The Crookston Visitor’s Bureau (CVB) met last week and was notified that they’d be receiving an additional $22,000 in funds that had been in a CVB account with the Chamber Chamber of Commerce. Additionally, Crookston Housing and Economic Development Authority Executive Director Craig Hoiseth informed the committee that the City of Crookston was canceling the reconciliation of accounts at the Chamber because some of the documentation couldn’t be produced.
Laurie Stahlecker, the owner of Scobey’s Pub & Grub and the Crookston Inn manager, said it would’ve been nice for the CVB to have been included in that decision rather than made aware after the fact. However, the CVB board said they were happy to be receiving more money. ’We’ve had our new money, which is money collected since the Chamber terminated the (CVB) agreement with the city,” said CVB Board Chair Nell DeBoer. “We got that check right away, and now, we were gifted the old CVB money that went into the account as well. We were also able to receive a Crisis Grant from (Explore) Minnesota Tourism for $3,700 to further our mission. Very excited to have some money in our account now, and a lot of things we want to do can now take place, including the visitor’s guide. We have a goal of having that ready by January 31.”
DeBoer said some components of the visitor’s guides have already gone to the printer, but they are still working on some of what will be included. “The meat and potatoes of that is definitely our hotels will be represented in that,” said DeBoer. “All of our restaurants, convenience stores, retailers. That is the main thing, to give a little description, pictures, and information on all of our businesses in town that would be of interest to visitors. We also have area attractions and a big list of all of our events and the highlights of what those events entail, and contact information for those as well. We’re going to have a separate section on places where you can have conferences, conventions, weddings. All of the places we have in town where you could hold those, the caterers and those kinds of things. Our biggest thing is to try to attract people to see that Crookston can be used as a place to have big things.”
DeBoer said the board talked about hiring a tourism coordinator but would like to have as many things established as possible before making that hire. “We got the board to approve a website, so we are working on that as well,” said DeBoer. “It won’t be fully ready right away, but it will be up with some important information, contact information and such so people can find us. We’re going to be continuing to add to that to keep it fresh and updated all the time.”
As far as a tourism coordinator, it would be a part-time job. “We talked about a timeline for a tourism coordinator. We do want to hire a part-time tourism coordinator. I proposed hiring in three months,” said DeBoer. “I thought that was a lofty goal, so we’re maybe looking at six months before we can hire someone. We definitely want things in place for that person. The structure to be there. The website to be up and running. All of our ducks in a row for that person, so we can guarantee their success.”
The other aspect of the CVB has been providing grants for events bringing people to town. DeBoer said that while the board has a rough draft for the grant program, they want to get insight from other organizations before finalizing the program. “We have a rough draft of if you wanted to run an event in town that says this is the criteria you need to meet and expectations that we have in order to give you that grant,” said DeBoer. “We’re working on that first. From there, we’re going to do a sub-committee maybe and have them come up with the actual grant. I have a call out to meet with the Chamber Chair (Lance Norman) to talk about the grant, pass that on to them, and ask for any suggestions they have with the grant process. I know they had some concerns or suggestions. We want to make sure they’re included. And then, Councilmen Steve Erickson and Joe Kresl have a copy that they are going to take to the Council because there was some concern from the Council about how that grant process was going to be. We want to be very, very, very, very transparent to everyone and include as many groups as we can for input in doing this grant process.”
