The 2016 Regional Leaders’ Retreat wrapped up just before 10:30 a.m. Saturday morning in Overland Park, and there was a lot of discussion on a number of topics, leaving local leaders with plenty to move on in the coming year.

This was the first retreat for Junction City’s new Chamber CEO, Dennis Beson. He explained that he’s looking forward to getting started on some of the action plans that were put into place. One area that caught his attention was the information put out about the National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility being built in Manhattan.

“We’re maybe even lagging a little bit as a town. We have to step up and we may have to get really aggressive with putting some plans together, as far as locating some people there,” said Beson. “But it’s also exciting, because I think we have tremendous opportunity.”

Workforce development was another key topic during the retreat and that’s one area Beson says he feels Junction City and Geary County is ahead of the game on, as they work to become an ACT Work Ready Certified Community.

“We’ve established a work readiness program that we’re already almost through the first year of training on a two-year training program. And that’s going to put us ahead, as far as, categorizing our workers, determining what kind of workforce we actually have in Junction City, and then knowing what our deficiencies are so we can actually improve on that.”

Junction City / Geary County leaders will begin moving forward with the information and action plans that were developed during the retreat starting Monday evening when they come together for the Joint City/County meeting at the C.L. Hoover Opera House.