The Crested Butte News Serving the Gunnison Valley since 1999
Roles and responsibilities
of tourism-oriented
entities at issue
Research is under way to determine critical issues related to tourism in the Gunnison Valley and the entities charged with promoting it. The Gunnison County Board of County Commissioners, wearing Local Marketing District (LMD) hats, agreed this week to contribute an additional $8,500 to expand the scope of that research, to include gathering more input from additional stakeholders and paying for the completion of a final report, with recommendations.
The project is in the hands of Marv and Marty Weidner of Managing Results, LLC (MR) of Crested Butte, commissioned to facilitate both one-on-one and group stakeholder meetings. The hoped-for result is to better define roles and responsibilities of the Gunnison County Tourism Association (TA) and the local chambers of commerce.
“They want to do another round of discussions and get consensus,” said Gunnison County community development director Russ Forrest.
“Progress has been made,” said Commissioner Paula Swenson. “It’s hard, but I think if we stop now, we’re not going to get to where we want to be in terms of rebuilding.”
“This is a hard discussion,” added Commissioner Jonathan Houck, “because we’re clarifying roles and responsibilities. It’s complicated. But it’s our responsibility to invest this money that the voters approved in order to have the most impact.”
“I’m tentatively supportive of this whole process,” said Commissioner Phil Chamberland, “and hopeful of good outcomes.” We need to know, he said, “What should a chamber be doing? What roles and responsibilities do we expect from the TA?”
Jen Bickford of Three Rivers Resort in Almont and a member of the Tourism Association board of directors asked three questions, two on behalf of Mary Zimmerman from the San Moritz Condominiums. “Was this [project] put out to bid? Is that standard procedure for $20,000 of county money?” she asked. “Mary is concerned because [the Weidners] are campaign contributors to two of the commissioners and there could be a conflict.”
“Work like this is almost never put out to bid,” responded Matthew Birnie, county manager.
Bickford continued, “She also wants to know about the Radcliff study from 2011. How much did that cost? There was nothing followed up there. Is there going to be?”
“The Radcliff study was requested by the Tourism Association,” said Swenson. “It has been a tool that the TA has utilized.”
“What is the process for transparency?” asked Bickford.
“Will there be an opportunity at these meetings for public comment?” added Tourism Association director Pamela Loughman. “For example, today’s meeting. There’s no documentation included in the agenda referencing the $8,500 involved and no public input period designated.”
Forrest said the meeting to review and discuss the final report would include a public hearing, and that all stakeholders are encouraged to come forward with any input in the meantime.
“Public comment is always allowed, but when the final report comes out, we’ll invite official public comment,” added Swenson.
“I’ve been having conversations about this issue for five years,” said Swenson after the BOCC/LMD meeting. “At first, we thought it was a clash of personalities that was causing the problems. But then all the tires changed and we still had issues. We formed the TA with the intent to keep the chambers whole. The assumption was that all the entities would work together, but we never gave them the tools to do that. We never outlined what was expected of each of these entities.”
Consultation with representatives from the LMD, the TA, the Gunnison and Crested Butte/Mt. Crested Butte Chambers of Commerce and additional stakeholders was prompted by two questions:
From your perspective, what are the most critical issues and trends related to tourism on the horizon—both for the county as a whole and for the Tourism Association—over the next five years?
Three to five years from now, what results would you most like to be able to say have been accomplished?
Between now and August 22, MR will conduct one-on-one interviews with additional stakeholders and match the responses with those received from representatives from the TA, LMD and chambers of commerce to ensure a solid outline for what the community needs and how each entity will fill a role in accomplishing that. After that, Swenson said, “We’ll bring all parties together to talk about those findings. Hopefully, at the end of that conversation, they’ll have enough information to create a final report with recommendations to the LMD.”
