Conejo Valley Chamber Names Business Owner New Executive Director

The Conejo Valley Chamber of Commerce has tapped a real estate investor with 15 years of experience managing Southern California chambers of commerce to lead the organization into the next century, officials said Thursday.

Fred Burkhardt, who owns an investment property management firm in Bend, Ore., will take over Sept. 4 as the chamber’s new executive director. His appointment comes just a week before the chamber is scheduled to reexamine its goals at its annual board of directors retreat.

“We are taking this opportunity to reassess the services we are offering to our members,” said Judy St. John, chamber board president.

Burkhardt will replace interim Executive Director Terry Greenberg, the former editor of the then-Thousand Oaks News Chronicle, now-Thousand Oaks Star, who is leaving to become the editor of a similar-sized newspaper in the Midwest.

“The executive board has been working with Terry [Greenberg] to assess where we are and put together an agenda for the retreat,” St. John said. “Now we are going to make Fred [Burkhardt] a part of that process. He has ideas, and we have ideas about things that could be done better. The daylong retreat will bring the two together.”

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Besides looking for new members, St. John said, the chamber wants to create new committees to better serve the needs of businesses, such as one targeting the retail community.

Burkhardt was selected from about 30 candidates that included several local business people as well as chamber executives from other cities, St. John said. He was chosen because he had extensive experience as a chamber executive and as a business owner, she said.

Chamber officials said they hoped Burkhardt would reinvigorate the organization. Before Greenberg began his temporary position in May, Steve Rubenstein led the chamber for 14 years. During his tenure, Rubenstein was credited with bolstering the organization’s membership from 640 to a peak of 1,670. Membership has since declined to 1,200.

Though he will have to wait for direction from the chamber’s Aug. 23 board retreat, Burkhardt said he already has his own plans.

“With a membership of about 1,200, in a community that has about 12,000 businesses, we will move immediately to expand the chamber’s membership,” he said. “I would like to see us get to 20% of the business community.”

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Burkhardt has already sent a survey to board members. He said the results would serve as an indicator of the board’s priorities. After attending the retreat, Burkhardt said, he plans to do an “intense community audit,” conducting one-on-one interviews with chamber members, elected officials, homeowners associations, industry groups and other organizations. “We will try to hammer out a plan of action for the next few years,” he said.

Burkhardt, 52, was executive vice president of the West Covina Chamber of Commerce between 1981 and 1990. Before that, he served as executive vice president of the San Gabriel Valley Council of Business and Industry, manager of research and economic development for the Pasadena Chamber of Commerce and assistant manager of the Glendale Chamber of Commerce.

While in West Covina, Burkhardt helped realize the expansion of The Plaza at West Covina, a major mall, said Tracy Tabeizon, who worked closely with Burkhardt for five years at the West Covina chamber.

“He is a very dynamic individual,” Tabeizon said. “He was very involved with the community and had good relations with city officials.”

He has a bachelor’s degree from San Diego State University and an MBA from USC, as well as a certificate in public relations from UCLA. Burkhardt is a past member of the faculty of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Institute of Organizational Management and past president of the Southern California Assn. of Chamber of Commerce Executives.

Burkhardt said he originally moved to Oregon to retire, but quickly tired of not working and opened his own real estate firm, Central Oregon Investment and Management Inc. He and his wife, Linda, are now returning to California to be closer to their three children and five grandchildren who live in Southern California, including an adult daughter in Oxnard.

Greenberg said he has enjoyed his short stay at the chamber but was looking forward to his return to the newspaper business.

“The sad part will be leaving Thousand Oaks and all the friends we have here,” he said. “I think that [with Burkhardt], the chamber is going to get a hell of guy.”