WACVB BOARD OF DIRECTORS MEETING
Comfort Suites, Oshkosh
January 15, 2010

Attendees: Lynn Peters/Fox Cities, Christine Rebout/Janesville, Tom Barrett/Stevens Point, Darien Schaefer/Wausau-Central WI, Deb Fredriksen/Beloit, Brad Toll/Green Bay, Nancy Justman/Brookfield, Tammy Tritz/Waukesha-Pewaukee, Romy Snyder/Wisconsin Dells, George Hennerley/Lake Geneva, AJ Frels/Wisconsin Rapids, Dennis DuChene/Kenosha, Deb Archer/Madison, Dave Blank/Racine, Wendy Hielsberg/Oshkosh, Cari Obst/Bayfield, Linda John/Visit Eau Claire

Absent:, Chris Hanson/Tomah, Bob Duffy/Oconomowoc, Sharon Kirn/Marshfield, Dave Clements/La Crosse, Jack Moneypenny/Door County, Kathleen Galas/Manitowoc

Guests:  Brent Forrester/Visit Milwaukee, Kathleen Eichoff/Elkhart Lake, Diane Pedersen/Washington County, Kathy Seeberg/Walworth County

1) WACVB BUSINESS

a) Call To Order 
Chair Darien Schaefer called the meeting to order at 8:30 am. He thanked
Wendy Hielsberg/Oshkosh CVB for hosting the meeting, CEO forum and holiday party.

b) Consent Agenda
Wendy made a motion to approve the minutes, Dave Blank seconded the motion and the minutes were approved.  Romy Snyder reviewed the financials.   Wendy made a motion to approve the financials. Linda seconded and the financials were approved. 

c) President Report – Darien thanked everyone for their membership in WACVB and hoped that together we could accomplish more with the WI Dept. of tourism.

2) TEAM REPORTS

a) Government Affairs Team – Dave reviewed action plan.  SE RTA draft legislation still has a funding option that would allow room taxes to be increases by 8% in Racine and Kenosha counties.  Hertel and Hamilton Consulting have been lobbying SE WI legislators on the issue and Dave/Racine County CVB issued a public statement opposing the funding mechanism.  Hertel said that alternative funding source taskforce meeting continues and that she and Romy are on it.  Blank and Hertel said the Reinvest in WI initiative is on hold following a statewide survey that indicated that the anti-tax sentiment is too high to move forward with an initiative that would raise sales taxes by 1/8 of a percent.  The group is supposed to reconvene early this spring with a strategy session.  Hertel reported that the Room tax coalition is still working on an informal opinion from the Attorney General concerning room tax use, but nothing has been submitted yet.

b) PR Team – Brad Toll reviewed action plan.  He reported that WACVB legislative day is Mar. 3 with an e-mail invitation coming soon to members.  Please save the date.  WACVB will have a booth at two organization events, the Gov. Conf. on Economic Development and the League of WI Municipalities.  Deb Archer volunteered to work the WACVB booth at the Econ Dev. Conference. 

c) Education Team – Lynn gave a summary of the fall convention survey.  Most comments were very positive with suggestions for tweaking next year’s convention.  Lynn said that the CEO forum went well and received a 4.85 rating on the attendee survey (highest ever).  April 23rd is the next forum and it will be on social networking and will include a How Social is your DMO ranking report for participants.  The cost will be $125 for the report and forum and $25 for additional forum attendees.  Most information will be out soon.  Peters said the team is looking at a grant writing forum by the WI Arts Board for the summer.  She said the team will continue the monthly educational tidbits, organize case studies for the lunchtime topics and continue to use linked in as a WACVB communication tool.

d) M&C Marketing Team – Deb Archer reported that the team will focus ‘10 efforts on a meetings means business campaign to try to keep meetings business in WI from WI Companies.  The team will also analyze Think Wisconsin past programs and review how to move forward with WDT.   Brent Foerster went over with Meetings means business PR plan and the final plan will be sent to members when ready.  Lots of discussion about timing and theme.  Members suggested timing the kickoff with the WI Gov. Conf. on Tourism, but if not, enough time to plan properly.  Tammy Tritz said her sub team will be surveying member to determine if/how members want to continue with cooperative activities to promote Wisconsin meetings, such as tradeshows and cooperative advertising.

