Motion Strengthens Tourism Recommendations

The work over the past 4 months of the ad hoc Tourism committee, was rewarded with a supporting motion of Council on Feb. 9th. The motion:

• recognizes the key strategies identified in the Tourism Report
• opens the door for financial resources
• strikes a steering committee and a chair
• assigns staff support
• tasks the steering committee to develop a short term contract to act on the prioritized recommendations as approved by Council
• and invites quarterly reports from the Chair of the steering committee

Our next meeting is Monday, March 23rd to identify the chair and begin the process of prioritizing the recommendations in our report.

In 2007, tourism in Ontario directly or indirectly employed more than 300,000 workers.
Tourism revenue in 2007 was $22.1 billion or 3.4% of the province’s Gross Domestic Product, which was greater than the combined total from agriculture, forestry/logging, commercial fishing/hunting and mining.

Discovering Ontario: A report on the future of tourism proposes four strategies to help the provincial government and the tourism industry create jobs and build the province’s economy:
Greg Sorbara, MPP for Vaughan, released a report today that lays out a 10-year plan for boosting the tourism industry by marketing Ontario as one of the world’s best places to visit.