Missoula CVB Newsletter October 8, 2004

We have been away for a while following Mark Martins departure to the Lone Star State. We will be doing our best to keep you up to date with everything going on in the tourism community.

2004 � 2005 Missoula Visitors Guides are here. This year we printed 100,000 up 25,000 from last year. Please contact Barb Neilan at the CVB office. 532-3250 or [email protected].

http://www.missoulacvb.org

We just returned from the Tourism Advisory Council meeting in Billings and we are happy to report that our consumer advertising was approved for fiscal year 2004-2005. Lodging tax revenue figures for the second quarter April 1 thru June 30 indicate a 3% growth statewide and a 4% increase in Glacier Country as a whole but collections in Missoula were flat with $332,840 collected in 2003 and $334,325 in 2004.

Missoula Parks and Recreation is looking for volunteer trailblazers to
open access to a new bicycle/pedestrian bridge spanning Rattlesnake Creek at
the north end of Duncan Drive. Volunteers will work with Parks and
Recreation staff to construct a new trail link to the bridge site on Saturday,
October 16, from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Join us for some work, a lot of fun, and
beautiful scenery-no experience is necessary. Transportation, tools, training, and dinner will be provided.
The bridge is a project of the non-profit "Friends of Missoula Parks" and will create a vital trail link in the Rattlesnake Greenway. Bridge construction is slated to begin later this fall. Interested volunteers should call Missoula Parks and Recreation at 721-PARK to register. Volunteers should meet at the McCormick Recreation Building at 11 a.m. on the 16th, and bring gloves, work boots, long pants, water and appropriate outerwear.

http://www.ci.missoula.mt.us/parksrec

I am pleased to announce our most recent edition of Niche News is now available on our web site at the link below under "Activity Group". This edition looks at visitors participating in �Festivals & Special Events� as a primary activity. This Niche News is a summary of findings that have been extracted from our 2001-2002 Nonresident Visitor Survey. Each summary displays a detailed profile of visitors based on their travel characteristics.

Niche News Publication

Some interesting news from Utah!

Sep. 16– Utah ‘s stagnating tourism industry is pursuing legislation that would result in a $55 million state investment over the next decade to bolster promotional campaigns.

But the draft bill has a long way to go before it makes it through the Legislature and there are no assurances what amount of funding will remain if and when a final version receives lawmakers’ approval next session.

As Sen. Carlene Walker observed Wednesday as the Workforce Services and Community and Economic Development Interim Committee tinkered with its wording: "This is a work in progress, and probably not the final version. Every time we meet we make changes and I believe there will be more."

Utah Tourism Industry Coalition executive director Nanette Groves and Ski Utah President Kip Pitou know all too well the vulnerability of legislation with large fiscal notes, such as the $10 million investment requested from the 2005 Legislature in the current draft of the bill.

During the last two legislative sessions, their hopes for increased tourism promotion funding died with bills that never came close to passage.

So they huddled in the hall after Wednesday’s interim committee session with Richard Bradford, deputy director of the state Department of Community and Economic Development (which oversees tourism) and industry lobbyists to stake out a course of action to keep this rendition of the bill on track to receive serious consideration in the upcoming session.

In its present format, the Legislature would allocate $10 million next year for marketing the state, $9 million the following year, $8 million the year after that and so on, the appropriation declining $1 million each year until no money is given after a decade.

But by then, $55 million in public funds would be invested to tout Utah ‘s geographic wonders and recreation possibilities, money that tourism officials insist will be well spent. They contend that for every dollar invested in tourism, $8 comes back in money spent by out-of-state visitors.

The bill also stipulates that a portion of the extra sales and use tax generated as a result of the enhanced promotional effort will go into a fund that will underwrite future advertising after the state subsidy ends.

Another provision designed to improve the bill’s appeal at the local-government level requires 20 percent of the Tourism Marketing Performance Fund to be set aside for a "cooperative program" where it can be used by "cities, counties, nonprofit destination marketing organizations and similar public entities."

How money going into the fund is used to promote out-of-state advertising will be decided by a Board of Travel Development. As of Wednesday, it would be a 13-member board, two more than previously contemplated, with the recent addition of representatives from the Utah Association of Counties and the Utah Tourism Industry Coalition.

The interim committee is expected to discuss the bill again at its mid-October meeting.

The Montana tourism industry will be lobbying our legislature next session to not only continue funding tourism marketing with the bed tax, but also to return funds that have been diverted for other uses back to marketing and promotion. If you have any ideas on how to impress upon our legislatures the importance of tourism, or wish to participate in the lobbying effort, please let us know at the CVB office.

Check out this weeks downtown events at the MDA website http://www.missouladowntown.com

The Montana InnKeepers Association has provided MCVB with several copies of a CD that illustrates the important of tourism as an economic revenue generator. If you would like to view this or share it contact the MCVB office.

If you have any items of interest you would like included in our weekly newsletter email them to [email protected]

Jon Bernthal