COEUR d'ALENE - For the first time, six legislatively active organizations are cooperating to send Kootenai County's legislative leaders to Boise with an agenda.

The chambers of commerce in Coeur d'Alene and Post Falls have joined forces with the North Idaho Building Contractors Association, Coeur d'Alene Association of Realtors, North Idaho College and the city of Coeur d'Alene are co-hosting an event on Dec. 11 to educate state legislators on their priorities.

The Post Falls Chamber of Commerce has taken the lead to organize registrations. Chamber CEO Pam Houser said her members are still fine-tuning their agenda, and probably will be until the legislative session begins in January.

"But we will have an agenda printed off and ready for the sendoff," she said. "After we listen to the legislators, we will probably go back and tweak it a little bit."

She said her members' top priorities this year will be education and economic development. She said it's all about job creation.

"We are interested in education funding for technical education," Houser said. "The innovation side is a really big deal. It's always been huge, but we need to keep beating that drum."

She said the chamber is likely to have other educational issues on its final agenda, but the primary focus will be supporting efforts that transition students from school into the workforce.

Houser said a one-hour reception starts at 4 p.m., followed by the presentations starting at 5 p.m.

"And there should be some time for Q and A at the end," she said.

The Post Falls chamber is taking reservations for the event, which costs $15 in advance or $20 at the door.

Dist. 2 Rep. Vito Barbieri, R-Dalton, said all the state legislators will be in Boise today through Friday for organizational meetings, so they should have a pretty good idea of how the session is going to go when they get back.

Mark Browning, who manages government relations for NIC, said NIC is going to push for more community college funding.

"For us when the economy goes up, our enrollment goes down," he said, adding the college depends on enrollments to fund its fixed costs.

NIC's primary focus will be getting community colleges increased appropriations from the state's general fund.

Browning said the college has a whole list of requests, such as increased funding for its popular aerospace program, which has been highly successful in training aerospace workers for local jobs.

He said it will also focus on funding for a joint-use building, along with University of Idaho, and Lewis-Clark State College.

NIC is going to ask for security upgrades as well.

Browning said in the past, legislators were invited to a half-dozen different sendoff events, so this year they will hold one joint event and take the pressure off the elected officials.

Representatives from the other hosting organizations could not be reached for comment Tuesday.

The event will be held at Garden Plaza of Post Falls at 545 N. Garden Plaza Court. Registration is available online at the Post Falls chamber website or by calling 773-5016.