CITRUS COUNTY TOURIST DEVELOPMENT COUNCIL Lecanto Government Building Room W. Sovereign Path, Lecanto, FL December 12, :00 am

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1 Commissioner Ronald E. Kitchen, Jr. Councilmember Jacquie Hepfer Mike Shoemaker Vice-Chairman Michael Mancke Dr. Paresh Desai Daryl Seaton Councilmember Crystal River Mike Engiles Gene McGee Council Members Present: Chairman Ronald E. Kitchen Vice Chair Michael Mancke Mike Engiles Mike Shoemaker Daryl Seaton Gene McGee Dr. Paresh Desai Council Members Absent: Jacquie Hepfer Crystal River Councilmember County Staff Present: Marti Spewock, John Pricher, Veronica Davis, Terry Natwick, Randy Oliver Public in Attendance: Ann Pope, Chris Kingree Call to Order: The meeting was called to order at 9:00 am followed by the invocation and pledge of allegiance. Marti Spewock called the roll. There were seven members present for a quorum. ADOPTION OF AGENDA A motion was made to adopt the agenda with changes to the Board Member listing (corrected). Mover: Gene McGee Seconder: Dr. Desai John introduced Terry Natwick as the new Sales & Marketing Manager for the VCB. Efforts will be made by the entire staff, as needed, to work with economic development but this position works for the VCB/TDC. APPROVE MINUTES OF MEETING A motion was made to approve the minutes of the October 18 th, October 24 th and November 14 th meetings as presented. Chairman Kitchen commented that he liked all the details provided and members not at the meetings can get caught up on happenings if they read them. Mover: Michael Mancke Seconder: Gene McGee

2 OPEN TO THE PUBLIC NA UNFINISHED BUSINESS 2019 Proposed TDC meeting schedule: changes can be made going forward if something needs to be rescheduled. The schedule will be reviewed again come summer time. A motion was made to approve the 2019 Proposed TDC Meeting Schedule Mover: Michael Mancke Seconder: Mike Engiles Germany Road Show The consensus of the board is to do both ITB Berlin and the Germany Road Show. A vote was not taken on this agenda item at an earlier TDC meeting. A motion was made to approve travel and budget transfer for $4,250 for the Germany Road Show Mover: Daryl Seaton Seconder: Michael Mancke NEW BUSINESS Partnership Proposal 2019 Bassmaster Opens Series John walked the board through the sponsorship offering and how it would help increase the fresh water fishing tourism segment. The investment is easy to absorb into the budget and further markets that side of the County. Gene McGee agrees with emphasizing the east side with the lakes. Daryl Seaton thinks the east side has a lot of opportunity and asked Mr. Kingree about the quality of our lakes in Citrus County and if they are good enough for these types of tournaments. Mr. Kingree provided that Lake Russo is rated 38 th on the Bassmasters Top 100 list for big bass in the Country and is in the top 5 in the State of Florida. After Irma, there was a big fish kill and a lot of downsizing on the fishing traffic to Lake Rousseau because of that. Mr. Kingree, in conjunction with Gambler Lures produced video of fresh water fishing in Lake Russo and how good it is which will be aired via YouTube shortly. Out of the Tsala Apopka chain, Lake Hernando fishes the best for tournament fishing which is already attracting a state level Florida bass tournament fishing trail. There are two qualifiers held in Citrus County that are brought here by the State. There are 2,500 circuit members. They are at a grass roots club level circuit right now. This level qualifies us for the pro level but he feels that the exposure wouldn t be as good. His offering is the network of hard working people involved in the industry. He has his own YouTube channel with approximately 40,000 subscribers to air all the videos. Daryl Seaton feels we should be sponsoring more of this type of event and that this may be our introduction to this market. Michael Mancke likes the whole idea, but if we tap into it correctly, we don t have the infrastructure to handle it, which is a great problem to have. Major League Fishing is one of the top rated shows on TV and gets huge ratings and they are making a huge contribution to the industry. Michael Mancke likes the fact it s home grown. Gene McGee is comfortable with Chris as an ambassador to market out county and would like to charge Chris with working with John to bring in a multi-day tournament to put us on the map. Daryl Seaton seconds that with the caveat to come with a long term

