Yellow Pages
SEDRO-WOOLLEY — The Sedro-Woolley Chamber of Commerce has hired its new executive director from within.
The chamber’s board of directors announced earlier this week that it has selected fellow board member Pola Kelley for the job.
Kelley, who owns the Allstate Insurance office on State Street, takes over as director on July 1. Her salary was not disclosed.
Kelley will resign from the board, where she has sat for six years. She was board president from 2005 to 2007.
“She is very well versed in the workings of the chamber,” said current President Randall Wilson. “She’s a leader in the community, with her business. She’s a perfect fit.”
Kelley replaces David Bricka, who resigned in December after less than two years on the job. Board members said they waited six months to hire a new director because revenues from the affiliated Department of Licensing office were down.
Kelley’s role will be to expand the services offered to the chamber’s 218 members, many of them town businesses.
“It’s a tough economy right now, and the more the chamber can do to help businesses with information, the better,” Wilson said.
Kelley is especially interested in furthering the chamber’s downtown revitalization effort.
“I’d like the downtown to be the kind of place where you have a sense of pride,” Kelley said. “I’ve lived here long enough to know that Sedro-Woolley has the ability to be that kind of place.”
Kelley, 58, has lived in Sedro-Woolley since she was a child. She is a graduate of Sedro-Woolley High School and worked for environmental firms in Mount Vernon and Spokane.
Her grandparents are Stanley and Hedwig Janicki, who moved to Skagit County in 1920. The Janicki Industries clan, including Mary, Peter, John and Mike Janicki, are Kelley’s first cousins.
