Candace Carr Strauss has already met dozens of new people, sat down with local officials, gone on a few hikes and experienced first-hand the woes of the local housing market.

And that was just her first two weeks on the job.

“Things are going really well,” the new president and CEO of the Sedona Chamber of Commerce said last week. “I had heard about the ‘Sedona way’ of people being very friendly and welcoming and it’s true. I’ve had a whole lot of folks reach out to me, even before I had gotten here. It continued upon my arrival and I’m meeting new people every day.”

She replaces Jennifer Wesselhoff, who departed Sedona last October to become president and CEO of the chamber of commerce in Park City, Utah.

Carr Strauss comes to Sedona after having served as the CEO of the Big Sky Chamber of Commerce & Visit Big Sky, in Big Sky, Mont.

“In a way, Big Sky and Sedona are sister cities because there are far too many similarities between the two,” she said. “It’s actually kind of crazy how similar they are.”

As far as how she heard about the opening in Sedona, Carr Strauss said she was contacted by a recruiter, who she happened to know and was familiar with her capabilities and work in Big Sky.

“She said that my skill set would lend itself well to the opportunity in Sedona and asked if I would be interested in looking at it,” she said. “As I started to dig in and read more I became very excited about the opportunity. I recognize that we have challenges here but I think we have to stop, take stock and be grateful where we find ourselves today for the fact that we have continued to see tourism.”

She said that areas like Sedona and Big Sky have been very fortunate, compared to many other tourist destinations, that numbers have held steady during the pandemic while many cities have suffered.

One of the other draws to Sedona for Carr Strauss, who is married and has two teenage children, is the fact that her sister and sister’s children live in Tempe. Her mother did as well but passed away in late February.

“It’s a little bittersweet,” she said regarding her excitement of the new job but the sudden loss of her mother. “It was definitely not the transition I had planned or hoped for but everyone has been so lovely and supportive after finding out about my mom.”

Carr Strauss, a native of Ohio and graduate of Miami University of Oxford, Ohio, said in her research of Sedona, she found all the positive aspects of the community but is aware of a certain segment of the population that sees tourism as a negative thing and blames the chamber.

“My eyes are wide open,” she said. “How I look at it is, fundamentally these people are passionate about where they live and they’re trying to safeguard what they’re passionate about and what they love. But we don’t always do the best job in manifesting that and how we put that out into the universe.

“We all have to remember to be kind to one another. There’s not enough of that these days and obviously with everyone being cooped up with the pandemic has exacerbated that stress. It’s just that heightened sensitivity right now and I hope that will dissipate with the rollout of the vaccines and we get to roam about the cabin as we once did.”

Carr Strauss said one of the biggest issues facing this area is the lack of affordable and available workforce housing. And like city officials, she would like to find a balance for both residents and those homeowners who wish to use their residence for shortterm vacation rentals. She’s encouraged by what she’s heard in terms of local transit and how it will help with traffic and reduce parking issues at area trailheads. Another issue facing Sedona, she said, is the lack of working-class families and the impact it’s having on school enrollment.

“If you look at any livability index on what makes a true community, it’s having a socioeconomically-diverse resident base,” she said. “We’re losing that.”

At the time of her Carr Strauss’s hiring, Chamber Board President Lonnie Lillie said he was relieved and happy that the search was over. The search committee was impressed that she has served as a CEO as well as with the way she presented herself during the interview process.

“Candace continues to impress,” Lillie said this week. “She is jumping right in — meeting with local leaders. I believe in her first two weeks she has had meetings or hikes with different leaders throughout the Verde Valley.”