The North Webster-Tippecanoe Township Chamber of Commerce will be renovating the concession stand at the North Webster Community Center as a visitor’s center. The Chamber is relocating its office from the Tippecanoe Township building to the NWCC. InkFreeNews photo by Keith Knepp.

By Keith Knepp
InkFreeNews

NORTH WEBSTER — During the North Webster-Tippecanoe Township annual banquet, it was announced the North Webster-Tippecanoe Township Chamber of Commerce plans to renovate the old concession stand area at the North Webster Community Center to open a new visitor’s center.

This coincides with the chamber moving its office from the Tippecanoe Township building on South Morton Street to the NWCC as a result of the township selling that property to the North Webster Church of God.

“With the sale of the township building the chamber had to find a new office location,” said Chamber President Emily Shipley. “Over a period of a few months, starting last summer, we started to look at options around North Webster. A priority was finding a space where we could have our monthly meetings. Since we are all volunteers and wouldn’t be able to staff an office, spending thousands on rent for a storefront didn’t make sense. We needed to find a location where we could have a monthly meeting, have storage for our event supplies and decorations, as well as host our telephone answering service. Scott Kuhn, Karen White and I toured a couple of places in town and took photos to take back to the board for a vote.

“When Scott and I toured the Community Center with Emily Worrell, she gave us a couple of options for space. The spaces she offered us were beautiful, however, none of them made sense to have an office we couldn’t staff. If we couldn’t staff, it didn’t make sense to pay rent. While touring we walked past the old concession stand. She offered us this space because of the cabinetry, which would be able to store some of our supplies. With the rental of this space we would have the use of a room to hold our monthly board meeting which was the priority, as well as WiFi and a phone extension.

“After some careful thought, Scott and I came up with the idea to rent this space and utilize all the benefits of being a tenant at the Community Center, but we also came up with a plan to present to the board of creating this space to be a visitor’s center.

“The concessions stand is next to the building entrance on SR 13. Those doors will not be open on a daily basis, but will be during big events at the NWCC and during community events.”

The visitor’s center will not be staffed during most times. “There may be days that having a volunteer would be ideal,” said Shipley. “For now, the visitor center will be used as a central location to find brochures, lake maps, a calendar of events, our community guide and necessary information for residents, potential residents, and visitors to glean information. Ideas are limitless and we are encouraging our members to have input.”

The chamber will display its “Member of the Month” photos and historical community photos at the visitors center. It also will have a suggestion box, as they are always looking for suggestions on events and activities that will benefit the community. This will be allow people to provide anonymous suggestions.

“Directing people to the Visitor Center will be through our social media accounts and advertising,” Shipley said. “All of our members will be encouraged to direct people there for community information.”

Construction on the new space started earlier this week. Next week they will work on painting the walls and gathering information to be displayed. Renovations should be completed by the end of the month.

“Funding for this project is minimal because we have awesome volunteers, such as Chris Trowbridge, Paula Miller, Scott Kuhn and myself who are giving their time and talent,” Shipley concluded. “The paint and supplies will be purchased by the chamber.”

Visitor’s Center to open in North Webster