By Ed Slavin
(c) Copyright 2013
“Tourism is everybody's business,” was long the motto of the national tourism business. Is a long history of waste and maladroit marketing and lost opportunities endangering the success of our City's 450th anniversary in 2015 and of the commemoration of the 1964 Civil Rights Act (2014) and 500th anniversary of Spanish Florida (this year)?
It's Our Money
Our St. Johns County local option "bed tax" money – there's a 4% tax on short term lodgings – is spent on tourist promotion (Category I); arts, cultural and special events (Category II); and beaches and recreation (Category III). People have been questioning its effectiveness for a quarter of a century, especially advertising (Category I).
Bed Tax Passed on Fourth Try
Thrice county voters rejected a Tourist Development Act bed tax on tourists. In 1986, they finally approved a bed tax on short term lodging, and innkeepers started collecting it in 1987. Tens of millions of bed tax revenues have been collected spent for more than 25 years, with the idea of putting “heads in beds,” but with what result?
Hotel occupancy rates still average only 59%.
What are the spenders of our Category I bed tax money doing to embrace our cultural diversity and our environment and to provide quality tourist experiences, consumer protection and good jobs at living wages?
Tourist Development Council
The St. Johns County Tourist Development Council (TDC) is an arm of St. Johns County government, headed by a seven-person Board.
Visitor and Convention Bureau
St. Johns County Visitors and Convention Bureau, Inc. (VCB) was founded in 1994 by Virginia Whetstone, local motelier and chocolatier. Vanderbilt economics alumna Virginia Whetstone is most noted for erecting a wooden fence at her Anchorage Motel, with the fence fastened onto the Bridge of Lions, blocking the view of Matanzas Bay (Florida DOT has ordered its removal). On the other side of the Bay, in our Historic District,at the Bayfront Motel in 1981, Virginia Whetstone's father, Henry Whetstone, Sr., proposed a five-story glass walled condominium. Virginia Whetstone remains at VCB member to this day.
Some 250 VCB members pay $100/year to promote their business interests as a 501(c)(6). As VCB Executive Director Richard Goldman wrote in an E-mail refusing to provide any documents to us: “VCB ACTIVITIES DIRECTLY BENEFIT THE TOURISM RELATED BUSINESSES INCLUDING TOURISM DEVELOPMENT TAX COLLECTORS. INDIRECTLY, ITS ACTIVITIES STIMULATE VISITOR SPENDING AND COLLECTION OF MORE SALES RELATED TAXES AND FEES THAN WOULD BE COLLECTED FROM RESIDENTS ALONE.” (Capital letters in original).
July 15, 2013 TDC Meeting
Come see the public TDC meeting at the County Administration Building (Taj Mahal) on July 15, 2013 at 1:30 PM. Watch democracy in action. Help encourage TDC to ask questions of TDC staff, and of the VCB. VCB currently has a contract with St. Johns County that expires at 11:59 PM on September 30, 2013. Under the three-year contract, VCB gets some $3.4 million in bed tax money this year, most of which will be siphoned to multinational advertising agency MMGY or spent on advertising and agency commissions. It's our money – what is being done with it?
MMGY Invited Price Increases at VCB Meeting
MMGY is the world's largest tourism marketing consultant. MMGY's Vice Chairman, Dr. Peter Yesawich, a Ph.D. psychologist, advised VCB attendees to raise prices at a May 4, 2013 Worlde Golf Village report on the state of the “tourism industry (sic).” This invites illegality.
Preliminary Criminal Antitrust Inquiry Opened
A preliminary inquiry is underway by the the criminal section of the Antitrust Division of the Justice Department in Washington, D.C. concerning possible price-fixing conspiracy – discussing pricing in meetings, which could be a per se violation of Section 1 of the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890, forbidding “every contract, combination or conspiracy in restraint of trade.”
VCB Faces Antitrust Liability
As it is, VCB could be hauled before a Federal Grand Jury and indicted for antitrust violations.
VCB could also be sued by tourists in a class action antitrust and discrimation case, and they might win – some of the proceeds might be used to start a Tourist Club to protect against consumer fraudsters (like motel owners who advertise jacuzzis when they haven't worked in months, or who raise rates or cancel reservations after rooms are booked, as the Howard Johnson motel did to a wedding party after Mumford & Sons announced its concert, blaming a computer).
Other Florida Tourist Businesses Know Better Than to Talk About Pricing
Outside the VCB, other businesses know better than to talk pricing with each other: the Florida Restaurant and Lodging Association expressly forbids any price discussion for good reason. Pricefixing, market division and bidrigging conspiracies are federal felonies: criminal antitrust violations are punishable by ten year prison terms, $100 million corporate fines and $1 million in individual fines (fines can be increased to twice the amount conspirators gained from illegal acs, or twice the money lost by victims of crime, if either amount is over $100 million)..
