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HomeMy WebLinkAboutM011012 TCC Draft Minutes, 1-10-12 WSU Extension Center, Madrona Room 9:10 am Members attending were: Allison Willing, Carol Christiansen, Chuck Russell, Joy Baisch, Bill Roney, Nathan La Plante, Bud Schindler & Diane Schostak via conference phone. Unexcused: Amanda Others: John Austin, Teresa Verraes called in at 9:25 am. Staff: Kitti deLong Minutes, 11-8-11 Carol moved to approve the Minutes as presented. Bill seconded. Motion passed unanimously. Financial Report – End of Year 2011 - Kitti We had a little unexpected excitement in that the County LTAC account was short and we couldn’t expend the final balance that should have been in our TCC account. That balance was $2,607.40 as shown on your End-of-Year Financial Statement. I haven’t heard the final word about what happened but Aimee Campbell, who took Karen Bednarski’s place in the Auditor’s office and writes the checks to pay our invoices, said that the County LTAC fund had an unusual and extraordinary expense this year of approx. $2,800 for the vandalism repairs at the Gateway VC. Those repairs were discussed during the LTAC meeting in September and the minutes say that Philip Morley asked the Board Members to take that amount from the Capital Fund. There was a vote to do that, which passed unanimously. That should have happened through an Appropriation. Philip did tell me that Appropriation may have slipped through the cracks and he was going to look into the matter. I have not heard back from him whether that really was the case. Those last funds could not be expended because an Appropriation could not be accomplished before the end of the year. That takes three to four weeks and must be advertised. So Philip said that if that was the case, that the Appropriation had been missed, that we would need to pay the last of the bills after the first of the year with 2012 funds and then Philip would do a first quarter appropriation to “make TCC whole” this year. Financial Report, 1-10-2012 There are two invoices this month: Balance of Reprinting Cost an Activity Map Invoice from 2011 $1,808.23 Coordinator’s Services & Expenses 793.24 Total: $2,601.46 Allison made a motion to accept the Financial Reports as presented. Bill seconded. Motion passed unanimously. Kitti requested TCC purchase a Polycom phone conferencing unit. The unit at WSU does not work well enough because the people who call in are not able to hear what is happening at the meeting. TCC purchased one in the past, but sent it back because WSU agreed to put a conferencing unit in the Madrona room. That unit is completely inadequate. Discussion. Carol made a motion to purchase a Polycom unit with a budget of between $240 and $400 and have Gary Smith investigate the technical choices. Nathan seconded. Motion passed unanimously. Teresa joined via phone at 9:25 am. Carol asked how the budget is determined. Joy explained the process. Diane suggested that Carol review the document, “OPVB and OPTC: What’s the Difference.” Diane will re-distribute that article. Christina will send out her article on the acronyms. Additions There were no additions. Commissioner’s Update – John Austin John presented the charts for Hotel/Motel Lodging Tax income and the chart for General Sales Tax Receipts. John stated that the repayment to the State for their overpayment in 2004 came out of our August amount. County LTAC income is doing significantly better considering that we paid that $11,000 and also considering the loss of Port Hadlock Inn. Joy stated that LTAC income from the Inn at Port Hadlock was a significant portion of Sales Tax income. Christina said that a lot of kudos should go to Port Ludlow because they have worked hard to increase visitors and overnight stays. Port Ludlow received a round of kudos. Discussion about how Kalaloch did last year. Carol asked if we need a motion to approve the 2012 budget. Joy stated that we had approved the 2012 budget in August in preparation for the LTAC Budget Request meeting in September. Discussion about how cumbersome the system is with the present invoicing system and with the County having to write checks for TCC invoices. Discussion about the fact that TCC cannot accept funds from any agency because of this system. Also, there is no ability to check whether invoices have been paid and no way to check balances of TCC’s account without calling the Auditor’s office. Joy asked if anyone here is interested in putting this TCC financial system under another form of system, for instance, 501c3, for financial management. Discussion. Questions are: Who might do this, possibility of administrative fees. Joy had a conversation with Donna to ask if she would give us a crash course in how to figure out how the system works and she has agreed. John stated that the Commissioners were surprised and saddened to find out that Kate Burke was bumped by seniority and is leaving Fort Worden. Discussion about what a tremendous loss that is. Commissioners are conducting interviews with seven people applying for the job of Community Development Director, which was Al Scalf’s position. The County Budget has been approved. Joy stated that there was an increase in cost of permits that all affect tourism. Discussion. 