3 plan to market the county. The board has talked about tournaments being held in Citrus County and would like to see this happen going forward. A motion was made to approve participation at the platinum level in the Bassmasters Open Series for $8000 from the VCB budget. Mover: Gene McGee Seconder: Michael Mancke Video Production Opportunity with Visit FL John discussed this opportunity with the board and provided input as to why he feels it s a good idea to participate. Visit FL has a video content production and marketing opportunity available. The program delivers 15 and 30 second edits as well as he full length video at roughly 90 seconds. Filming will commence in January. Cost of the project is $6,440. He would like to take this expenditure out of the VCB marketing budget but asks that when the true up revenue is put into the budget in February a portion goes back into this account. The board agreed that it was a good project and the VCB should move ahead with the opportunity using the projected revenue allocation. DIRECTORS/MEDIA REPORT Additional Marketing Funds Policy It came up in the October workshop that the rollover amount (or true-up) from FY 16/17 ($92,530) and a $100,000 from the special projects fund should be allocated to the VCB budget for FY 18/19. After the transfer, there would be $530,000 and change left in the special projects fund. John wanted to make sure the board was aware of the actual number and what it was going to be used for. A preliminary list should be available in January. He wants to make sure the board is aware of how rapidly we would reach the $200,000 line operating this way. It could be as quick as two years to reach the $200,000 cap for that account which could create a significant drop between FY 20 and FY 21 because the money would be gone. We just had the true-up, and while we are doing well, that is not always a certainty. We may want to look at a slower transfer rate, still adding the money so when it reaches $200,000 it s not such a significant drop off from previous years. Chairman Kitchen paraphrased John by saying that every year the reserve was growing and the carry forward was growing and we weren t spending any of it. The board decided to spent whatever the true-up was in the next FY budget. Based on what is drawn down, if we only have this much it will take X number of years to get to the agreed upon minimum of $200,000. Then, if you used to spending $200,000 a year and it s not there, don t be surprised when it s gone. He feels that it may not be stacked and revenues could continue to increase so the true-up could continue to be larger each year. The other thing is every budget year we will look at it and modify it to make sure to stay on track and not over spend. As of now it s this, but it could be more or less each year and we will adjust accordingly. Gene McGee commented that this money is money we wanted in marketing and we can look at it every year but he wants to be able to spend it now also. Michael Mancke agrees with Gene to spend it when we have it. Daryl Seaton agrees also to spend it when we have it and if handled properly it should increase what we bring in in the future. Spending it is marketing. We know we can t have elevated spending levels forever.

4 Randy Oliver commented that the true up from FY 16/17 won t be known until February; however, $200,000 is projected from the 17/18 budget for FY 19/20 s budget. The Website creation is moving forward and looking like end of summer before completion. John would rather have it later and correct than early and missing components. Chairman Kitchen finds it fascinating that revenue collections from previous years like 1997 and 1998 were at $238,000; today our true up is that much. As a board, we have done a lot of things that have contributed to the larger bottom line (ad agency, additional staff, social media, new website, etc.). John provided that the VCB is working on a report card type of annual report that highlights the successes throughout the year. This report should be available at the January meeting, barring any printing problems. Chairman Kitchen commented that the board talked about resurrecting the ½ cent sales tax referendum for road resurfacing. It is more effective in communities with high tourist numbers, since they pay a large percentage of the tax collected. A 1% sales tax in Citrus County would bring in $15M and a half cent would bring in $7.5M, based on our population. If we go out and start talking to people to see if they are interested in this, is that amount based on just the citizens divided by what the State sends us in collections? Can we extrapolate what that money is and where the money comes from? If we have a ½ million tourists visit each year how much of the tax comes from tourists and would it offset that number? In Alachua County John said they estimated that 25-30% of the one cent increase was directly related to people passing through. Randy Oliver will look into it, but sales tax collections are reported by zip codes and DOR and he feels it will be in the 20% range. We need to get information out to the community to educate them. Destination Update: the STR report shows a decrease in occupancy for October 2018 less than October 2017; a 4.2% growth in ADR and a -16.1% decrease in RevPAR. Much of that is accountable to Hurricane Michael. The YTD results show a -2.0% decrease in Occupancy, a 4.0% growth in ADR and a 1.9% growth in RevPAR for the fiscal year comparison. Tourist Development Tax Collection: we show an increase of $1,524 from October 2017 to 2018, or a 1.27% upturn. YTD shows a 1.27% growth or $1,524 for the Fiscal Year, a total collection of $121,483. Citrus Being Social Update: Facebook showed growth to get to 160,900+ page likes. The Facebook page for Fishing in Citrus County shows a steady growth with 6,375 page likes, exceeding our goal of 5,000. The Citrus County Tourism Advocates page is getting great engagement with partners with 700 Likes. Instagram: 8,012 followers. We added 118 followers in November. Our goal is to reach 10,000. A Visit FL paddleboard post reached 2,867 likes. Twitter VisitFL had a manatee and Crystal River focus.

5 OTHER BUSINESS BY COUNCIL MEMBERS Mike Engiles asked if there was any update from DEMA on getting the pavilion. To date, nothing has been received. VCB will continue to research. Dr. Desai inquired on the status of potential boat ramp fees as discussed at a BoCC meeting. Chairman Kitchen doesn t feel that the board has any appetite to instill county wide fees for boat ramps, although, if there was a method where residents could get a discount or get in free, and visitors would pick up the fees, they would look at it. Legal is researching the possibilities of that scenario. Resident passes are also being looked into. Daryl Seaton commented that most other counties charge for using their boat ramps. He doesn t feel it would hurt the industry. Chairman Kitchen commented that there will be continuing discussions at the BoCC. Daryl Seaton feels that a long term plan is necessary before deciding on any action. OPEN TO THE PUBLIC NA ADJOURNMENT: Chairman Kitchen called for adjournment at 10:25 am. The next regular meeting is Wednesday, January 9, at 9:00 am at the same location.