GRANTS, N.M. – The Grants Cibola County Chamber of Commerce and New Mexico Mining Museum have hired an executive director.
Around five months ago, former Executive Director of the Chamber of Commerce and the Mining Museum, Les Gaines, has recently stepped down from his position.
In his place is the newly elected Ryan Waterbury.
While the New Mexico Mining Museum and Grants Cibola County Chamber of commerce two separate non-profit boards, they share a single executive director and the office space inside the museum located at 100 Iron Avenue in Grants.
Originally from Florida, then Colorado, Waterbury brings a new perspective to the city of Grants and hopes to see it prosper. He moved to Grants several years ago, wanting to live near or on a mountain, and fell in love with the view.
“I like a lot of things about [this] town. It’s quiet; it’s pretty darn safe; pretty darn clean; I mean, if you’re raising a family, what else are you looking for? Light traffic, low crime; good cost of living, as far as property.” Waterbury said. “Why not Grants?”
Waterbury said he has talked about the potential the Grants-Cibola community and the potential for what could be done. He said that there are small projects that haven’t been touched in a while or are just missing the mark, that have potential and can help the community.
When the position of executive director came to his attention, Waterbury decided it was a good opportunity where he could turn his ideas into action.
Waterbury said his history in running a multi-million- dollar company and opening his own LLC allows him to know what it is like to manage staff and be a small business owner. With these contrasting careers, Waterbury has developed what he calls a “networking and sales mentality”.
The immediate goals for the city of Grants will focus on updating the current Chamber of Commerce website and attracting more tourism. He intends to make Grants an attention-getter to bring those passing by on the Interstate into the town, looking for them to stop and browse at stores, eat at a restaurant, or keep this town in mind so that they may return.
Executive Director Waterbury has not only had many ideas, which he hopes to put into effect. He has been involved in community events, volunteering for the quad just a few weeks ago, and planning to again next year.
Waterbury has been thinking of ideas to support community events. Community fun like raffles, a market, or other forms of entertainment are currently being considered. With any of these ideas added, Waterbury believes the number of attendees would likely increase, and with that, so would tourism.
More ideas concerning activities are making more races, adding markets, and creating more events, to get this community and non-locals together. Waterbury emphasizes the need for more outdoor activities, especially because of the way the town and mountain are.
Since moving to this town, he and his family have enjoyed the mountains, hiking and going on side-by-side rides, as well as going snowshoeing for the first time.
He believes that the mountain and creating more activities focused on it plays a key part in attracting more tourists.
The initiatives this year concerning the Chamber of Commerce will continue to focus on highlighting local businesses.
Initiatives concerning the Mining Museum are utilizing the space and maximizing what they have, so that they can use it properly. He hopes to create more displays and have more mining merchandise and Grants-Milan-Cibola focused items.
However, he knows he must start with “Just baby steps in the beginning and then I’ve got some bigger ideas down the road.”
What he is trying to achieve will likely come with many challenges, which he plans to address with what he called “patience and perseverance”.
To measure the success of his initiatives and goals he said, “I guess that’ll be for everybody else to determine.”
Overall, his goal is to get to know everybody in the community and get involved. He wants to make it easier for people to do business and cross-sell. He wants there to be more money that can be spent improving the town.
Waterbury said, “I would like to see Grants be what it really is.”