VCB Refuses to Disclose Any of Our Documents,. County Still Footdragging
I asked VCB Executive Director Richard Goldman for a copy of VCB's Antitrust and Civil Rights Compliance policies on May 20, 2013. Goldman and VCB refuse to provide any documents whatever, in apparent violation of the Florida Open Records Act, which covers records of government contractors like VCB, which has government members (who voted until 2003), a government function and was housed in the County Administration Building until 2009. St. Johns County Administrator Michael Wanchick, St. Johns County Attorney Patrick McCormack, and the St. Johns County Commission have not directed VCB to respond, although VCB member Priscilla Bennett, a/k/a Rachel Bennett, appears to have gone to bat for VCB in lobbying the County Attorney's office on my Open Records request.
VCB Seems to Be Against New Tourist Attractions
VCB has refused to take a position on the St. Augustine National Historical Park and National Seashore.
VCB is unfriendly toward other proposed tourist attractions, refusing to cooperate with one developer, dodging telephone calls and refusing to share data.
TDC Members Rightly Questioning VCB About Nearly Everything
Meanwhile, astute TDC members – including three government officials and people with significant tourism and other business experience – have rightly begun questioning every single line item, every expenditure and every assumption.
At their June 17, 2013 meeting, TDC members publicly complained about a lack of long range planning.
This comes in the wake of the fiasco of the County's $300,000 “Tourism Master Plan,” which was developed by an international consulting firm after a “quick driving trip” around St. Johns County, as the St. Augustine Record reported September 24, 2008. It initially recommended a water slide park, eschewing African-American, Hispanic and GLBT history.
VCB Fails to Promote St. Augustine's Strengths
Our Oldest European-founded City in America is about to observe its 450th birthday. It's worth celebrating cultural diversity in a cool place – Mayor Joseph Lester Boles, Jr. calls it “our first diverse city.” America's first Roman Catholics, first Jews, first slave and free African-Americans and first Hispanics arrived here on September 8, 1565. America's first Greeks, Italians, Menorcans arrived two centuries later. Polyglot Spanish St. Augustine survived starvation, pirates, invaders, genocide, wars, arson, slavery, and segregation. Today, St. Augustine has embraced tolerance and historic preservation – the first freed slave community was here in 1740 and Jim Crow segregation was ended by the courage of the St. Augustine Movement.
Despite 450th and 500th, VCB Not Advertising in Miami, Refuses to Say Why
None of this has made much an impression on cynical VCB, which is not advertising in Miami, despite the City of St. Augustine's strategic plan to maximize Hispanic tourism from families sharing their heritage. The 500th anniversary of Spanish Florida and 450th anniversary of St. Augustine require outreach to people in Miami – we're not advertising there. Why?
So I asked MMGY Media Group Director Cyndy Murrieta at the May 14, 2013 meeting why VCB was not advertising in Miami. Murietta condescendingly told me to ask her after the meeting. I requested a public answer, then and there. Then Murrietta said “I'm being heckled.” I am still waiting for an answer. Murrietta proclaimed that instead of Miami, St. Augustine is targeting “affluent” tourists, in Augusta, Savannah, and Atlanta in Georgia and in Orlando and The Villages in Florida, and advertising in Reader's Digest and Better Homes and Gardens. Wonder why? VCB won't say.
VCB Continues History of “Jim Crow” Segregation Continues, De Facto
Until 1964, St. Augustine and St. Johns County motels and restaurants were segregated by state law – “Jim Crow” segregation. Local residents made history with Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Revs. Andrew Young and Hosea Williams and Dr. Robert Hayling, DDS Our local heroes made national headlines here in St. Augustine. None of this is reflected in VCB St. Augustine tourism materials.
“Absence of Black Faces,” Stores Close at 6:00 PM
In 1994, focus groups found an “absence of black faces” in St. Augustine tourist literature. They also complained about stores that close at 6 PM, with VCB founder Virginia Whetstone, proprietor of a St. George Street candy store, saying she was afraid of “crime.” No empirical data supports this claim: St. Augustine has some 59 police officers for a city of 13,000 souls and 12.3 square miles.
VCB Still Treating Some Tourists as “Strangers”
Tourism has been an engine of the local economy since the 1800s. Tourists were originally referred to in St. Augustine as “strangers” – the term “tourist” did not emerge until the 20th century. VCB is still treating as “strangers” African-Americans, Hispanics, young people and GLBT people. VCB's actions are illegal and offensive.
