A PRESIDENTIAL ADVISORY COUNCIL ON TRAVEL AND TOURISM

Tourism is an unsung hero of the U.S. economy. Over the course of the past eight years, it has generated more than 56.7 million jobs, $3.7 trillion in expenditures, $622 billion in state, local and federal taxes and $157 billion in trade surpluses. Despite such robust economic performance, tourism’s contributions to the prosperity of American life have not been fully recognized, understood nor strategically developed by many policymakers for what it is: A powerful driver of jobs, community development, small business growth and export generation.

The United States’ tourism policy was previously coordinated to some extent through the United States Tourism Administration (USTA), which operated under the Department of Commerce with an annual budget of approximately $17 million. The Administration was abolished due to congressional budget cuts and a perception among many policymakers that the organization was not achieving its mission. Its successor, the Tourism Industries office within Commerce’s International Trade Administration operates on a small budget and is largely a statistical resource for inbound travel data. It has neither the resources nor the directive to promote the U.S. as a desirable travel destination overseas.

This lack of strong, coordinated U.S. government support puts the U.S. travel and tourism industry at a sharp disadvantage to its international competitors. More than 130 countries have official, government-sponsored tourism offices. These nations have recognized that a coordinated national tourism policy fulfills numerous domestic goals, including job creation, expanding trade surpluses and creating economic vitality on a multi-regional basis within their countries. This reality is borne out by the fact that the U.S. has fallen behind in recent years to become the third most popular travel destination in the world – behind France and Spain. Not surprisingly, both of these countries provide significant annual funds to their national tourism promotion offices.

The Travel Business Roundtable (TBR) advocates the establishment of a President’s Council on Travel and Tourism to help the U.S. retain its edge against its competitors as the premier travel destination in the world. The Council would be created by Executive Order as a federal advisory committee under the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA). It would be comprised of not more than 35 presidentially appointed members from the private, public and non-profit sectors. These members would represent a diverse range of business, government and non-profit organizations with experience relating to policy matters impacting tourism development. Operating on a substantially smaller budget than the old USTA, the Council would pursue four essential objectives:

	Foster tourism policy development and coordination within the federal government;
	Demonstrate how effective tourism policy can be implemented;
	Raise awareness of the economic importance of travel and tourism; and
	Develop appropriate benchmarks to measure tourism policy success.

The Council’s activities would include:

	Reviewing current policies and programs that support tourism export growth;
	Performing a marketplace needs assessment;
	Identifying replicable examples of effective tourism export policy from other countries;
	Recommending policy improvements and additional opportunities to advance U.S. tourism exports abroad;
	Advising the President on policies that would foster fiscal prosperity and growth for small tourism-related businesses;
	Advising the President on domestic policies and approaches that can promote community-based tourism development, particularly in rural and economically depressed areas; and
	Creating and participating in projects that help forge partnerships among representative of federal and state agencies, urban centers and rural communities, with the goal of creating a strategic vision for community-based tourism development.

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