Tourism Board Facing Elimination By Legislature
Florida has a lot of attractions and attractive places, and apparently the state legislature figures that is enough to attract tourists.
Unless the senate and house reverse course and provide $50 million in funding then Visit Florida, the state’s tourism board, will cease to exist after Sept. 30.
You can bet other state tourism boards – and state legislators – are watching what happens in Florida and how (or if) tourism is affected in the Sunshine State. Because it could have a huge impact on tourism boards across the country.
And, judging by one person’s comments, that funding is unlikely to happen.
“In a trillion-dollar economy, a few million dollars put towards advertising a few different places cannot possibly have a direct correlation to tourism,” House Speaker Jose Oliva, R-Miami, said. “… the types of attractions that exist here in Florida, the weather — there’s a whole series of factors. Visit Florida is probably least among them.”
In what should be a wake-up call to other tourism boards, Visit Florida did itself no favors through some expensive and questionable projects, in particular it spending $11.6 million in 2017 to sponsor a cooking show hosted by celebrity chef Emeril Lagasse, $2.875 million with auto-racing team Visit Florida Racing, and a $1 million promotion contract with Miami rapper Pitbull.
Tourism in the state is booming. Visit Florida has reported eight years of record tourism numbers, topped by 126.1 million visitors in 2018. By contrast, in 2011 there were 87.3 visitors.
Funding for Visit Florida has skyrocketed, too, from $35 million in 2011 to $76 million in 2019.
Bill Lupfer, president and CEO of the Florida Attractions Association, an Orlando-based trade group of theme parks large and small, said, “the idea of tourists will come anyway is a false narrative. There’s no reason to gamble the success we have had as a state by playing political games.”
Some things even keep tourists away, such as hurricanes and last summer’s nasty outbreak of the red tide, and a tourism board (or savvy PR agency) can counter negative national media attention with a good public relations campaign.
If Visit Florida ceases to exist, then the legislature is banking on Florida’s sunshine, its theme parks, quirky attractions like gator parks and of course its beaches are enough to keep visitors rolling into the Sunshine State. If not, then it will balance the loss in tourism against the $50-75 it is saving by not having a tourism board.
And as mentioned earlier, others are watching what happens in Florida.
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