No Quality Standards
University of Florida Geography Professor Ary Lamme blasted St. Augustine's tacky tourist traps in his 1992 book on historic preservation. There were TDC discussions about establishing quality standards for hotels and restaurants in 1997, but they failed.
Our City is plagued with low-quality motels that don't provide what they promise, leading to bad memories for tourists – non-working jacuzzis and other conditions adverse to quality. Our local governments do not adequately regulate motels.
Still No Marketing to African-Americans
St. Augustine's unique African-American and Civil Rights history will draw tourists. State Representative Alonzo Reddick of Orlando chaired the House Tourism and Economic Development Committee for four years, told Margo Pope, “I think that if more blacks were aware of the black history of St. Augustine, it could become the tourist mecca for black history.” This would create jobs and opportunities. (February 4, 1995 Record). St. Augustine is still missing those opportunities.
“One of Best Kept Secrets”
In 1995, Kevin Stark, General Manager of the Association of Tennis Professionals, said St. Augustine was “one of the best kept secrets” in Florida. While this is no longer true – with our City making many national and world lists – it's still true about our Civil Rights and African-American history.
Discriminatory Marketing Materials
For decades, possible illegal discrimination – Civil Rights and Fair Housing violations – have been committed in St. Johns County real estate marketing of tourism. Real estate ads (printed in the St. Augustine Record) and billboards (erected by CBS, Gannett and other billboard companies) showed only white families. Precedents, including a case brought by a law professor against Mobil Oil's real estate subsidiary, suggests this exclusionary literature is illegal.
In this, the 500th anniversary of Spanish Floroda, VCB's current expensive St. Augustine tourist literature shows no photos of Native American Indians, with 199 photos of white people, only eleven (11) photographs of African-Americans (most of what appear to be happy slaves), and four (4) Hispanics.
VCB Not Marketing Civil Rights History, or to GLBT Tourists
VCB is also not reaching out to GLBT tourists, even though our City recognizes sexual orientation as a protected class in Fair Housing law, and by federal court order, Rainbow flags flew on our historic Bridge of Lions for six days in 2005 in honor of GLBT Pride week.
There's nothing about Civil Rights or GLBT people in our tourist literature – no photos of Dr. King and Rev. Andrew Young, no mention of the Andrew Young and Civil Rights Footsoldier memorials in our Slave Market Square, no mention of St. Augustine to the adoption of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.
Harry Truman said “the only thing new under the sun is the history you don't know.” The amount of history VCB does not know and does not share is simply staggering.
VCB Not Reaching Youth Market
Brand marketers look to build brand loyalty in college. In our town, some business owners don't want young people. That's why they hounded artists and entertainers off St. George Street, costing millions of dollars over two decades. In 1987, Chamber of Commerce Executive Vice President Coralee Pomar told the St. Augustine Record, “we don't go around to college campuses asking people to come here.” That's still true. At the May 14, 2013 VCB meeting, 1565Today Publisher Brian Nelson asked Yesawich about the youth market and Yesawich said it might not be very lucrative and could dilute the city's image, and claimed that Colonial Williamsburg had tried but failed to court the youth market.
Grammy-winning Mumford & Sons disagrees with Yesawich & Co: in September, they're holding one of only three U.S. “Gentlemen of the Road Concerts” here, at Francis Field, in downtown historic St. Augustine. Every hotel room was booked the first weekend after the announcement. Mumford & Sons like St. Augustine's diverse history and culture, our protection of GLBT people in our Fair Housing ordinance, and they must have noticed all the surf boards and kayaks on the local waterways and roads
Rich History Lacking in “Historic Coast” Marketing
Sadly absent from the tourist literature is the richness of our history – this is not Disney, but our consultants work for Disney and some 200 other tourist businesses, which is troublesome on loyalty and antitrust grounds.
VCB has not disputed the facts.
We are hiding our light under a bushel basket.
St. Augustine Marketing, Branding Seriously Flawed for Decades
Our branding here in St. Augustine has been seriously flawed for decades, and is still in need of uplift.
The ratio of spending on attracting tourists is roughly 40 dollars on advertising for every one dollar on research. Public relations – which brings good news coverage – is ignored by VCB. There has not been a single article about St. Augustine tourism in the New York Times travel section since September 5, 2003 – go to the Bunnery on St. George Street and you can see the yellowed article on the bulletin board.
Ad agencies make money on commissions, and cannot show results. They emit numbers, but they get commissions whether their marketing approaches make sense or not.
