Tourism Victoria will have more budgeting certainty and likely more money to spend to market the city to the world if an agreement in principle with the City of Victoria is finalized in the spring.
The destination marketing organization stands to get about $1 million more for marketing each year and a five-year commitment from the city if the relationship is approved.
Calling it a huge deal, Tourism Victoria chief executive Paul Nursey said it is a new framework that allows Tourism Victoria to make longer-term plans.
“Most other DMOs have five-year renewal plans and they are able to plan in the medium to long-term horizon. We have always been able to get our funding renewed on an annual basis, but this will drive slightly different behaviour in terms of our long-term approach,” Nursey said.
Under the terms of the agreement, Tourism Victoria’s funding would be approved by votes every five years instead of annually. It will also integrate its sales and marketing staff with the Victoria Conference Centre and will donate $1 million over 11 years to help establish the David Foster Harbour Pathway with a focus on the Belleville Street Terminal.
And if the agreement is approved by the hotels, the accommodation sector will increase the Municipal Regional District Tax rate to three per cent from its current two per cent. Nursey said that has the potential of increasing Tourism Victoria’s marketing budget by $1 million from its current $2.3 million.
However, Nursey noted some of the hotels already collect three per cent after they opted into a voluntary program in 2011 to make up for cuts to provincial grants. “So it could be a wash,” he said. “If this agreement goes through, I’m not sure that [extra one per cent will stay].”
Still, according to Reid James, general manager of the Hotel Grand Pacific and chairman of the Hotel Association of Greater Victoria, it will mean more money, as the new three per cent rate would apply to all accommodations in the city.
“We are for this. We are still waiting to hear from some of the accommodation sector, but so far, certainly, the majority is in favour of this,” James said.
James said the hotel association will determine what becomes of the extra one per cent tax collected by about 18 hotels if and when the new agreement with the city is passed.
Dave Cowen, general manager of Butchart Gardens and chairman of Tourism Victoria, said the membership is solidly behind the new deal with the city.
“This is a modernization of an agreement that’s been in place for nearly 35 years, and it really allows the professional marketers at Tourism Victoria to plan more than annually,” Cowen said. “To do strategic marketing, you need to move in at least three-year chunks and now they will have some certainty around budget and commitment.”
Nursey said he hopes details of the deal will be hammered out by the early spring in order for the new tax regime to be in place by January 2017.
City of Victoria Mayor Lisa Helps called the deal “the biggest decision in a generation” for the accommodation and tourism sector and an exciting partnership that will let the city build itself and Tourism Victoria sell it to the world.
