The county council agreed to enter a three year contract with the San Juan Islands Visitors Bureau Sept. 10. Business owners and non-profit representatives from several islands spoke during citizens access time to encourage the council to renew the contract.

“Tourist are going to come here one way or another, any the best way for them to come is as educated visitors so they can minimize the impact on wildlife,” Wolf Hollow Executive Director Chandra Stone told the council.

Gary Franco brought in props of two glass containers, one filled with coins, adn the other empty to illustrate the financial contribution tourists and the Visitors Bureau make.

Brian Goodremonte also painted the picture of how tourism affects the economy.

“Tourism and construction make up 70% of the island’s economy,” he said, adding that contractors he has spoken with attribute half of their business to tourism.

“We need leadership to bring together different groups and have an honest dialogue. If we manage growth responsibly and intentionally the current model is sustainable for decades,” he concluded.

Lopez business owner Paul McCully discussed how the Visitors Bureau has worked to understand the unique qualities of each island.

“Lopez has the smallest visiting market. The Visitor’s Bureau has given Lopez equal opportunity. With out it, Lopez would get lost n the noise of San Juan and Orcas,” he explained.

Earth Box owner Laura Saccio provided the council with background on how the Visitors Bureau was formed.

“A collective of shop keepers, innkeepers and others did not want to compete with one another and proposed a Lodging Tax in 2023” Saccio explained. “They wanted to form a cohesive marketing organization that could shape their message to the outside world. Rather than letting giant corporations describe the San Juans to the outside world, we wanted those who live here to decide who we are and how we want to be portrayed.”

Saccio brought data as well, telling council that tourism brought 300 million in revenue to the county, and $10.2 million in sales tax in 2023 alone.

Once everyone who wanted to speak at public access had spoken, Brandon Andrews Parks and Fair Director began his presentation. He told the council he recommended renewing the contract.Options for the contract’s duration were one, three or five years.

Before getting to the contract, however, Andrews provided results of his reseach on Visitors Bureaus. Through reaching out to Washington counties similar to San Juan, like Chelan, Grant and Leavenworth, Andrews gathered information about how they handle tourism. San Juan was the only Visitors Bureau of the counties he looked at, that had a staff dedicated to stewardship.

Council member Cindy Wolf noted that through multi-year surveys, letters and other public outreach, there was clearly a need for some kind of balance. In that data and input, islanders generally seemed to feel that 2019 was just about right in regards to tourism. “Maybe, philosophically we should look at that and see how we can support sustaining that rather than stimulating growth year after year without limit,” Wolf said.

Council Chair Jane Fuller reminded her co-council members that there is still not a responsible tourism plan, and that a lot of work has gone in to creating one. The Destination Managment Plan is still under review, and can be read online at https://engage.sanjuancountywa.gov/destination-management-plan.

“There has been a volume of correspondence from constituents not wanting funding for tourism,” said Fuller. “There are many in the county who are opposed to tourism, even if they recognize it is what fuels our economy, they still don’t want more people coming.”

Council member Christine Minney brought the discussion to the task at hand saying “Our decision here to day is to decide to have a contract, or not have a contract. Three years, It is a good chunk of time. So is five, but, I am very comfortable with three.”

Wolf and Fuller agreed with Minney that one year was too short, but felt five years was too long considering some of their concerns, and they both wanted to take a look at the contract and write it as a flat fee. The vote was unanimous.

“Our preference was to restore our typical five-year contract,” Deborah Hoskinson, Visitor’s Bureau Executive Director siad. “However, we’re pleased the Council has the confidence in our economic development work – from over the past 21 years – to award a three-year contract to continue our responsible tourism marketing and visitor education programs to support a sustainable visitor economy in the San Juan Islands.”