Decades of Citizen Concerns About Low-Quality Marketing
For decades, St. Augustine residents have raised concerns about the low-quality marketing paid for with bed tax dollars – 1950s “Jim Crow” marketing still excludes, offends and excludes African-Americans, Hispanics, GLBT people and young people.
Two St. Augustine couples wrote of St. Augustine tourism billboards displayed throughout South Florida..
On June 1, 1983, after visiting South Florida, St. Augustine residents Ben and Jeanne Troemel wrote in a letter printed the St. Augustine Record about the “large and expensive billboards” extolling only beaches, asking “what unthinking committee or person” spent so much money on such a large and “worthless billboard.”
Ten years later, in 1993, St. Augustine residents Frances and Robert Neelands saw St. Augustine billboards, with Ponce de Leon grasping a surfboard. Mrs. Frances Neelands (later for twelve years administrative aide to County Commissioner James Bryant) wrote a pithy letter in the St. Augustine Record June 13, 1993 that the billboards were “childish and non-creative,” stating she was “embarrassed to see such a billboard representing the oldest continous1y occupied city in the United States.”
Are Our Bed Tax Dollars Wasted?
Twenty years later, are our Category I bed tax dollars are still being wasted? Is money being squandered on bad advertising with bad taste, excessive advertising commissions, elitist studies of the richest 50% of Americans?
Is our branding contaminated by the subjective value preferences of MMGY and Dr. Peter Yesawich, a Ph.D. psychologist consultant, both of whom work for Disney and other large organizations?
Our marketing does not reflect our City's values – historic and environmental preservation, human rights and equality.
TDC Ad Gave 800 Number for Erotic Phone Line
In 1996, expensive brochures targeting rich white golfers were distributed by VCB to The Players Championship, bearing an erroneous 800-number for an erotic telephone talk service line!
History of Bed Tax Funds Misused
Bed tax money has been misused, including payments to the Association of Tennis Professionals and World Golf Village to locate here. Bed tax money has been abused for lavish advertising contracts, to subsidize public tours of private Flagler College, and even to send school children on trips – the St. Augustine High School Jazz Band in 1997.
For two years, TDC's advertising contract was illegal, with its contract with the Zimmerman advertising agency of Tallahassee reportedly not approved by the St. Johns County Commission (St. Augustine Record, December 15, 1995).
History of Sunshine Violations
Over the years, Margo Pope and the St. Augustine Record documented Sunshine violations that plagued the Tourist Development Council, held without public notice. They also documented abuses by the former contractor for tourism promotion, the Chamber of Commerce, and the successor entity, the Visitor and Convention Bureau.
$20,000 Junket for Chamber
In 1995, the Chamber of Commerce spent bed tax money on a $20,000 trip to Brazil, Argentina, Montreal and London. That junket helped lead to the Chamber losing, and VCB getting, the county tourism contract. At the time, it was said TDC meant “Times Demand Change.” But what changed?
We Need More “Friendraising,” While Ending “Jim Crow” Marketing
The University of Florida's Vice President, Ed Poppell, refers to “friendmaking” rather than “fundraising” as UF's goal – TDC needs to adopt his vision. VCB is needlessly offending African-Americans, Hispanics, Youth and GLBT people. They are our City's future
“Jim Crow” marketing and hiring practices must end.
We're not doing enough to attract the “heritage tourists” (“history buffs”) and the “eco-tourists” (formerly known as naturalists) to St. Augustine. They spend twice as much money, twice as much time, and they enjoy our city more than random tourists bouncing back after Disney, which businessman Richard Pounds once called a “giant vacuum cleaner.”
To attract more heritage and environmental tourists, we need a St. Augustine National Historical Park and National Seashore, with trolleys connecting current state parks and beaches. www.staugustgreen.com
We'd be better off spending money on public relations and grass roots lobbyists to accomplish that goal, than doing the same old things and expecting different results – ads in Readers' Digest and Better Homes and Gardens.
No Statistics on Worker Wages
Our tourism workers are grossly underpaid, some perhaps illegally. Yet a plethora of acronym-laced VCB statistics provided to TDC each month say nothing about the wages or welfare of employees, or whether any of them are being paid adequately to make money for the tourism industry.
Conclusion
The Tourist Development Council – TDC – will address these issues on July 15, 2013, as they set the year's tourism budget. Come speak out at 1:30 pm at the County Administration Taj Mahal..
As former City Commissioner Sandra Parks says, “A budget is a moral document.”
Let TDC stand for “Times Demand Change.”
Ed Slavin
Clean Up City of St. Augustine, Florida
www.cleanupcityofstaugustine.blogspot.com
Box 3084
St. Augustine, Florida 32085-3084
904-377-4998
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