10:00 Debbie Black called in re: Spring Campaign Culinary Adventure: Last fall, we ended up with 30 people who took part in the contest. That number was up from last year, but the increase is slow. One person nearly completed all of the questions and it was the same person who won last spring. In the end, no one actually won a prize but Debbie did contact those who submitted photos and told them we would like to send them an apron. John left at 10:06 am. Debbie suggested that we continue to add more sites. One site included in the Fall Campaign has closed. She suggested adding the Elwah Dam Restoration and Rocky Brook Falls. She would like to continue to add sites around the loop and then can promote by region later. Discussion. For the Seattle Dining contest, Debbie suggested having a passport that is stamped and have graduated levels for prizes, maybe an apron as a prize for anyone who submits photos, etc. She asked for suggestions for including locally grown, locally harvested produce. Please send Debbie names and contact info of anyone you would like to add. Debbie suggested that instead of doing this as a two or three month campaign, extend this from spring through fall so people have six months to complete the tasks involved in the contest. Christina asked if this would take away from trying to increase the shoulder season visitors, which this contest was designed to promote. Debbie thought this suggested change would improve all visitor traffic and that contestants would probably come more often than once. Debbie suggested that we have an event like a tour that departed from the Seattle side and had an overnight stay involved, and maybe have several chaperones on the bus, with maybe a farmer, etc, and promote this event with advertising in specific culinary publications. Discussion about running the same tour as a FAM tour for media to work out the kinks. Discussion about logistics, who to include, how to accomplish this task. Debbie would like to get take media out in March and then promote the tour to the public a little later in the spring. If there is some demand for this, then we can run it again. Discussion. Diane suggested that we look at what Evergreen Escapes is doing with culinary tours on the east side and maybe we should try to work with them. Joy suggested including some of the concierges who support us and get their feedback on this. Discussion about Jean Boyle, who has an airporter-sized van and who does some tours in Jefferson County. Social Media: Debbie has been driving all traffic to olympicpeninsula.org. There is a Facebook page associated with that now. Would like to set up a blog to disseminate our information and also utilize the Facebook page to keep the word going especially with people who have come out and experienced this already. Christina stated that she has a 2 ½ minute culinary video that is on ejoypt.com and we can link to that. Joy stated that we are trying to get a story line going to use in our promotions. Debbie is considering advertising with Sound Rider, which targets the motorcycle population. They do a promotion called Café-to-Café that targets a population that is looking for places to ride to and we can look at some opportunities there. Sound Rider does not want us to compete with their Café-to-Café promotion, though. Discussion. They cannot promote anything that involves alcohol and driving. Debbie is looking for potential up-coming trade shows where we might have an opportunity to promote the contest. Discussion about the NW Food Services show at Semiamoo on April 29. Debbie felt that would be a good fit. This campaign, Debbie would like to do some advertising on TV with 30-second spots. We can select the network we want the spots on, as well as the geographic area where they are shown. Discussion about KVI Radio with a local talk show. Debbie would also like to explore some new on-line advertising. Debbie needs the budget amount for the spring campaign and then she can get a proposal out to us. Discussion about the amount we will budget for the Spring Campaign. Diane has budgeted the same amount this year as last, $27,000. Discussion about Adventure Travel Media. Diane had a long conversation with the owner of that company and feels that she wants to explore further the possible benefits of this agency. She is adding another $1,500 from OPVB to that contract to make $6,500 and will focus on several fronts, including culinary. Spring Campaign Budget will be 60% of total budget, with 40% for the Campaign. The total budget includes: $5,000 from OPTC, $27,000 for OPVB, and $27,000 from TCC for a total of $59,000. That makes the Spring Campaign