The Dell Rapids Chamber of Commerce has big plans for rest of the 2017 calendar year. Chamber President Dan Ahlers highlighted some of the items the chamber has planned during the Dell Rapids City Council regular meeting on Monday, August 21st.
The first event that will be happening is the “Rhythm at the Rapids” music festival on Saturday, September 16th. This is the second year for the event at Dell Rapids City Park.
“We created this event hoping it will be eventually a mini Jazz Fest for our community. We did fairly well last year for our first year. There were somewhere between 400 and 600 people total that attended that,” said Ahlers.
The event had five bands last year, and this year’s event will also feature five bands. The chamber plans to have other family friendly events at the park during the day such has bounce houses, face painting, and canvas painting. The city council also approved a 1-day alcoholic beverage license for the music festival to allow the chamber to sell alcoholic beverages throughout the day. The first act of the day will start at 11:00 a.m. with the last act scheduled to start at 7:30 p.m.
A new Dell Rapids Chamber of Commerce Administrator has also been hired. Calvin Bloemendaal, a recent graduate from South Dakota State University, was hired for the open position. Bloemendaal has degrees in Consumer Services Management and Family Financial Services. Bloemendaal will start in a couple of weeks and will also be giving chamber updates to the city council soon.
“He’s excited to get started. I think he’s going to be a great addition to our team and certainly is going to help move the chamber organization forward and help us continue to grow,” Ahlers said.
Ahlers also mentioned other projects that are in progress for the chamber. The chamber billboards will soon be updated with a new look. Ahlers reported that designs are in the final stages of being complete with a target of getting them in place yet this fall. A new Dell Rapids visitors and community guide is also in the works by the chamber. The guide will include a history of Dell Rapids section, culture section, business section, and possibly a couple of pages dedicated to surrounding communities. The chamber is working with Anderson Publications to print the guide, and they hope to have them complete by the Christmas at the Dells celebration.