Our Voice: Washington’s lack of tourism funding is embarrassing
Washington is a beautiful state that includes a scenic coastline, rain forests, majestic mountains, acres of vineyards dotted by wineries, impressive rivers — notably the Columbia — and urban attractions on both sides of the Cascades.
What it does not have is a good way to market these amenities to potential visitors, thanks to the short-sighted decision by the state Legislature to close the state tourism office in 2011.
Since then, Washington has dropped to the bottom in the nation for tourism spending, falling far behind neighboring states who decided to boost their marketing programs while we decided to sit nearly dormant.
Members of the state tourism industry have joined forces to ask for a paltry $400,000 in the supplemental budget for 2015-17 to keep a few marketing tools going.
David Blandford of the Washington Tourism Alliance said the money would cover just the essentials, like continuing the tourism website so visitors can at least get basic travel information about the state when they search the internet.
This is a completely reasonable request, but with other financial needs to be met and only a couple weeks left in the legislative session, its fate is uncertain. Late last week, it looked like the House was considering providing about half of what was requested.
Compared with what other states spend on tourism, it is embarrassing Washington can’t do better.
The U.S. Travel Association, a nonprofit policy organization for the nation’s travel industry, conducted a report a couple of years ago on the power of promoting tourism, and used Washington as an example of what not to do.
Washington spent $3 million in 2010 on tourism promotion, which was considered low by industry standards. But when lawmakers shut down the state tourism office the following year, neighboring states sensed an opportunity to increase their market share. So guess what? They increased their tourism budgets.
As an example, Montana boosted its tourism spending by about 30 percent, which meant that from 2010-12 it spent almost $32 million advertising itself while Washington spent nothing. Predictably, traveler spending in Montana grew 70 percent faster than in Washington during that period, meaning Montana’s travel-related tax revenue also grew faster than in our state.
No disrespect to Montana, but surely Washington has at least as much or more to offer visitors. But without a state tourism office, we can’t get the word out effectively.
In 2013, the Washington Tourism Alliance received $1 million from the state to support a bare-bones marketing program until a more reliable funding solution could be found. The money was divided across a two-year biennium, which meant $500,000 a year was allocated.
Now tourism officials are back this session asking for $400,000 just to “keep the lights on,” Blandford said.
Washington has no destination marketing strategy like other states around the country and it shows.
The U.S. Travel Association report said that during the year Washington closed its tourism office, the state’s growth in traveler spending was 13 percent slower than the rest of the country. Washington’s growth in state and local taxes generated by travel was 26 percent slower than the nation overall during that same time.
And we will just keep slipping. Other states advertise while we hope someone stumbles on our tourism website.
The potential for attracting visitors and boosting tax revenue is huge in Washington, but we are missing out because we have no state tourism office. The least lawmakers can do this session is keep what we have going, and pay for the full request being made by what’s left of our state tourism industry.
This story was originally published February 27, 2016 at 11:52 PM with the headline "Our Voice: Washington’s lack of tourism funding is embarrassing."