After nearly three years on the job Tom Weigand, Chamber of Commerce CEO will be stepping down Friday.

Weigand spoke to the Military Affairs Council Breakfast audience Thursday morning at the Geary County Convention Center. During his remarks he explained he hopes he will be remembered for his work on regionalism.

“What I want to say is that we, as economic development people and chamber people, we work together very well. What the challenge is, is that the elected officials have a constituency they have to report to and be responsible for. Business’ don’t see those party lines, or those county lines, or those city boundaries, they see the region. So you’ve got to keep focusing on that available workforce within an hour of Junction City or Manhattan,” said Weigand.

An example Weigand used was when Advanced Call Center Technologies was interested in locating a call center in Junction City they didn’t ask about utility rates, or tax rates, but if there was an available work force. ACCT started with 35 employee’s this past June and have now grown to 150 employees. Weigand added that they are now looking into hiring an additional 300 employee’s in the coming months.

The search for Weigand’s successor is a work in progress. The hope is to have a CEO in place within the coming months.