Tourism recovering slowly

David Hulse
Posted 8/21/12

MILFORD, PA — In an area where tourism is king, the nurturing of the hotel and tourism industry is economic development.

Carl Wilgus, president and CEO of the four-county Pocono Mountains …

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Tourism recovering slowly

Posted

MILFORD, PA — In an area where tourism is king, the nurturing of the hotel and tourism industry is economic development.

Carl Wilgus, president and CEO of the four-county Pocono Mountains Visitors Bureau (PMVB) emphasized that point early on in his annual report to the Pike County Commissioners, saying the bureau’s business is “economic development through tourism marketing.”

In 2014, PMVB spent $5.2 million of its near $6 million budget on sales and marketing.

Convention bookings are the heart of bureau sales, and Wilgus reported that expanded use of Internet marketing provided a 15% increase in leads over the prior year. PMVB saw a 91% rise in Internet hits after adding an “app” for hand-held devices.

He admitted that actual room nights had only a modest increase in the recovering economy. “We expect a healthy bump with the opening of 400 rooms at Kalahari Resort [the new indoor waterpark in Mount Pocono] in June.”

Convention room nights in 2014 amounted to 19,432, compared to 29,133 in 2012.

With the loss of direct state funding in recent years, Wilgus noted that PMVB is operating on a smaller budget than 2007, and 79% of that funding is derived from the hotel room tax.

That money is spent judiciously he explained, in cooperative media advertising buys in New York and New Jersey for example, which for a $1.6 million investment accessed $3.5 million in advertising.

Bureau operating costs totaled 13% of the budget, compared to 17% in other tourism bureaus of PMVB’s size.

Wilgus spoke in support of an amended hotel tax bill in the legislature, which would allow counties to increase the rate from the current 3% to 5%.

That increase would also, for the first time, include campgrounds in the tax, although it’s unknown whether campgrounds located on state lands or federal lands in Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area would be taxable.

Campground owners oppose the change.

The amendment also provides for an increase in a county’s administrative fee for collecting the tax from 2% to up to 5%.

In other business, Commissioner Matt Osterberg said the county has received word from the PA Museum Commission approving the revised plans for the Milford courthouse addition. “Now we can take it to the borough,” he said.

The commissioners met briefly on December 23 to give final approval to Pike’s 2015 budget.

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