REINVENTING ITSELF UNIVERSAL CITY/NOHO CHAMBER LOOKS AHEAD TO FUTURE.

Byline: Rick Coca Valley News Writer

Universal City/North Hollywood Chamber of Commerce President Annie G. Reed sees herself as the antithesis of a chamber president. For one, she's only the sixth female president in the chamber's 95-year history. Even more unusual, she said, are her liberal politics and affiliation with organized labor.

``I'm a teamster,'' Reed said. ``(It) just floors everybody on the business committees.''

The second-year chamber president is an associate dean at Los Angeles Valley College, where she has built the extension and learning program into a successful venture for the college. An educator with a master's degree in psychology and a law degree, Reed has more than 20 years experience in higher education. Her chamber involvement began in 1990 and has grown steadily ever since.

Politics aside, Reed said she and her predominately conservative male colleagues have similar goals for the 250-member chamber.

``We find common ground and the common ground is we know we have to build our membership,'' Reed said. ``Any chamber lives and dies on membership. We give value to our members. (These) are things that are not political.''

To that end, Reed said her chamber has received a lot of interest from its members for a business networking opportunity called ``clustering.'' In clustering, individuals or groups representing one specialty business or area of expertise work in private groups to help each other. So one group would have one real estate agent, one lawyer and one accountant, for example.

``The essence of what I'd like to see happen is (to) become modernized because chambers are antiquated agencies,'' Reed said.

Reed said chambers have to become technologically savvy to ``appeal to Generation X.'' Unless chambers learn to change with the times and appeal to younger business people, they will not survive, Reed predicted.

At its peak, the Universal City/North Hollywood chamber had about 500 members, Reed said. One of the reasons for the decline is that major corporations no longer see active chamber membership as vital to their success. Reed said NBC Universal is the lone major corporation that has remained active in her chamber.

``They're a part of our name and they're our largest supporter,'' Reed said. ``They've been wonderful and they're active on our board as well.''

Still, Reed said the writing is on the wall. Chambers must change or risk going under.

``You have to look to the future and not to the present,'' Reed said. ``If the chambers are going to be a part of the community, they have to appeal to the changes in the community.''

On a positive note, Reed said the changes that have occurred in North Hollywood have been welcome.

``The development that we have now is fantastic,'' Reed said, citing some of the chic apartments in the NoHo Arts District.

``It's becoming the place to be and it will become the business place to be,'' Reed said.

The chamber will sponsor the 14th Annual NoHo Theatre and Arts Festival on May 20 and May 21. About 70,000 to 80,000 people are expected to attend the two-day event.

Reed said the chamber is currently located at the Valley Plaza Shopping Center at 6369 Bellingham Ave. in North Hollywood. She said in the 1950s, Valley Plaza was one of the largest, if not the largest, shopping centers in the country.

After a number of years on the downside, Valley Plaza is set to undergo major renovations.

The Universal City/North Hollywood Chamber of Commerce is also going through a renovation of sorts, Reed said. The chamber's board of directors seats have been reduced by half to 16.

``It's been going in so much of a positive direction, the bottom line is, we're reinventing ourselves,'' Reed said. ``We have to. We're appealing to a younger audience.''

For information on the Universal City/North Hollywood Chamber of Commerce, call [phone] or go to www.noho.org.

CAPTION(S):

photo

Photo:

Annie G. Reed, an educator, is in her second year as president of the Universal City/North Hollywood Chamber of Commerce.