HomeMy Public PortalAbout10-02-2017 Minutes Tourism Board Regular Meeting
Minutes
Tourism Board
6:15 p.m. Oct. 2, 2017
Town Barn, 101 E. Orange St.
Present: Chair Mary Catherine McKee, Kathleen Ferguson, Libbie Hough, Vice Chair Erik Myers,
Mark Bateman, Kim Tesoro, and Tommy Stann
Absent: Matt Hughes
Staff: Economic Development Planner Shannan Campbell
Guests: Sarah DeGennaro and Neil Stutzer
Item 1: Call meeting to order
Chair Mary Catherine McKee called the meeting to order at 6:15 p.m.
Item 2: Consideration of changes or adjustments to the agenda
Member Kathleen Ferguson suggested moving the old business item regarding the Handmade Parade
earlier in the agenda.
Motion: Member Ferguson moved to approve the agenda as amended.
Second: Member Libbie Hough seconded.
Vote: Unanimous
Item 3: Consideration of minutes from Sept. 18, 2017, meeting
Motion: Ms. Hough moved approval of the minutes as presented.
Second: Ms. Ferguson seconded.
Vote: Unanimous
Item 4: General comment
There were no comments.
Item 5: Monthly reports
a. Alliance for Historic Hillsborough Director’s Report:
Executive Director Sarah DeGennaro reported that people coming to the visitors center were
down in August, with 394 visitors counted. Last fiscal year, the alliance started tracking visitors
who walk into the center. The Alliance staff and volunteers are noting that many visitors stop to
read the interpretive sign along the sidewalk on West King Street but do not come inside. Ms.
DeGennaro may request that the interpretive sign be moved closer to the Visitors Center. She
also may try setting out chalkboard signs that encourage people to walk into the building.
Someone noted that the open/closed sign cannot be read from the street.
Ms. DeGennaro reported that the Sundays at Pleasant Green Park were a successful outreach
event. The Alliance is collaborating on a historic resources book, which will be a coffee table
book about historic places in Orange County. The Alliance has also taken a survey of white
historic home signs in the district to discern where signs are needed, should be replaced, or
need maintenance.
Ms. DeGennaro reported she has been attending the merchants meeting each month with
Economic Development Planner Shannan Campbell. She has been working on recruiting homes
for the Holiday Home Tour. She has also been working on the Visitors Center video.
Programs are continuing nicely, Ms. DeGennaro reported. The History Pub Crawl tour is full for
Oct. 21 in West Hillsborough. Also, the alliance counted 94 hours of volunteer services in
August. On Aug. 10, the alliance partnered with the Orange County Historical Museum and the
Burwell School Historic Site to host a tea for teachers.
b. Visitors Center Communications Report:
Ms. Campbell reported that the Visitors Center’s Facebook page gained 34 followers in August.
There were Facebook posts about the opening of Whit’s Frozen Custard, Mystery Brewing now
serving lunch, and a photo of someone ‘dancing in the rain’ with a multi-colored umbrella on
Riverwalk. Also, there was a link to a travel blog piece on ‘10 small towns in North Carolina that
everyone should visit’, which included Hillsborough. There was also a strong Twitter post about
a book reading at Purple Crow.
c. Chapel Hill/Orange County Visitors Bureau Report:
Ms. Campbell reported that the bureau commissioned a feasibility study to determine whether
Orange County could support either another conference center or athletic center with indoor
fields. The bureau is also seeking a new advertising/marketing firm and hopes to have a
selection by their next meeting.
d. Tourism Board Staff and Food and Beverage Tax Revenues Report:
Ms. Campbell reported the tax revenues have increased a little over 9 percent from the last
fiscal year. Revenue was strong in June, despite the downtown construction. Also, Jimmy’s
Famous Hot Dogs is opening soon in the former Pizza Hut location on South Churton Street. And
permits have been pulled for a new bar that is supposed to be opening on West King Street next
to Cup-A-Joe. Volume records should be open any day and activity is moving along on the
Gatewood restaurant(s) project.
Item 6: New business items
a. Grant final report compiled information
Ms. Campbell summarized that the board issued five grants for a total of $32,453. The total
numbers of residents served is 1,493. The number of direct tourists is 1,600. The grants involved
182 volunteers. The Historic Hillsborough Half Marathon and 5K was revenue positive, and the
Hillsborough Running Club has indicated that they will likely not ask for any additional tourism
funding for this event. Two grant projects were revenue neutral, and two were revenue
negative. The direct tourist numbers are not strong, but two of the projects are what Ms.
Campbell would call ‘boomerang projects’ that help get the name of Hillsborough out in the
world and will hopefully motivate people to check out Hillsborough that wouldn’t have
otherwise, she said. One grant was for remote broadcasting equipment for radio station WHUP-
FM, and the other was for the Elizabeth Keckley book project.
Item 7: Old business items
a. Handmade Parade funding request
Ms. Campbell reviewed that the board can approve it, deny, authorize partial funding, or table
the item. Ms. Campbell said this is an event that brings many people to town, but the board
needs to determine the dollar amount that they’re comfortable contributing to it from the tax
revenues. The Hillsborough Arts Council is requesting $9,525 from the Tourism Board. The
council originally requested $15,000. The council is receiving $2,500 as a grant from the Orange
County Arts Commission. It expects to gain $400 from t-shirt sales, $250 from vendor fees,
$2,400 from sponsorships and $1,400 from programming fees. Hillsborough Arts Council
Chairman Neil Stutzer said the council is asking the Tourism Board only $300 toward the project
coordinator fees to cover expenses on the day of the event.
