The Milpitas Chamber of Commerce has undergone various changes over the past year.
In recent years, the Chamber has experienced its fair share of staff and board resignations, largely because of claims related to organizational mismanagement of their budget and low morale within the Chamber team. This all came to a head in February 2023 when the Board President himself, Inderjit Mundra, resigned from his position.
Hopeful for positive changes under the new leadership, local business owner Tim Alcorn joined the Chamber Board of Directors.
Yet, Alcorn has since resigned from his role as Vice President of Policy (on October 10), citing harassment and bullying as two of his reasons.
While things were good at first according to Alcorn, he alleged that during his time as part of the Board, he witnessed Board Members bullying each other and harassing Chamber staff. Examples posed by Alcorn included some Board Members demanding time cards from office staff, as well as Board Members sending emails to each other telling one another to resign.
“It was not a place of business, it was not a place of Milpitas values. It was a place of party planning, bullying, and harassment,” Alcorn said.
The Beat was able to confirm some of the bullying claims by speaking with current members of the Chamber Board. “The Chamber does have a bad apple that should be asked to resign,” said Juliette Gomez, Vice President of Marketing, Idea Generation, and Events. “Demeaning, bullying, and harassing anybody in a volunteer or work environment is uncalled for and should not be tolerated.”
There are some who contradict these claims. “Adults in organizations like the Chamber will have differences of opinions,” said Francisco Hernandez, Vice President of the Chamber. “Just because one person disagrees versus another I don’t think there’s any bullying in that sense.”
However, these issues don’t paint the full picture when it comes to the Milpitas Chamber of Commerce: “There are some people who care a lot about titles and there’s a lot of people who care about getting the work done,” said Jennifer Cullenbine, current Board Member and previous President. She stated that despite these issues, the Chamber has come a long way in the past year.
One component in which the Chamber has improved is its financial situation. According to Alcorn as well as multiple current Board Members, the Chamber has been up to date with all of their bills and has also been successfully working to pay off their debts over the past year.
While they have plans to be completely debt-free soon, the Chamber is especially committed to the responsibility of managing their finances enough to help support themselves and their 170+ business members, a number that continues to grow each day, according to current Chamber President Norma Morales.
Currently, the Chamber is focusing on its own growth, along with fostering the relationship between its business members and the City of Milpitas. They have worked on this by improving the transparency between themselves and the City through regular monthly meetings. The Chamber has also been planning events for members, focusing on education, promotion, advocacy, and networking. Overall, Board Members such as Cullenbine remain optimistic for the future of the Chamber despite the challenges they’ve faced.
“There’s a lot of really good people on the Chamber Board,” said Alcorn. “Without them, there would be no Chamber.” Despite resigning from the Board, Alcorn’s business continues to be a registered member of the Chamber and Alcorn is “extremely hopeful” about the Chamber turning around.
“It’s a lot of hard work,” said Morales, regarding having to build the Chamber back up after being left with debts from the 2023 board. Morales also said that the Chamber “Can always go up,” and that they intend to continue building off their successes and supporting Milpitas businesses.
So the Current Chamber Board is looking toward the future, and community members can provide them with any feedback that they have to help the Chamber improve. Business owners can also stop by the Chamber office to inquire about joining as a member.
