MCKINNEY (WBAP/KLIF)- The McKinney Chamber of Commerce is pushing for more inclusion and diversity in the area. “Obviously racism should not be tolerated in our community but we wanted to take it a step further and say okay but what are we going to do about it,” said Chamber President Lisa Hermes.
Hermes said they plan to combat this issues with a multi-pronged approach, launching initiatives to help the McKinney area define any actionable changes that can be made at the local or state level. Hermes said first, they will be looking internally to see if the chamber membership, as a whole, reflects the diversity of McKinney. “We’ll do this by looking at specific sets of data, including the number of businesses that are owned by minorities and women,” she said. Second, the chamber plans to partner with other McKinney-based groups to enhance opportunities that are already in place to support a diverse and inclusive workforce. Third, the Chamber created a Chamber Board Task Force that focuses on diversity and inclusion. Hermes said this task force will collect information about businesses in the area.
“We are still in the early stages of research, collecting data and once we have that we want to publish it and be very transparent in our findings,” said Hermes.
Hermes said with the information, they are going to decide what they can do to bridge the gaps and make sure all businesses can thrive in the city. “We want to have those tough conversations and come up with solutions on how we can move forward,” said Hermes. “I think the local level is probably the best place for change to start because that’s really where all of our interactions begin,” she said.