Tourism Development Council Meeting Wednesday March 10, 2021 2:00 - 4:00 pm
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Tourism Development Council Meeting
Wednesday
March 10, 2021
2:00 – 4:00 pm
Zoom Meeting
Members Present: Jody Carson, David Penilton, Tammy Thompson, Holly Pfortmiller, Betsy
LaBarge, Luke Spencer, Dewey Griffo
Staff Present: Samara Phelps, Janice Nilson, Ithaca Janzen, Annie Austin, Lizzie Keenan
Action Items:
Welcome/Call to Order/Declaration of Conflicts — Jody Carson, Chair
Approve November 18, 2020 Minutes—Samara Phelps, Executive Director
A motion to approve minutes was made by Tammy Thompson and 2nd by David Penilton voting
unanimous
It was noted that January minutes were not reviewed as there was not a quorum in January and
with retreat and budget preparation minutes were not completed. They will be reviewed in
April.
Discussions:
FY21/22 Priorities with Budget Applied – Presentation & Discussion - Samara Phelps
The 21/22 budget was reviewed. The revenue is projected to be 70% or $2,717,666 based on
Travel Oregon baseline projection.
Forecasting cautiously to program confidently. Portland will be slowest area to recover. We do
have a high performer in the mountain. The Regional Cooperative Tourism Program is using
carryover funds to stabilize funding over the biennium
The key Issues in 21/22 were COVID and Wildfire impacts. Negative Perception of the
Destination around Safety. Overuse of Specific Location and underused in others. Department
Reduced Capacity and Financial Stability.
Staff addressed and determined what we want to do.
o Address COVID-19/Disaster impacts –
be responsive and be nimble – increasing value of website and social values;
Meet local operator’s needs and address hardest hit areas. Portland region
does provide a budget to help serve this specific area.
o Foster a positive impression of the destination.
Strong positive destination presence for visitor audience
Create a positive perception of destination by stakeholders.
Ensure messaging is relevant to current environment
o Mitigate overuse and underuse
Utilize Marketing and Communication tools.
Leverage local identity.
Direct Investment (called Grants in the past) Federal Partners funds– focused on visitor services at Mt Hood National Forest
Zig Zag.
o Build organizational Stability
Staffing – add 3 FTE
Technical support through contracts
Resiliency – increase contingency from 10 – 25% goal by 2024
Create response fund for unforeseen opportunities or needs.
Will we be rehiring a company (BPN) for work on all these things?
o Evaluating what is done with contracts and with staff. An agency of record is not
budgeted in FY21/22
Is contingency the same as reserves?
o Yes
The ranger station is not open?
o Currently it is not. We are working with them to move forward.
The 70% goal appears to be very conservative.
Primary Budget areas are
o Personnel
o Professional Services
o Sales Materials
New Travel Planner
New Assets (Photos)
o Advertising
Returned to the original budget (prior Covid) for 20/21
Visitor and local audiences included
Return of “Always on” campaign messaging
Co-op money for OTA drive to booking strategy
Potential Co-op marketing support for local businesses
o Contingency
Very rough based on carry forward from the previous year.
Will have 25% or 3 months working towards 50% or 6 months by 2024
o Direct Investments (Grants)
This doesn’t have a specific definition until we know the needs
o Partner Training and FAMS
Filling training and technical support needs not met in other areas.
o Dues & Memberships
This had been cut but is now returning. Good leveraging partnership
o Staff Trainings
Ability to attend conferences and trainings
Valued by organization and staff
Keeps us connected to changing Best Practices
Question for the TDC Overall - are there unmet needs? Is it consistent with critical strategies
that need to be addressed.
o Nice to see Advertising value increased
o Take into consideration the relationships built in the past need to be readdressed and
strengthened
o It appears computers may be a bit low
o Are short term rentals going anywhere currently? Probably not for a year or two due to 3 disasters in 1 year.
Regional Stakeholder Engagements - Lizzie Keenan, Regional Coordinator
All regions of Travel Oregon are having engagement sessions over the next few weeks, sharing
draft plans for the upcoming Biennium. Next week on Tuesday Mt Hood / Columbia River Gorge
are scheduled followed on Thursday by the Willamette Valley. Portland Region is not yet
scheduled.
At the most recent meeting – A regional recovery and stability fund has been created and the
funds have been divvied out. All regions were brought closer to normal budgets for the regions.
