Town Manager Laurel Prevetti said the town will have to pull from the “very tight” general fund or utilize leftover ARPA funds to cover the increase. It comes as the town faces a $3 million annual budget deficit each year for the next five years.ĬBS travel show calls Bay Area salon a “Destination’ Funds for that position ran out in January, by which time the combined social media accounts increased their followers from 2,700 to 9,500.ĬOVID funds aside, this is the first major budget increase for the Los Gatos Chamber of Commerce in four years. The following year, the town used American Rescue Plan Act funds to fund the Chamber specifically to boost “emergency destination marketing” in an effort to jumpstart pandemic relief and support local businesses.Ĭhamber events staffer Donna McCurrie said at the May 1 council meeting that the Chamber used those funds to hire a social media coordinator to revamp and rebrand the tourism social media channels to “Visit Los Gatos CA” in June 2021. Tourism revenue dropped from $2.4 million to $700,000 after COVID broke out in 2020. The town first contracted with the Chamber to run the Visitor Information Center in 2001 with a budget of $100,526. The town has given the Chamber $55,000 a year since 2019, and this marks the first increase since then. … But you’re still at the tail end of Silicon Valley.” “I think the biggest draw is where we are situated geographically: the last stop before you go into the mountains before the Pacific Ocean. Everyone has their own idea,” Somers said. “The strategy around branding Los Gatos has always been a little ambiguous. She admits that part of the problem is that no one has yet cracked exactly how to market Los Gatos to tourists. “With that validation and with the new executive director starting here, it really does open the doors for more collaboration with the town staff,” Somers said. Somers said there’s no bad blood between the Chamber and the council, and that the increase in funds will help the new executive director, who has not yet been hired, start with a clean slate. They never really listened to us before.” “We weren’t even going to say anything this year because of the budget constraints. “We were totally surprised,” Somers said of the allocation. Somers is stepping down on June 30, and the rest of the Chamber’s three-person staff is set to leave this summer. But by the time the town council came around to her vision-approving $88,000 last week to fund the town’s Visitor and Information Center, social media and marketing-it was too late for her and the Chamber of Commerce she oversees as executive director. Catherine Somers has always wanted Los Gatos to be seen as a tourist destination.
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