Boulder debate: To lure or not to lure tourists

BOULDER – The city of Boulder is in the unique tourism position of being a destination, a gateway, a stop on a circuit and a side-trip all in one.

Being all those things means that a steady stream of visitors comes to the city or passes through it year round. Many of Boulder’s residents, mostly business owners and city officials concerned with revenues, are happy to see the throngs. Others are happy to see them only if the visitors promise not to stay.

“We don’t think of people who come to Boulder as ‘tourists,’´ said Stan Zemler, president of the Boulder Chamber of Commerce. “To us, they’re visitors, and they are more often from Louisville than they are from out of the state or from a foreign country.”

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The Fall 1999 Downtown Boulder Survey confirms that half of the Pearl Street Mall users are Boulder residents. Seventeen percent are from other parts of Boulder County and 33 percent are from other areas of Colorado or out-of-state.

Ron Secrist, city manager, said tourism has a substantial impact on the Boulder economy based on sales tax revenue from tourism and the results of the annual fall survey. “We are interested in keeping the number of visitors the same or growing it some,” he said, citing the current convention center study taking place. While the study is targeted at the business traveler, Secrist said that in Boulder’s changing economic environment, the city wants to stay open to any options that help it maintain the existing sales-tax base. While the Boulder chamber initiated the convention-center study, Secrist asked city council members’ permission to take part in it, and they agreed.

While he’s open to investigating ways to keep Boulder’s economy diversified, city councilman Spencer Havlick said he’s against spending any more public funds to attract additional visitors to the city. “Boulder is a magnet anyway. Magazines have rated it in the top 10 for the best places to live and in the top five of the best outdoor places. The more people you bring to Boulder, the more people there are who want to stay, and Boulder has exceeded its carrying capacity.”

Havlick said 82 percent of the respondents to the Integrated Planning Process wanted to keep the population of Boulder about 100,000. Studies have shown that when cities exceed 100,000 they experience a reduced quality of service at a higher cost, he said. Havlick thinks the city should spend its money to draw people in the region to the businesses that already are here, like the Pearl Street Mall.

The tourism arm for Boulder is the Convention and Visitors Bureau (CVB) housed at the chamber. Executive Director Shelly Helmrick reports to Zelmer, but the budget for the CVB comes from the city sales tax on accommodations and restaurants. The 1999 budget was $573,000, and the 2000 budget is $626,000. The total tax on a lodging room is 9.7 percent, which includes city, county and RTD taxes. The accommodations portion is 5.5 percent, of which the CVB gets 0.5 percent. The restaurant tax of 0.15 percent goes entirely to the CVB.

“Our budget is spent is several different areas including meetings marketing, visitor services, public relations and advertising, fulfillment, international and new markets, community and cultural programming and administration and operations,” Helmrick said. “In the area of advertising, each ad does have a specific method of tracking attached.”

She said the CVB does very little advertising because it is so expensive and difficult to generate results. The organization has been successful getting articles about Boulder placed in magazines, such as Sunset, which published an article about Boulder in its May 2000 issue. In addition, the CVB brings travel writers to Boulder for tours.

Tourism benefits Boulder businesses because people buy lodging and food, said Mary Ann Mahoney, public relations director for the Hotel Boulderado. “The tax isn’t much, but when they (CVB) go out and partner, they reach groups that come to Boulder.” Mahoney believes the CVB is doing a good job. “If they had more money, they could advertise in more magazines, but advertising is difficult to measure, expensive to do and track.”

Mahoney said she felt a difference in 1993 when the tourism office was gone. She felt like the nightly tourism traffic dropped off. “What a relief to have the Colorado Tourism Office back. When we don’t have the Colorado message out there, it’s harder to get the Boulder message out there,” Mahoney said.

She concurred with Havlick that Boulder draws people here just because it’s Boulder. “It has a great profile — healthy and health-conscious people, wonderful weather and a vibrant, high-tech community.” She said a friend from out-of-town asked her if everyone here runs or bikes.

Charles Goeldner, professor of Tourism Management and Marketing in the Center for Sustainable Tourism at the University of Colorado at Boulder, said tourism is important because it diversifies a city’s economy. Boulder’s tourism is under-developed compared to other cities of the same size and also compared to Denver, he said.

“Denver has a tourism infrastructure in place and most of it is new, he said. He cited as examples Elitch’s Six Flags, Denver International Airport, the Denver Center for Performing Arts, Ocean Journey and the Museum of Nature and Science. Goeldner said a convention and conference center would help Boulder’s tourism and could be used for a cultural center as well as for large meetings.

Tourism in Boulder is different, Goeldner said, because of its culture, and because it has a major state university. “CU is a powerful attraction,” he said. But Boulder doesn’t have the things others cities have, and it hasn’t made a concentrated effort to attract more visitors.

A convention center should do it, and to pay for it, he would increase a portion of the taxes that go to the fund the CVB. “I wouldn’t increase taxes,” he said. “I would just increase that portion of the existing tax, if I were running the city.” He said he wouldn’t increase the accommodation tax because of what happened in New York. “The city (New York) raised the accommodation tax to 21 percent and lost its meeting and convention business. When it lowered the tax to 17 percent, which is still high, it got some of the business back.”