MARYVILLE, Tenn. — At the Tennessee Association of Convention and Visitors Bureau annual event in Murfreesboro on Feb. 1, Blount County’s tourism efforts were highlighted as a “best practices” example for programs across the state.
The Blount Partnership was invited to share information about how it led the process of transforming from a Convention and Visitors Bureau to a Tourism Development Authority (TDA) last year. Blount Partnership CEO and President Bryan Daniels highlighted the benefits of the change, as well as the Tourism Development Act, which was passed by the Tennessee legislature in April of 2012.
“Tourism programs are not successful if operated in a vacuum. It takes cooperation within the community and support from area leaders to have a successful program,” said Daniels. “We are fortunate to have strong leadership with Senator Doug Overbey and Representatives Bob Ramsey and Art Swann. It was their support in getting the Tourism Development Act passed by the legislature that helped us get to the point we are at today.”
Daniels said it was the additional support of Blount County’s local governments that propelled the TDA as a first and best practices example for other communities to adopt.
Some of the benefits Daniels discussed for forming a TDA were the ability to attract new tourism capital investments and eliminate the financial burden for tourism funded initiatives to local governments; and the ability to better engage local tourism stakeholders and practitioners allowing them to effectively promote tourism as an economic development asset, while at the same time limiting the bureaucracy that sometimes interferes with those developments.
For more information, please contact the Smoky Mountain Tourism Development Authority at (800) 525.6834 or visit www.SmokyMountains.org. Follow the Smoky Mountain Tourism Development Authority at www.Facebook.com/PeacefulSide and Twitter.com/PeacefulSmokies.