By Julia Myers
University of Kentucky School of Journalism and Telecommunications
The new Midway Tourism Committee has decided not to pursue
creating a Midway chamber of commerce, but is still looking into the
possibility of starting its own tourism commission.
While a countywide chamber of commerce does exist, it’s a
common feeling in Midway that the town is often under-represented and
overlooked in favor of its larger neighbor and county seat, Versailles.
Midway Mayor Tom Bozarth, in an effort to reaffirm the
city’s presence in Woodford County, asked City Council Member Grayson
Vandegrift to look into the idea of creating a separate Midway tourism
commission.
Vandegrift, general manager of his family’s restaurant, 815
Prime, put together a small tourism committee of himself and two other business
owners. The council member says that
they are still very much in the research phase of creating a commission.
According to Vandegrift, a Midway tourism commission would
“tax visitors to make our community better, and the expenditures would have to
be spent on tourism-related things.”
With the prospect of the county’s first hotel coming to Midway, a Midway
tourism commission could collect more room-tax revenue than the county commission.
“Theoretically, if funds were raised down the road, the
tourism committee could buy a building downtown and turn it into a community
center, which could be used for tourism-related things as well as
resident-related things,” said Vandegrift.
“It would benefit everybody, and that’s why we’re looking at it.”
In addition to
Vandegrift, members include Merchants Association President Kenny Smith and
business owner Clare McCarthy. Smith
says his experience in a variety of businesses gives him “expertise in
attracting and serving visitors of our fair city.”
Vandegrift and Smith met last month to discuss their
options. McCarthy wasn’t able to attend,
but Vandegrift said they would “fill her in on the details.”
The meeting was “definitely a good starting point,”
according to Vandegrift, but they ultimately decided that the idea of a chamber
of commerce wasn’t something that they should further pursue.
“We just kind of concluded that the chamber of commerce was
not necessary, and it seemed redundant,” said Vandegrift. “We already have a county chamber, and we
also have a merchants association, which is essentially the same thing.”
Smith agreed, saying that a Midway
chamber would be repetitive.
He does, however, believe that creating a tourism commission “could be
very beneficial in attracting new visitors to the community.”
Smith said that last month’s meeting was mainly for
informational purposes. They are just
beginning to understand the available avenues and the guidelines they would
need to follow if they pursued the idea.
Attracting tourists is one responsibility of the Woodford
County Chamber of Commerce, which gets most of the money that the county
tourism commission collects in taxes on room rentals because the income isn’t
enough to hire someone to work for the commission, Vandegrift said at Monday’s special council meeting.
The chamber recently hired as its executive director Don Vizi, who previously served as executive
director of the Danville-Boyle County Chamber of Commerce and the chamber in
Gulf Breeze, Fla.
Vizi says he plans on getting the cities together and wants to avoid having any conflicts with
Midway and Versailles events. “I’ve
heard the rumor about trying to split up these two cities in the county,” Vizi
said in a recent interview. “I totally
disagree with it.”
The chamber hopes to have events in Midway, such as a
chamber expo. “We’re looking at a
location in Midway to host that,” said Vizi.
Putting together a “taste of Woodford County” is also on the
chamber’s to-do list. Vizi says that
because Midway has so many restaurants, it would likely host the event. “It’s a matter of maybe trying to get the
restaurants there to get re-active with the chamber,” he said. “That’s one of my big priorities is to talk
with the merchants of Midway.”
Bozarth says he has yet to hear from Vizi, other than a
“request for a $2,000 donation” to the chamber, and he and Vandegrift noted
that Vizi didn’t make it to the most recent Midway merchants’ meeting.
Both men said they oppose making the donation, and Bozarth said, “I wouldn’t even consider
giving them a dollar until they did and internal audit on their books.”
During the five months prior to Vizi’s hire, the chamber had
been inactive. “I can’t deal with what
happened with the chamber before,” he said.
“My plans are that Midway is exactly the same as Versailles; it just
happens to be that my office is here.”
Bozarth said, “I don’t think anything will ever change. “That’s why I think it will be good for us to
have a tourism commission.”
Vizi says that would be extremely expensive and
time-consuming. “It is a very extensive
proposition to put together a separate tourism commission for Midway, the same
if someone were to want to put a separate chamber for Midway,” he said. “You’d lose out on the community itself – the
whole Woodford County.”
Vandegrift said he could understand why Vizi wouldn’t
recommend two chambers of commerce, but that there are several counties that
have successfully implemented two tourism commissions. (He said he did not know
of any cases in which a city commission exists in a county with a countywide
commission. There is at least one: Burnside and Pulaski County, on Lake
Cumberland.
“There are a lot of
counties that have two cities and each has a tourism commission. Each one might be able to bring different
things to the table,” said Vandegrift.
“And they could still work together in a lot of ways. Either way, a tourism commission in Midway
would also be promoting Woodford County as a whole.”
Vizi acknowledges that he needs to Midway’s faith
in the chamber and persuade “everybody
to work together.” He wants Midway to
know that it’s part of the community, and that Versailles is not trying to
compete with it.
“I have to build up confidence for the chamber in Midway,”
he said. “The only way I can do that is
to talk with the members up there, talk with Midway tourism, talk with the
Midway Merchants Association, and the mayor, and to let them know that the
chamber is not a Versailles chamber. “
Vizi said that he and the chamber are committed to bringing
the community together. “I think it’s
just very important,” he said. “Midway
is a very important part of Woodford County.”
Vandegrift said that he has still not spoken with Vizi about
the issue.
Although Vandegrift initially wanted to speak to the rest of
the city council this month and present a recommendation for a tourism
commission, he now says that they’re going to push it back because they need
more information and the potential sale of the city water system “needs to be
our number one priority.”
Vandegrift says the committee will continue to meet every
month or two to continue researching and planning, but as of now, it’s still a
“long term goal.”
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