e) Sports Marketing Team – Dennis DuChene said the team will be coordinating the Sports WI NASC sponsorship soon  The team will also be surveying to gauge interest in cooperative efforts and suggested that survey be included on M&C survey.  The team will research Ready, Set Go grant program and make suggestions for improvement, such as implementing a PR effort with WDT when grants are awarded and getting statistics from WDT on grantees, estimated economic impact of events, etc.  There was also discussion about the Ready, Set, Go grant review process,  what are the proper channels to go through if the review committee has a question about an application.   Dennis said the group will determine whether WACVB can/should apply for state sports marketing dollars after this fiscal year.  Currently, WI Sports Development Corp. receives $125,000 per year to do sports marketing for the state as a sole-source vendor.  The WACVB sports marketing team will determine if the Dept. will again be granting the sole-source contract with WSDC or if it will go out to bid.  Dennis asked if the state’s sports marketing dollars should support for Badger State Games.  Discussion offered arguments for and against. 

f) Visitor Center Taskforce – Christine Rebout said the task force will review the WDT visitor center grant rules.  There is a Feb. 1 hearing on the proposed rules at 10 am.  WACVB may provide input after reviewing the guidelines.  There was discussion about what publications WDT is requiring/suggesting visitor centers receiving state funds carry.  Dennis said Kenosha is carrying “tier 1” and “tier 2” publications.  Tier 1 is WDT and other state tourism organizations publications and tier 2 is WACVB member visitor guides.  Lynn Peters made a motion that WACVB ask that the visitor center grants are open to all viable visitor centers, not only those near former Wisconsin welcome centers.  Christine seconded the motion and the motion passed.

g) WI Dept. of Tourism Taskforce – Snyder said the taskforce will be surveying members on what kind of information they want to receive from the Dept. of Tourism.  She and Linda will also be meeting with Deb and Dennis to determine how we should communicate next steps concerning Meetings & Convention marketing and Sports Marketing. 

h) Executive Team – Schaefer said the executive team will oversee membership issues instead of having a membership team.  Hertel said a 2010 membership survey will come out in February and will include questions about the value of WACVB (developed by the former membership team).  Darien reported that Door County Visitor Bureau is considering not renewing their membership.  There was much discussion with the consensus being that while WACVB dues are expensive the marketing, education, legislative and networking value is worth it.  George Hennerley offered to contact Jack and discuss and Darien planned to follow up as well.  Peters said the education team will review the DMO certification program to identify whether a DMO can keep their certification if they drop membership.  Executive team will choose mentors for our new members and review dues structure per a request from Deb.

i) 2010 Action Plan and Budget approval – Lynn made a motion to approve the action plan with the addition of the Visitor Center Taskforce additions.  Wendy seconded the motion and it was approved.  Darien reviewed the budget with changes as presented.  Lynn made a motion to approve and Brad seconded it.  Motion was approved.  Linda Adler requested a friendly amendment to add $1000 back into the travel & entertainment budget to allow Hertel to attend the DMAI convention.  Dave seconded it and motion was approved.  On a related matter, Darien and Romy noted that the exec team will be developing a policy to determine how much should be in the reserve fund and how it can be spent.

3) OLD/NEW BUSINESS:  Romy said the Dept. of Revenue gave a very good economic forecast at the Gov. Council on Tourism meeting.  She will be getting a copy of the PowerPoint and will forward to Julia for distribution.  Hielsberg noted that the Fond du Lac CVB seems to be having a power struggle with the city.  She suggested that the acting director contact Julia about the issue.  Brad Toll shared a “Tourism Pays” video that his bureau had customized from a piece originally done by the Denver CVB.  He will look into possibly a coop deal for WACVB members.

4) ADJOURNMENT:  Linda made a motion to adjourn and Nancy seconded it.  Motion was approved.