Member Mark Bateman said he does not like fully financially supporting the event, but he does
not mind giving the Hillsborough Arts Council something toward this event. Mr. Bateman asked
how much the Tourism Board has given to the Hillsborough Arts Council this year. Ms. Campbell
answered a little under $13,000 in a contract for Last Fridays and almost $7,000 in grants for the
River Park Concert and Last Fridays Art Walk. Mr. Bateman commented that the Hillsborough
Arts Council’s volunteer who hired the bands for Last Fridays did a great job this year.
Chairperson McKee said she would not want the Tourism Board to give the Hillsborough Arts
Council partial funding, but not enough to make the event happen or not enough to make the
event truly successful.
Ms. Hough said she appreciates the line item showing where other money is coming from and
that only $300 is going toward the project coordinator position. She said she was having trouble
justifying paying the entire amount because there may be other requests for special projects in
this fiscal year. She offered the suggestion of paying 50 percent of the requested amount now
and 50 percent in the next budget year.
Committee Member Kim Tesoro asked when the Arts Council needs a decision. Ms. Campbell
explained that the project spans two fiscal years; FY18 and FY19. In the current budget, the
Tourism Board only has $500 that is unallocated to spend without dipping into the fund balance.
Ms. Campbell was asked by board members how much tax revenue the Alliance for Historic
Hillsborough was given beyond what was budgeted to carry out the contract services in the last
fiscal year. Ms. Campbell answered she expected it to be between $17,000 and $20,000 based
on the 9% increase in revenues from last year, but she did not have the exact number in front of
her. She said that if the Board wanted to ask the Alliance for that overage back to re-allocate to
other visitors services that she could verify an exact dollar amount with the Town finance
department and invoice the Alliance. The Board directed her to move forward with this.
Member Ferguson said the Handmade Parade is a flagship event and she does not want to
nickel and dime it. She does not have trouble taking money from the fund balance to fund this
event since the fund balance is healthy. She said it is an event that is on marketing materials
across the community. It is not a new event, and the board has a good feel for the organization
and their responsibility with spending public funds.
Board members asked how it has been sponsored in the past. Ms. Campbell answered it has
been sponsored by the Tourism Board and the Town of Hillsborough Board of Commissioners.
Ms. Campbell said the Hillsborough Arts Council would like to move toward having a yearly
contract for this event. Ms. Campbell said the Tourism Board is really out of money for this fiscal
year for Special Projects and Partnerships but has two options being 1.) fund balance use or 2.)
requesting funds back from the Alliance for payment over the contract budget. She reminded
the Board that they can only allocate up to $4,999.99 to Special Projects and Partnerships per
their current policy for that funding. For Fiscal Year 2019, the budget has not been set yet.
Vice Chair Erik Myers said he is not in favor of contracting for specific events and indicated that
if the Board is going to contract with the Arts Council for another big event that maybe the
contract should be more of a general contract with the Arts Council. Ms. Tesoro said the
Tourism Board has issued one contract and two grants for the Hillsborough Arts Council. Vice
Chair Myers said the Tourism Board allocates a lot of money to the Hillsborough Arts Council.
While he sees value in supporting the arts, it is probably worth evaluating where the Tourism
Board money is going and what is the return on the investment, he said. He said that he does
not want the Tourism Board to become the sole funding source for the organization and
explained that organizations are stronger when they have diverse funding sources.
Ms. Hough suggested the Tourism Board pay a percentage now to help get the event started
and another percentage later. Ms. Tesoro said that does mean this board is promising money for
FY19 that hasn’t been budgeted yet. Chairwoman McKee said this board also needs to have the
conversation about the return on investment.
Ms. Campbell said if the Tourism Board paid half of the requested amount now, it would be
$4,762.50. Ms. Hough said she would be comfortable with that because the board knows it is
getting money back from the Alliance in extra tax revenues from FY17. Ms. Campbell said the
revenue will likely come back in the next 60 days. The board expressed interest in tabling this
decision until next month when the board knows exactly how much the overage paid to the
Alliance is going to be.
Motion: Ms. Hough moved to table this decision until the next meeting on Nov. 6 so that the
board could evaluate how much was going to be requested back from the Alliance from
FY17 tax revenues
Discussion: Vice Chairman Myers said he would like to see an attempt at calculating how the parade
generates revenues for the town. He said he is anti-parade because he thinks it is a
detriment to commerce. Commissioner Ferguson noted that the town and Orange
County Arts Commission were going to soon be releasing the Arts and Economic
Prosperity report numbers for the town and county.
Second: Ms. Tesoro seconded.
Vote: Unanimous
There was further discussion about how to quantify return on investment on a free event. Vice
Chairman Myers said there is marketing involved and the overall feel that having big events gives to
town, but he thinks everything needs to be looked at. Others said they understood what he was saying.
Commissioner Ferguson excused herself at 6:48 p.m. to attend another meeting.
Item 8: Staff/board comments and discussion items
• Ms. DeGennaro shared the Visitors Center budget with the board.
• Chairwoman McKee requested an item be placed on an upcoming meeting agenda
regarding refining the grant scoring process. Others supported this request.
• Ms. Hough noted that 2018 marks the 200th birthday of abolitionist leader Frederick
Douglass and there would be bicentennial events. The Orange County Public Library is
working on a Frederick Douglass celebration. From a Tourism Board standpoint,
anything we can do to promote this would be good, Ms. Hough said.
• Ms. DeGennaro shared that the Hillsborough Garden Club is planting poppy seeds as
part of the observation of the anniversary of World War I around town for the Spring.
The Alliance for Historic Hillsborough will transform the back room of the Visitors Center
into a ‘World War I living room’.
Item 9: Adjourn
Chairwoman McKee adjourned the meeting at 7:10 p.m.