H-T Chamber taps business, community leaders

The Houma Terrebonne Chamber of Commerce named South Louisiana Medical Associates, an instructional medical facility connected with the Alton Ochsner Medical Foundation and governed by the Louisiana State University Medical Center, as its Large Business of the Year last Wednesday during their 82nd banquet at the Houma-Terrebonne Civic Center.

SLMA offers primary adult services, a women’s clinic and a pediatric clinic. It is associated with the Leonard J. Chabert Medical Center and during the past 11 years has had an economic impact on the area totaling more than $250 million.

Before a crowd of approximately 590 business leaders from a wide range of fields and disciplines, SLMA CEO Michael Garcia, M.D., accepted the award.

“On behalf of our physicians and our group I want to thank the chamber for inviting us here and recognizing our work,” Garcia said.

In turn, the Small Business of the Year Award was offered to AHA! Massage Clinic. During the past three years, that company’s net income has tripled and their workforce has grown from two employees to 20 full-time staff members.

“I want to thank everybody that put their heart into AHA!,” owner Dominique Newsome said.

“The Chamber’s very honored to recognize excellence in business with both the small and large business of the year. They both represent what is great about Terrebonne Parish. Our economy is strong and very vibrant, and both of [tonight’s winners] are strong and vibrant businesses that contribute to the economy and the quality of life in Terrebonne Parish,” Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Drake Pothier said.

Pothier noted that this year’s business award winners have seen exceptional growth during a time when other businesses in other parts of the country have either lost opportunities or at best held steady in their operations.

Fletcher Technical Community College Chancellor Travis Lavigne introduced retired educators Ken and Mary Royston to receive the 2010 Most Useful Citizen Award. For more than 40 years the Roystons have been actively involved in educational and humanitarian issues in Terrebonne Parish.

“I never dreamed this would happen. But the work that we do, we don’t do it alone. We always have others to back us up and to work with us in everything that we do,” Mary Royston said.

“I haven’t done anything except what I enjoy doing,” Ken Royston said.

The night’s program also paid tribute to Lindsay White, who on Jan. 15 was named Teenager of the Year by the American Legion. Terrebonne Parish President Michel Claudet said, after the banquet, that he would like to hire White as a summer intern with parish government.

The chamber also introduced and installed new officers for 2011. James J. “J.J.” Buquet III of Buquet Distributing Company was named as the organization’s new chairman.

During his chamber message, Buquet said that the chamber has a full plate for the coming year. “Today after several years of [government cuts we] are putting together ideas that we can present to the [state] legislature. Our government affairs committee will have a heavy, heavy load. Starting next month the process of statewide redistricting will begin with a series of community outreach meetings. In late March the Legislature will go into special session to begin the work of redrawing virtually every state and federal district statewide. The biggest fight is expected to be their realignment of congressional districts throughout the state and of course we are dropping from seven to six,” he said.

Buquet said that there is no doubt that current 3rd District will look very different than it does today. “It begs the question, which community will hold influence? Your chamber will be very involved in this process,” he said.

The chamber board voted last week to support the Terrebonne Economic Development Agency and Buquet called on the Terrebonne Parish Council to renew its cooperative endeavor agreement with TEDA. “Failure to [renew funding with TEDA] would be devastating to this critically important government agency,” Buquet said to those in attendance.

Buquet said that chamber members have set the recovery of businesses harmed by BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill as a top priority and he intends to see that is addressed during the coming year.

Positive activities for the region that were mentioned by Buquet included the alignment of the Morganza-to-the-Gulf levee, and the hurricane protection plan no longer being in question. He also described the building of an approved floodgate on the Houma Navigational Canal.

Buquet encouraged members to become active on committees and acting in securing economic opportunities for the region.

The keynote speaker for the night was Scott Rasmussen, founder of Rasmussen Reports. During his presentation, Rasmussen explained that many times people use statistics to slant their arguments or misrepresent others. But in the end the numbers do not lie when used appropriately.

“We did a lot of polling last year on offshore oil drilling … and much of it was taken out of context,” Rasmussen said. He explained how polling shifts based on political influence. “But … today 60 percent of Americans support offshore oil drilling. They opposed the moratorium. They want to see America find new sources of energy,” he said as he stated that there is often a difference between public opinion and politician opinion.

Rasmussen offered an overview of history and how it has impacted politics, economics and quality of life. “We live in a nation where people are concerned about the economy. They are concerned about their welfare. They are not sure what is going to happen next. We do have … a great history. American people do not want to be governed from the left or the right or the center, they want to govern themselves,” he said.

“Things [take] time. The good news is that is we would call our nation to its highest ideals that is what most people are looking for. Polling shows consistently that Americans still believe the words to the Declaration of Independence … they believe that governments do derive their only just authority from the consent of the governed and that our nation was conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all of us were created equal.

“What that means is that the person who will rise to get us out of this difficult period that we are in is a person who can deliver the same message … that government of the people and by the people and for the people shall not parish from this earth,” Rasmussen said.

Buquet said that this banquet was one among a good string of such events during the past few years. “I was happy to be in a position to continue that. I think Mr. Rasmussen delivered a very insightful speech and gave us a lot to think about,” he said.

Immediately following the event, Buquet assessed Rasmussen’s message as in part meaning that a cultural mentality of entitlement needs to be changed for the benefit of business and society as a whole.

“It starts on an very individual basis. As far as what the chamber can do is what we have done for a number of years. We’ve gone to [Washington] D.C. and lobbied. In different years it has been different issued. One year it was Morganza. In the post Katrina years it was Katrina. I’m hoping to arrange another trip to Washington this year and arrange a meeting to say we are the secondary market of the major [oil companies]. If they can see the faces of us that are hurting maybe they will get the message that [federal policies] are affecting Main Street not just Wall Street,” Buquet said.