One of this week's business briefs in the Orlando Sentinel contained an item of a potential plan by County Manager Mike Freilinger to "privatize" (outsource) the leisure-travel portion of the Convention & Visitors Bureau. Since it was a "brief," we're almost sure that some information was glossed over or lost in translation, but we're left scratching our heads.
According to the article, "Some elected officials and industry experts have suggested a private corporation, led by hotels and other tourism representatives, could make better use of tourist-tax dollars to attract families and other leisure travelers to Osceola." It goes on to say that "[Freilinger] said the visitors bureau could then focus on filling the county-owned facilities with conventions and sports events."
OK. We understand that the CVB has been in turmoil for years now. However, if you're looking for efficiency and accountability, is creating a new "private corporation" to oversee the spending of tourist-tax dollars the right way to go? We would have thought that instead, if outsourcing was on the table, the county would put the operation of the tourism bureau functions out to RFP, hopefully attracting bids from companies with experience in this type of marketing, who would bring operating efficiencies and a contract with clear performance standards to the table. The "privatecorporation" brings forth concepts of the creation of a new executive job
(and payroll) for someone who is a friend of the county, and the words "steep learning curve" during the next two years of discussions on how the new corporation has performed its duties.
Then there's the second part. After the county outsources the bulk of the current duties of the CVB, they are going to redirect the CVB to market "county-owned facilities?" Do we really need a full CVB staff to market Osceola Heritage Park? And why, if you were considering outsourcing such a large part of the tourism marketing, would you keep that small little nugget of marketing "county-owned facilities?"
We look forward to the full, in-depth report on this plan in the upcoming weeks. Maybe in the meantime we can come up with a better slogan than "Orlando: Built for families. Made for memories."
According to the article, "Some elected officials and industry experts have suggested a private corporation, led by hotels and other tourism representatives, could make better use of tourist-tax dollars to attract families and other leisure travelers to Osceola." It goes on to say that "[Freilinger] said the visitors bureau could then focus on filling the county-owned facilities with conventions and sports events."
OK. We understand that the CVB has been in turmoil for years now. However, if you're looking for efficiency and accountability, is creating a new "private corporation" to oversee the spending of tourist-tax dollars the right way to go? We would have thought that instead, if outsourcing was on the table, the county would put the operation of the tourism bureau functions out to RFP, hopefully attracting bids from companies with experience in this type of marketing, who would bring operating efficiencies and a contract with clear performance standards to the table. The "privatecorporation" brings forth concepts of the creation of a new executive job
(and payroll) for someone who is a friend of the county, and the words "steep learning curve" during the next two years of discussions on how the new corporation has performed its duties.
Then there's the second part. After the county outsources the bulk of the current duties of the CVB, they are going to redirect the CVB to market "county-owned facilities?" Do we really need a full CVB staff to market Osceola Heritage Park? And why, if you were considering outsourcing such a large part of the tourism marketing, would you keep that small little nugget of marketing "county-owned facilities?"
We look forward to the full, in-depth report on this plan in the upcoming weeks. Maybe in the meantime we can come up with a better slogan than "Orlando: Built for families. Made for memories."
2 comments:
There should be no CVB and no tax dollars for advertising campaigns. Have tourists pay taxes to help us fix our roads that they use with out paying other types of taxes is fine, but this whole paying taxes so a select few can market their own "attractions" is just dumb. The county can't keep track of our money now, why do we think it would be better under a private group of interested parties?
Because that private group gives campaign contributions to the county commissioners. I believe that any person or entity that receives any money from the government should not be allowed to donate any campaign money to candidates. It is clearly a conflict of interest.
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