A portion of the retail tourism tax collected by Branson retail establishments, theatres, hotels, motels, restaurants, and attractions for marketing within the Branson/Lakes Area Tourism Community Enhancement District (TCED) may be diverted to market areas outside of the TCED as far away as Galena, Crane, and Cape Fair. Under a proposal currently being considered by the TCED Board, $400,000 of TCED marketing funds would be channeled to the Table Rock Lake Area Chamber of Commerce, formerly known as the Kimberling City Chamber of Commerce, in an attempt to get a $200,000 reimbursement from Missouri’s Division of Tourism.
Under the proposal, as discussed thus far, the funds would not go directly from the TCED but would be funneled through the Branson Lakes Area Convention and Visitors Bureau (CVB). The CVB currently has a contract with the TCED to market the TCED and it is through that contract that the funds would be funneled to the Table Rock Lake Area Chamber of Commerce.
Wyli Barnes, President/CEO of the Table Rock Lake Area Chamber of Commerce made a presentation to the TCED Board at its Feb. 6 meeting outlining the proposal. The only official action taken by the board as a result of the presentation was to pass a motion directing the Board’s president to “write a letter to the Table Rock Lake Area Chamber of Commerce that the board is interested in encouraging the Branson CVB to subcontract with the Table Rock Lake Area Chamber of Commerce to obtain the $200,000 funding through the Missouri Department of Tourism.”
At least one of the members of the TCED Board, Bill Skains, Manager, Engler Block, Branson, expressed his concern that the TCED was doing something outside of its legislative authority. In response board member Bert Lehman, co-owner of Artilla Cove Resort, Indian Point, said “We’re not doing anything outside of our TCED.” Skains said, “I disagree” and Leman said, “Table Rock Lake is in the TCED.”
An examination of the current map used by the TCED to show its boundaries indicates that Table Rock Lake is not included in the TCED. Further, it shows that only a small portion of the southeastern portion of Stone County, including Indian Point, Silver Dollar City, and selected portions of Stone County, mostly west of State Highway 265 to the shoreline of Table Rock Lake and north of the southern boundary of the State Park are in the TCED. Not only geographically but economically, the vast majority of the TCED is located within Taney County and the city of Branson.
In a telephone interview on Feb. 7, Lehman, while acknowledging that the current map is the map that has been used to determine the TCED boundaries up to this point said that the map may not be accurate because it has never been digitized. He further pointed out that the boundaries of the Village of Indian Point encompass a portion of Table Rock Lake but he does not know whether or not the metes and bounds description used to initially formulate the TCED included any portion of Table Rock Lake.
At meeting held at Silver Dollar City on Oct. 10, 2007 Blaine Luetkemeyer, the Director of the Missouri Department of Tourism informed those in attendance of recent changes to the guidelines his department uses in its cooperative marketing program. Luetkemeyer and his staff arbitrarily put the changes in place without the approval of the Missouri Tourism Commission or broad dissemination to the various county commissions throughout the state who they had charged with implementing them.
The new arbitrarily imposed guidelines mean that the Division of Tourism will only recognize one entity within each county for participation in its cooperative marketing program. Under the program, the Division will provide matching funds to only one entity in each county. Stone County has designated the Table Rock Lake Area Chamber of Commerce, located in Kimberling City as that entity. The map of the TCED indicates that Kimberling City and the vast majority of Stone County are not within the TCED.
To get $200,000 in reimbursement from the Division of Tourism, the Table Rock Lake Area Chamber of Commerce must spend $400,000 and then apply for reimbursement from the state. Information presented during the presentation indicates that the Table Rock Lake Area Chamber of Commerce does not have the $400,000 necessary to maximize the reimbursement available from the state. The purpose of the request is to try to fund the Table Rock Lake Area Chamber of Commerce with sufficient funding to do so.
Furnished courtesy of the Branson Daily Independent.
See related editorial entitled: "Even Kimberling City can’t win the pot unless they ante up, or can they?"
