The Charlottesville Albemarle Convention & Visitors Bureau (CACVB) recently issued a Request for Proposal (RFP) seeking an outside firm “to provide electronic public relations and media services.” These services include:

• Single user license to access media database with complete contact information and access to a minimum of 8,000 media outlets including individual contacts and corresponding contact information and preferences for travel industry media persons

• Electronic tracking of earned media (not traditional clipping service MUST be electronic clips/tracking) by keyword with reporting that includes, at a minimum, a report on the number of articles per outlet, reach, circulation (or impression), and equivalent advertising value of earned media

• Press release distribution through PRWeb, PRNewswire or other credible outlets of this same function

So what exactly is CACVB and why does it require these outside services? The short answer is that CACVB is a multi-million dollar subsidy for the local hotel industry, and the proposed outside vendor represents services that don't require government funding in the first place.

Let's start with the official definition of CACVB and its mission:

The Charlottesville Albemarle Convention & Visitors Bureau (CACVB) is a regional program funded by the City, County and the private sector. The CACVB operates a visitor center on the East End of the Downtown Mall. The CACVB is responsible for marketing area tourism assets to leisure travelers, group tours and meeting planners to increase the economic benefits of tourism in the community. (Italics added.)

Charlottesville and Albemarle County each “contribute” 25% of their respective lodging tax revenues to fund CACVB. The lodging tax is a 6% assessment on all hotel bills. For the current fiscal year, Charlottesville contributed $619,143.00 to CACVB from $2,476,572.00 in estimated lodging taxes received. Albemarle County listed a CACVB contribution of $707,044.00 in its budget, but the County did not itemize its total lodging tax receipts.

Curiously, the combined Charlottesville and Albemarle contributions total $1,326,187.00, which is $42,117.00 more than the actual budget published by the City for CACVB, which is only $1,284,070.00. The budget explanation above notes “private sector” funding, but there is no line item or other evidence of any such contributions. The City simply lists $664,927.00 in “non general fund” revenues in addition to the $619,143.00 in dedicated City lodging taxes.

In any case, CACVB will spend about $1.3 million this fiscal year. This pays for 11 employees (five full-time) and various other expenditures related to “marketing area tourism assets.” As the Request for Proposal above explains, CACVB wants an outside firm to assist it with “electronic public relations and media services.” It's not clear why CACVB's existing employees are incapable of providing these services for themselves. For that matter, it's not clear why tax dollars should fund the marketing of private businesses like hotels.

The first item sought in the RFP is a “[s]ingle user license to access media database with complete contact information and access to a minimum of 8,000 media outlets.” This can be obtained easily without a separate vendor. A simple internet search turns up a number of subscription media databases. For example, Contacts on Tap offers access to 60,000 media listings for just a few hundred dollars:

If you're a cost-conscious independent practitioner or small to mid-size PR firm, our single-seat annual subscription to Contacts On Tap LITE is just $395. If you're with a Chamber of Commerce or Convention and Visitors Bureau that occasionally — or frequently — needs to provide updated media contact information to members, our annual multi-seat license is just $895 for Contacts On Tap LITE.

Another item mentioned in the RFP, press release distribution, is yet another thing CACVB could do on its own without an outside vendor. The RFP even mentions specific press release distribution services, like PRWeb, which anyone can access for a fee. CACVB's own RFP notes, “One staff person handles the public relations and media components.” Yet he or she isn't handling much when a basic function like press release distribution needs to be outsourced to a vendor.

The other item mentioned in the RFP, “[e]lectronic tracking of earned media,” is a fancy way of saying CACVB wants to know when Charlottesville and its tourist attractions are mentioned in the press. “Earned media” refers to unpaid publicity in news articles, op-eds, blogs, et cetera. The most basic method for electronically tracking earned media is, well, an internet search engine. Google Alert and Technorati provide basic earned media tracking. CACVB wants something more complex. In particular, it wants a vendor to track “equivalent advertising value of earned media.” In other words, if a magazine runs a feature story on Charlottesville, the vendor will estimate how much that would have cost had it been a paid advertisement. CACVB wants this information so it claim credit.

CACVB is very good at claiming credit. For example, in a 2006 city newsletter, CACVB claimed a 7-to-1 “return on investment.” How did the city determine this? By paying yet another outside vendor “to evaluate the performance of the bureau.” Some might question the value of paying someone to fairly evaluate your own performance, but not the Charlottesville city manager:

[CACVB] engaged the services of North Star Destination Strategies, a tourism focused research company, to evaluate the performance of the Bureau. The results indicated that the CACVB exceeded the 7 to 1 Return on Investment contractual performance standard set by the City. North Star found that for each dollar invested in the CACVB the Bureau directly created 8.8 dollars in visitor spending in the community, exceeding their goal by nearly 25%. Other measures of the CACVB's performance included media coverage and private investment in CACVB programs. The Bureau generated more than 7,200 hotel room nights through meetings and group tours brought to our area.

For the record, North Star Destination Strategies – the “tourism focused research company” – identifies itself as a “city branding specialist.” In other words, cities pay North Star to develop propaganda for their tourism offices. North Star CEO Don McEachern had this to say about developing Charlottesville's “brand” as part of his company's contract with CACVB:

Charlottesville . . . has a strong tourism product. But that product was all about history and historical tourism was declining. Thus Charlottesville underwent a branding initiative, looking for something more than history to attract visitors. Research found that every aspect of this city – from its aesthetics to its attractions to the University of Virginia – is imbued with quality, class and culture that are exemplified in the ideals of our founding fathers. So even if a visitor is not into history, he or she can still thrill to Charlottesville's exceptionally rich tourism experience that is the result of our country's highest standards. Visitors were targeted with a strategy focusing on the city's revolutionary standards and the pursuit of happiness.

Huh? So, because history isn't enough of tourist attraction, Charlottesville's tourism “brand” now emphasizes . . . “revolutionary standards and the pursuit of happiness”? I wonder if the “revolutionary standards” include not paying consultants to make such facile recommendations. Then again, I suppose McEachern and North Star were simply pursuing their own happiness, albeit at the expense of Charlottesville taxpayers.

Now as for the fantastic claim that CACVB “directly created” almost $9 for every dollar spent, the operative question is whether this alleged return could have been generated more efficiently by the private sector. At the end of the day, CACVB is nothing more than a subsidy for the local hotel industry. CACVB notes it “works with” a total of 46 hotels and inns. There's no good reason these businesses – most of whom are part of larger corporate chains – can't pay for their own advertising. Certainly hotel bookings would not suffer in the absence of CACVB, which renders absurd the claim that the Bureau alone is responsible for “generating” over 7,200 hotel room nights. Has CACVB never heard of Expedia, Hotels.com, Priceline, et cetera?

If Charlottesville and Albemarle County really wanted to boost local tourism, they would start by eliminating the very hotel taxes that are now used to fund CACVB. The 6% tax imposes unnecessary costs on both travelers and hotels. Its only function is to provide a slush fund for CACVB and related “tourism programs” that keep people (and vendors) on the government payroll. Charlottesville-Albemarle already has a Chamber of Commerce – let it deal with tourism advertising.