budget $35,400, and the Fall Campaign budget will be $23,600. It was agreed that we would continue to use Debbie Black and we will go in the directions she has suggested. Discussion about how we choose venues so we aren’t always going to the same ones. We may not want to focus on the trivia. Discussion. PT LTAC – Christina Port Townsend was named “One of the Top 10 Coolest Small Towns in America” by Budget Travel and is the only one on the list in the Pacific NW. As of yesterday, we are in the fourth place. Christina wants everyone to vote and vote everyday until January 31. She has just put one video on the web from a historical perspective. Christina stated that we don’t win anything except nationwide recognition. The Kennewick ferry was launched last week. Christina is going to a meeting next week with Washington State Ferries who will be initiating a marketing plan for communities that have ferry service. PT LTAC is having a meeting this afternoon and came in $7500 under budget. They’re hoping to roll that money over into 2012. Over the last year, they have lost almost 50 rooms in Port Townsend. Had a tremendous holiday promotion. There was a budget cut with the Main Street program and so the City did the promotion using LTAC. 370 people signed up for the contest to win a two night getaway to PT. Christina and Diane are going to the WTA board meeting on Thursday. Christina is chairing the state-wide Summit on April 5 at SeaTac. Keynote speaker is Roger Dow from US Travel Association. A reception will be held the night before the Summit. Goal for this year is to work hard to bring more people in during April to October time-frame. Christina will send a link on a study of travel trends to Kitti and she will send this out to the TCC Board members. Discussion about which WTA application to use, has been confusion since they are not dated. The current application is on the website: washingtontourismalliance.com. Allison asked if there was a way for us to include promotion activities that would draw Canadians during their two weeks of Spring Break in March. Discussion. It was determined that we couldn’t move our Spring Campaign up enough to accomplish that this year and would have to work on that for next year. Christina stated that over Presidents Day Weekend, the Salmon Derby will be held out of the Boat Haven and she is reaching out to see how we can partner with those fishermen. Another event is the Red Wine and Chocolate Tour over two weekends, on Feb. 11-12, & 18-20, hosted by the Olympic Peninsula Wineries Association. Diane announced that Linda Peterson is building a small resort on the Upper Hoh Road, and is also building a monument to the St. Nicholai wreck. OPTC - Diane Diane is working on the Victoria Campaign and thinks we will get a little more reach and a little more lift this year. Also, OPTC is about to get some co-op dollars from Whidbey and Kitsap. Will go to Germany in March on a trade mission. We have enough funds to do the Germany Mission and will look into the UK/France Mission for fall. Nathan LaPlante just hired Debbie Black and her team to represent Port Ludlow this year. She will be reaching out for a whole lot more. Port Ludlow has new websites that they hope to have finished soon. The Golf Course is hosting the International Golf Association on Jan. 27 and Chef Dan will host “Healthy Cooking” on Jan 14. Bill stated that the lodging list has been reviewed. Parks list is out and to be reviewed. Is waiting for the reformat of the face sheet that you see on the rack. Will print 30,000 with 15,000 folded. We are printing a smaller amount because of the volatility of the lodging industry since there have been so many lodgings closing and therefore changes on the back of the map. Are down 6.5% from 2010 to 2011. Discussion about whether Gateway VC can be moved. At the LTAC discussion in September, it was determined that there were no other sites that will work, either because there are too many problems or because of DOT issues, and Bill has decided to keep Gateway Visitor Center where it is. Discussion about bringing in trailers that have bathroom facilities with running water. Maybe that would allow Gateway VC to get a sign on the highway since that is dependent on having a bathroom with running water. 2012 Meeting Schedule: Change Feb. meeting day to the 14, otherwise the schedule th is approved. Carol stated that there would be no Shrimp Fest this year. Joy will host a Shrimp Buffet by the Bay on Memorial Day Weekend, which will be off the Dose Road and will accommodate 3-4,000 people. That is one of the alternatives this year. Will also do garden tours and music. Have been in touch with the State Parks who do not know what they are going to do re: Shrimp Fest and things like that, because of budget difficulties. Carol stated that the Case Statement for Worthington Park is finished. Are now in the permitting process and hope to break ground soon. Meeting ended at 11:20 am.