Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, August 28, 1993 TAG: 9308280044
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: A8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: PAUL DELLINGER SOUTHWEST BUREAU
DATELINE: ABINGDON LENGTH: Medium
One of the tasks of the Southwest Virginia Tourism Infrastructure Strategic Planning Study Commission, established by this year's General Assembly, is to start a marketing organization and find ways to fund it.
The legislature budgeted about $30,000 for the University of Virginia's Center for Public Service at Wise to develop a strategic plan for tourism from the counties of Giles, Montgomery, Floyd and Carroll to the western tip of Virginia.
Kitty Grady, president of Blue Ridge Highlands and public relations director for the town of Wytheville, said the group was set up as an umbrella organization to promote and further develop Southwest Virginia's travel and recreation industries.
The $7,000 it collects annually in membership dues pays for postage and a toll-free telephone line for inquiries about tourism destinations, she said.
The group raised $43,000 to publish 200,000 copies of a regional tourism brochure three months ago, mainly through advertising in the brochure. It helped establish a visitors' center at Factory Merchants Mall in Fort Chiswell in partnership with the mall and the Jefferson National Forest.
In cooperation with Virginia Tech, it has published studies on how to get motorists off interstate highways into communities and how to attract international visitors. It has advocated hospitality training courses in cooperation with community colleges.
"Think what it could do if it had money," said Bob Thomas, representing New River Valley HOSTS.
He said the hospitality training is important, because people who come into contact with visitors at fast-food restaurants and other places are not familiar with their own areas' attractions.
by CNB