employed in the nuclear department at Emerson Processing in Marshalltown and Jennifer Brown, Bedford, Iowa.???????