The Greenville Area Chamber of Commerce Banquet will be held Feb. 21 at the Wendell Mitchell Conference Center on the campus of LBW Community College.

Executive Director Francine Wasden said the event offers an opportunity to “come together and see what the Chamber is doing, as well as learn what’s in store for the city in the upcoming year.”

“This really is an event for everyone, not just Chamber members,” Wasden said. “We’d love to see everyone come out for it.”

The event will mark the fourth consecutive year the Chamber of Commerce has held the banquet after a nearly four-decade hiatus.

This year’s speaker will be former First United Methodist Church minister Gorman Houston.

Houston served as the senior minister at FUMC in Greenville from 1992-98.

He is now a professor of management and marketing in the College of Commerce and Business Administration at the University of Alabama.

“We are very excited to have Gorman come home and speak at our banquet,” Wasden said. “I don’t personally know him, but I’ve talked to a lot of people who knew him while he was in Greenville and they loved him and his family, and I can’t wait to hear him speak.”

Wasden said the Chamber of Commerce chose to have Houston serve as its keynote speaker in an effort to continue to bring back speakers with ties to the area.

Melinda Rainey Thompson, Gordon Stone and James Spann served as three most recent speakers for the event.

“Our thought when we started having the banquet again was to bring back individuals with ties to Greenville who made an impact on our community while they were here,” Wasden said. “It gives us a chance to see what they’ve done since they left, and it also gives them a chance to see how Greenville has grown.”

Greenville Mayor Dexter McLendon will also deliver his State of the City address at the banquet, the Chamber of Commerce will present the “Distinguished Business Leader Award,” and the Greenville Area Jaycess will present the “John D. Murphy Citizen of the Year Award.”

Tickets for the event, which will begin at 6:30 p.m., are $25 and include dinner. To purchase tickets contact the Greenville Area Chamber of Commerce at (334) 382-3251.