Celebrating Bright Spots with the Team - Staff Team
Staff has pulled together bright spots of items completed over the past few months.
o Top Chef pitched stories to air in Portland - Three stories came through with 2 in the
Gorge and 1 an Oregon Trail Challenge Mt Hood Territory is named many times
throughout the series. It is on Bravo, Hulu and possibly other ways to view. Will run
April 1 through about July.
o Portland Region had a virtual media Event. Annie’s chickens attended and had 5
minutes to chat about the Willamette Valley Birding Trail. Specifically about the
Heritage Loop The chat included Luscher Farm, Maddox Woods and their views to Goat
Island, Camassia Nature Preserve, Hopkins Demonstration Forest, Talbert Nature Park
and shout outs about our main streets and their proximity to the great outdoors and
river recreation; Willamette Falls and some of the birds that can be seen there.
o Several media have asked to come out now in spring and others summer fall.
o Travel Oregon Advertorial – Communities featured in storytelling is so important at this
time. Worked in tandem with communities and the tourism leads we have.
o Again the hook was proximity to water recreation for 4 main streets, all of which one
can get to within a .5 mile walk.
o Tap Trail Local Campaign – promotion on the Tap Trail started 2/15 and continues to run
now. Pamplin Media ran an advertorial with a full color ad in all Clackamas county
newspapers and digital banner ads. The Tap Trail marked the 8th most popular page,
improved over last year.
o Instagram Stories Performance – strong engagement with Black History Month and local
businesses.
o Destination Ready Grant Funding – Mt. Hood Meadows received a grant for wayfinding
on new trails. The hope is it will help with some of the issues we’ve had on our side of
the mountain regarding trails, parking and such.
Race, Diversity, Equity & Inclusion – Opportunities to learn more - Samara Phelps
Updates were shared by Luke and Tammy
Martine Coblentz from the office of Equity and Inclusion will be joining us in our April meeting.
We are looking for that to be a robust discussion.
Updates:
Commissioner Schrader – updated on Locks bill. Still trying to unlock the locks. Corp meeting
was held recently. Repairs are going to be more costly than originally thought. Will notnecessarily kill the bill but it does need to run up the chain of command. Good news they are
still dedicated. Legislation in Salem needs to pass to form public corporation to become the
place where asset is placed.
TDC Member Reports—Roundtable
David – Welcome Martha good to have you on board. Samara thanks to you and team for
information today. Trying to get word out we are still open for business. Having to work harder
than before and I am behind to say the least. Got a couple new OTA’s on board. Having
deliverables to get out. With our Portland city tour – amazed at response to it. It now comes to
Oregon City, option of West Linn and Lake Oswego, West Linn and Oregon City. As it comes
through it spends an hour in either Downtown Oregon City or West Linn in addition to Lake
Oswego. Response has been really good. Have about 140 future date bookings. Looking at
other things as well. Will work with the team to get things moving faster.
Dewey – First Samara you and your team did a great job. Slide show very informative. Not a lot
of questions regarding budget. What is the timeframe for adding full time employees? Things
in my market, booked 3 large groups for soccer / baseball tournaments. I’m seeing things move
faster than I thought they would.
Luke – Out in Estacada waiting for highway to open up still. Thanks to Samara and team for
work and extra explanation. Estacada positive note, they are having a Diversity, Equity and
Inclusion seminar out there for folks that work for the city and some other key folks invited
others to participate to develop, gain and build. Cliff Jones is leading seminars. Definitely need
pretty excited.
Betsy – Also appreciate all of staff’s work. Nice to see familiar faces. Appreciate energy that is
coming with staff. Look forward to having more. Nice to have Martha with us. All that helps to
feel positive. Business is still going crazy. Last year everything started hitting the fan. It’s
encouraging that it’s looking more positive. In the last week or so we are seeing people book
longer summer stays. Now people are booking 8, 9, 10 day, 2 week stays now. Trails around Mt
Hood Meadows. That’s where I like to go; there are really great views. Hopefully we can
disperse more people to those places.
Tammy – Samara asked me to bring up the University of South Florida hosting a 7 week (2 hr.
modules) the end of March. It is a free program. There is a certificate issued at the end of the
program. It is a Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in the workplace. The program is sponsored by
Tampa Bay Rays, the University and a large company also sponsoring. It is free for everyone to
do. If you have questions or need the link, let me know. Second Dewey’s comment about
things coming up. Every single property I’m seeing an uptake in, its youth sports.
Holly – we are picking up. Feels like spring. Able to hire staff members. Life is good.
Jody – I have news for Willamette Falls and Landings, our executive director Siobhan has
resigned due to health issues. If you know of anyone interested in looking let Jody know.
Historic City Hall appears to be back on the docket. Willamette Main Street, juice bar is now
open again.Samara – I want to give an appreciation out to Janice in terms of this Budget. The staff has done a lot of brain power work but the county is undergoing new budget software, new budget system. She now does not only ours but others budgets and we couldn’t have had what we presented today without her. Adjourned 3:55 pm
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