By Colleen Dane
There is little doubt, to most who have been here, that Ottawa is a great place to visit.
This is a city filled with Canadiana. People come from all over the world to see symbols of our country, ranging from street corner Beavertail stands to the grand Parliament buildings.
Though many of the attractions that top tourists’ sightseeing lists are provided for by the federal government, it is co-operation between the feds and the city that makes Ottawa so appealing.
The infrastructure that city hall has built to accommodate the huge number of visitors who come here each year has not only improved the tourist experience, but has also created jobs and revenue that help local citizens.
This is why this year’s city budget cuts affecting the local tourism industry are especially vexing.
Though tourism as a whole didn’t go on the chopping block, significant peripheral cuts will nonetheless affect those businesses and organizations which are particularly focused on creating visitor revenue.
The Ottawa Tourism and Convention Authority is one such organization which suffered in the final draft.
Its overall income from the city has been drastically reduced. Despite the fact that they may be given some of the revenue from a proposed new three per cent hotel-room tax, it remains unclear whether or not it will be enough.
This means that such crowd-drawing events as Ottawa’s Tulip Festival and Winterlude, which are members of the tourism authority, will be provided less support. In turn, fewer toursists will come to the city, and local hotels, restaurants and other attractions which would usually benefit will also lose out.
While it is understandable that city council would want to help its own citizens before worrying about providing services for the out-of-towners, there is still a need to ensure that the tourism authority survives, in order for important tourist dollars to continue flowing into the city’s coffres.
Supporting tourism infrastructure ensures continued outside revenue, which in turn helps the city create better services for its own citizens.
So, even though some cuts were necessary in all sectors this year, concrete steps should have been taken to ensure tourism’s long-term vitality.
For example, the city needed to maintain sufficient funding to the tourism authority until it was clear that the hotel tax would be a reliable source of funding.
A one-time grant of about $1 million, which covers less than a year of the organization’s current operating budget, does not go far enough in sustaining the tourism authority’s long-term survival.
The tourism authority markets Ottawa around the world, encouraging tourists, conventioneers and other crowd-drawing events to choose our city over others.
If the city’s grant runs out, and new funding from the new tax doesn’t come through fast enough, 400 businesses that are members of the tourism authority will be without an important organizing body.
The city cannot rely on individual attractions to passively draw tourists to Ottawa on their own.
Maintaining tourism infrastructure is important for any city, let alone one like Ottawa that wants to benefit from an improved airport, the upcoming Grey Cup and a new war museum, as well as many other features this year.
Enough money needs to be guaranteed for organizations such as the tourism authority so people continue to consider Ottawa as an attractive place to visit.
Their trips only strengthen the city’s economy. But if we don’t continue to build the tourism industry, they won’t come, no matter how big the city’s monuments are.