Tourism head says business comments needed > Strategies for attracting tourists discussed at meeting

CALAIS — Hilary Sinclair, director of the Maine Office of Tourism, was in Calais this week to meet with Billy MacCready, executive director of the Quoddy Bay and Fundy Isle Tourism Office, to discuss strategies to attract tourists to the area.

“We have a very strong commitment to the project (the QBFIT). We feel Billy is doing an incredible job. She is one heck of a promoter and the concept of the `Two Nation Vacation’ is a wonderful idea,” Sinclair said.

The QBFIT office is in its second year of operation and is funded by the governments of Maine and New Brunswick. Its goal is to promote tourism and formulate a development plan for the tourism industry in Washington and Charlotte, New Brunswick, counties. Sinclair said the QBFIT demonstrated what a local effort could accomplish, and she said it was important for the program to continue and expand.

“The Maine Office of Tourism has sustained considerable budget cuts as have other state agencies, and right now we are just analyzing each project and sifting out what we are going to do,” she said.

Sinclair explained that Maine’s philosophy and approach to tourism differed from that of New Brunswick.

“The philosophy of tourism promotion throughout the United States is private-sector driven, and what we hope to do, in working with Billy, is help her build a coalition of private business support that will take over the project and fly with it,” she said.

The tourism director said education was necessary to encourage the private sector to become more involved in the QBFIT.

“We need to educate local businesses about tourism’s potential for the region. Help them understand its economic impact, job creation aspect and what they can do to increase their business from a marketing standpoint. What we like to see are cooperative efforts, through organizations such as the Chamber of Commerce, where the resources are pooled. You can get a lot more bang for your buck by pooling your resources and advertising the region collectively, than you can by promoting one individual business.

“Tourists that come into the region stay in motels, eat in restaurants, shop in local retail outlets, patronize the local attractions, buy gas and visit the local grocery stores. Everybody benefits and I think that many people do not understand the spinoff benefits from tourism that are equally important as the direct benefits. So we want to educate people in the local community about how important it is,” she said.

Sinclair said the state offered a speakers’ bureau that could send people knowledgeable about tourism to area service clubs and civic organizations. MacCready said that she believed it was very important to spearhead a program to educate area businesspeople about the potential for tourism.

MacCready said the QBFIT also had access to a New Brunswick program that sought to inform business people about the economic benefits of tourism. “We have access to a program that is already initiated, and it is just a case of changing it to fit our needs. I agree with Hillary that the education component is important,” she said.

Sinclair said that one of the realities of the tourism industry was that Maine had to compete for tourists in a global economy. She said that although her budget, like the budgets of all state agencies, was cut this year, that did not mean the state’s interest in tourism had been minimized.

“I think Maine recognizes the value of tourism. … The Maine Legislature has no difficulty understanding the value of tourism and in Maine it works very well. I do know the tourism receipts in Maine are $2 billion a year. I am sure they are considerably higher in New Brunswick, and I know they are considerably higher in Nova Scotia. I think that the philosophy on the state side and the (U.S.) government side is that it is working; it is working extremely well,” she said.

MacCready said that her meeting with Sinclair had been very productive for the QBFIT and she believed dialogues between representatives of the state and provincial governments would be beneficial to Washington and Charlotte counties.