Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, January 12, 1994 TAG: 9401150030
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-6 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: By PAUL DELLINGER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: RADFORD LENGTH: Medium
Charlotte Reed, economic development tourism specialist with the Virginia Tech Public Service Program, suggested that the group formally support the venture, and Greg Poirier, representing Doe Run Lodge and the governor's tourism board, made the motion.
But Tom Taylor, executive director of the Mount Rogers Planning District Commission, cautioned that all the facts were not in on the project. He said there will be a price to be paid in terms of roads and utilities, which could take from funds available to rural localities like those in Southwest Virginia to improve their infrastructure.
The motion to support the Disney venture passed without dissent. Taylor abstained.
Ed Crossan of Tech's Public Service Program said a discount program tried on an experimental basis last year had proved successful enough to expand.
Participating businesses gave 10-percent discount coupons in a joint brochure distributed in a variety of ways, from business organizations to employers who want to offer the discounts to their workers.
``This year we'd like to continue doing the same thing,'' Crossan said, and expand it. ``We've already tested the theory so ... we're implementing a program we know works.''
Crossan said the ``zero-budget'' work group that came up with the idea would like to expand it to places like Barter Theater, outdoor dramas like ``The Long Way Home,'' raceways, wineries, outdoor activities and perhaps state parks.
The discount plan would use tourism, which Crossan said has been underestimated as a factor in economic development, as its focal point. ``Tourism is the largest positive contributor to the balance of payments,'' he said.
Brochures this year would be distributed through chambers of commerce, visitors centers and travel shows.
Christy Parker, vice chairman of a revolving loan organization being set up by Rep. Rick Boucher, D-Abingdon, said the program should get under way this year with the hiring of a full-time administrator. It would provide low-interest loans to help small businesses with fixed assets or working capital when they were unable to get conventional loans, she said. The low-interest loans would cover no more than half the cost of a project, but could be used to leverage other financing.
Major considerations in deciding what projects to accept would include the number of jobs created, emphasis on historic preservation, and assistance to anchor tourism businesses in a region, she said.
``I think it's a good complement to what Virginia's Southwest Blue Ridge Highlands is doing,'' she said.
The volunteer tourism organization has been touted by members of the Southwest Virginia Infrastructure Strategic Planning Study Commission, created through a bill introduced by state Sen. William Wampler Jr., R-Bristol, as the logical organization to get state funding for tourism efforts in the region.
Kitty Grady, the Wytheville public relations director who is its president, said it could do much more with a budget and a full-time director although it has accomplished a lot with just volunteers.
The other thing that Wampler Commission members seem to have found is that Southwest Virginia does not need funding to create new tourism products as much as it does to advertise the ones it has, said John Strutner, a state tourism representative.
by CNB