A screenshot of the Sitka Convention and Visitors Bureau website. The assembly has voted to dissolve the bureau. (Screenshot June 24, 2015)
The saga of Sitka’s Convention and Visitors Bureau continued Tuesday night (8-26-15), as the Assembly moved one step closer to fully dissolving the bureau and hiring an outside contractor to do its work — likely the Sitka Chamber of Commerce.
The Assembly was expected to vote on whether to award a contract to the Chamber, but the contract wasn’t finished by the Tuesday meeting.
Instead, assembly members voted to authorize city staff to secure any city assets as the bureau prepares to shut down.
City Administrator Mark Gorman told the Assembly that his decision not to grant a new contract to the existing visitors’ bureau — or SCVB — was solidified when he received a call from an investigator at the state Department of Labor and Workforce Development this month, notifying him that the bureau would be penalized for two “serious” workers’ compensation violations.
“In the course of that conversation, it further affirmed for me that there had been management issues as well as governance issues,” Gorman said. “And given that we are in transition, I think that it’s very important that we get in and make sure that obligations, liabilities, and assets of the City and Borough of Sitka are protected.”
That will mean taking control of the bureau’s bank accounts, for starters, Gorman said, and compiling an inventory of city-owned equipment and supplies.
SCVB Board president Evy Kinnear said she disagreed with the decision to dissolve the bureau.
“I’m angry that this is happening,” Kinnear said, adding that she thinks it has been handled unprofessionally. But, she said, the larger issue is the future of Sitka’s tourism industry.
“My husband said, and I have to agree with him, that most important is that this visitor industry remain a viable, strong economic force as it’s become in the town,” Kinnear said. “We can’t function without it. And we can’t function without its growth.”
For that reason, Kinnear said, the SCVB board and its current executive director, Tonia Rioux, would support the Assembly’s decision.
