In the days leading up to end of the year, the Weyburn & District Chamber of Commerce always takes time to look back on the last year, and reflect upon the events and people that shaped our community.

As Jeff Chessall was sworn in as President of the Weyburn Chamber of Commerce in January, the Chamber began one of its busiest years.

2012 was a Weybex year, and the Chamber as proud to present its Business Excellence Awards. Souris Valley Industries was the New or Expanded Business Award winner, as well as Business of the Year. The Golden Service Award went to Home Hardware, Community Involvement went to the Mainil Family of Businesses, and Business Leader of the Year was Kim Thorson. The Royal Bank, John & Helen Georgacacos, and Access Communications were all inducted into the Business Hall of Fame.

This year the Chamber also presented its two annual awards - The Golden Sheaf to Three Farmers, and the Golden Spike to the Weyburn Young Fellows Club.

A less busy year politically, 2012 saw the Chamber host an All Candidates Forum for the Municipal Election. This alongside our regular events such as Parades, luncheons, and the golf tournament provided a busy year for our event volunteers and coordinators.

The mission of the Chamber is to represent the interests of our Members by advocating for a healthy community both economically and socially. The Chamber represented its Members this year in our meetings with the Federal Government as we pressed for changes to immigration regulations so that we can attract workers faster, and we expressed our concern around the increases to the duty free exemptions for cross borders shoppers. We met with the Provincial Government on many issues including minimum wage, the hospital funding, and others. The Chamber continues to have regular meetings with both of these Governments to ensure that our businesses are getting the policies required to continuing growing.

Closer to home, of course we meet regularly with representatives from the City and RM of Weyburn.

These two governments are meeting monthly at the District Planning Commission table, and the Chamber is participating in this initiative. Over the year we brought the concerns of our members to local government and in each case found that the solution was usually accessible and we were successful.

As Weyburn enters its Centennial Year in 2013, the Chamber is proud to stand tall and represent the business community and remain a community partner with a vision for growth and prosperity. The Board and staff of the Chamber would like to congratulate everyone on a successful 2012 and we look forward to a prosperous 2013.