Explore Minnesota Tourism / State Land Conveyance
[Music] resource finance committee to order uh today's date is february 16 2021. today members of course we're going to be virtual as as everyone knows um we're going to be going over two bills both of which will be uh laid over for possible inclusion so there will be no votes taken and we're going to um first we're going to start out we have some a lot of testifiers so we're going to start out with senator rood she has both bills but senate file do you have a preference would you want to do senate file 511 i think we're ready for that one first okay very good senator rude the senator senate file 511. thank you mr chair um i'm sorry we have a quorum just want to ignore that thank you perfect thank you uh senate uh file 511 is an appropriation for explore minnesota tourism um you know um in december um the hospitality industry lost 41 000 jobs just in one month and so this is a this is a bill to help them uh recover as we go forward and we have a lot of great testifiers uh today so with that i'm gonna hand it right over to sarah pisik who is the minnesota tourism growth coalition sarah welcome to the committee please start out by identifying yourself and go ahead thank you thank you mr chair and members my name is sarah pasic and i'm representing the minnesota tourism growth coalition we're a statewide group of public private and non-profit tourism organizations and businesses i want to thank senator rood and the bill co-authors several of who are on this committee for sponsoring senate file 511. i could bring you dozens of newspaper articles that have been written over the past months regarding the tourism and hospitality industry and they will all tell you the same thing the tourism industry has been hit the hardest and will likely be the last to recover from the coved 19 pandemic from duluth to st paul from grand rapids to mille lacs from worthington to winona from thief river falls to rochester every single part of the state has suffered information from explorer minnesota tourism shows that travel spending in minnesota decreased by 7.1 billion dollars in 2020. the latest forecast of 2020 international travel to minnesota shows an 80 percent year-over-year decrease with a return to pre-pandemic levels forecasted for 2024 or later mmb reports the leisure and hospitality sector was the hardest hit in annual employment numbers through december 2020 there were 123 400 fewer leisure and hospitality jobs in minnesota than there were in february resulting in a 44 drop in employment through december all other sectors combined had 113 000 fewer jobs senate file 511 proposes funding in four key grant programs the tourism recovery marketing grant program meetings and conventions marketing program events assistance grant program and a business cooperative marketing grant program each of these grants will benefit a different sector of the tourism and hospitality industry and 100 percent of these grant dollars will directly aid minnesota's tourism and hospitality industry no dollars will be spent on administrative costs as you know every dollar invested in tourism results in a return to the state in traveler spending state and local tax revenues and creates jobs so i want to turn things over to our testifiers who will provide information on each of the grant program requests thank you for your support of tourism thank you for that and members will hold questions till the end of the testimonies next we'll have terry matson visit saint paul is terry here i see you're there um welcome mr chairman terry matson here my name is terry mason i'm the president and ceo of of visit st paul uh and the river center uh testifying in support of senate file 511 i support recommendations for explore minnesota tourism the agency does outstanding work generating more revenues throughout the state while opening doors for the pandemic recovery and other forms of economic development in particular i mentioned the one million dollars in fiscal year 2022 and 1 million dollars in fiscal year 2023 for tourism recovery marketing grant programs these recovery grants provide needed help for organizations like visit st paul it's no secret the pandemic has been financially devastating for our industry and it's been devastating for our destination marketing organizations too public health continues to be the top priority and the financial implications are hitting us hard recovery is disparate and while we've seen some updates upticks along the way uh ebbs and flows and consumer sentiment it's a very slow trajectory upward a trudge if you will having said that vaccines are are making everyone optimistic for 2022 but we're still very much in the grips of an industry-wide depression 40 percent of of the job loss is is within our industry and over 80 percent of that impact falls on small businesses urban destinations like st paul and across the country in particular are struggling the metro is very much struggling in saint paul these recovery grants help fund programs like our ready together pledge saint paul's commitment to cleanliness and safety and other marketing campaigns such as share the love of saint paul explore minnesota's state of gratitude campaign also helps us ready uh for market and and ready us for speed to market when the time is right st paul needs visitors and minnesota needs visitors collaboration between all of us is really the key to our future and recovery will be helped by tourism uh equity and inclusion need to be a part of all conversations no one shares more of our state's diversity and by poc business support sometimes people overlook what we do but our visitors and our partners rarely forget how we make them feel this has been the the most challenging here that that any of us have ever faced our collective losses are devastating and to this day we still face uncertainty knowing that uh i know things will get better thank you sarah pasic and and the minnesota tourism growth coalition thank you senators uh for your hard work and consideration and thank you to explore minnesota for helping destinations all across this state we do this for the people who live here and we know that brighter days are ahead but we're still struggling so thank you very much for your support matson thank you for that thank you for the testimony next we'll move on to anna phil good morning visit mankato thank you mr chair and members i'm anna phil president at visit mankato i'm here to testify on behalf of the explore minnesota tourism funding request for meetings and conventions marketing grants under the advisement of the explorer minnesota tourism council explore minnesota is requesting a one-time special appropriation of two million dollars one million per year of the biennium to be used for the marketing grant program specifically to aid in the recovery of meetings and conventions business in minnesota this funding is needed for destination marketing organizations as they try to recover from the crisis we have found our meetings and conventions industry in across the state this industry has been disproportionately impacted due to the covid19 pandemic for example hotel and lodging sales are down statewide with the metro area especially severely hit and this is due in large part due to the severe downturn of meetings and conventions and other business but the effect is much greater than just in the lodging and industry and extends into convention centers meeting venues and all businesses that support this particular industry with many destination marketing organizations funding tied to lodging tax dollars these organizations are facing huge budget shortfalls and are unable to market their communities for meetings and conventions and while we're seeing reduced revenues we're also seeing rising costs for meetings and convention groups due to the health and safety protocols that these groups have to follow now to reduce the spread of covet 19. so
we're seeing these costs becoming the responsibility of destination marketing organizations in order to win that business in their particular communities and finally the state of minnesota is facing competition by surrounding states for meetings and convention business due to different covet 19 restrictions in those states we're seeing businesses go where they can to host their events which often means going to other states that have less restrictions on capacity size etc so we need to double down on our marketing in order to win this business back to the state these grant dollars would provide critical funding to communities as they rebuild group business through awareness marketing and confidence messaging and i just want to stress how important meetings and conventions are to building back our economies in the state of minnesota in our local communities meetings and conventions bring in in immense economic impact to their area attendees typically spend more than a typical visitor in a community often because those expenses are on the company's dime rather than the visitor's personal dime meetings impact more than just the typical hospitality sector it reaches into staging technology decorations cleaning in other sectors outside of the typical visitor services and then meetings and conferences help round out the year for many destinations bringing business during the off-season or shoulder season when leisure travel is at its lowest point in minnesota this is especially important meetings and conventions put people to work there's a reason why the event center in manca mankato sends a traffic report to its hospitality businesses this report includes includes a listing of the businesses the dates the uh expected attendance for those events so that those hospitality businesses can staff up and make sure that they have people ready to serve our visitors and then it introduces a community to future visitors business travel often brings newcomers to a destination that often results in bounce-back visits oftentimes with those bounce back visits bringing family and other companions in tow and then many people also make it a mini vacation they book uh days before their convention or days after their convention in order to enjoy that particular community meetings and conferences are critical to the recovery of our state and local economies thank you again for the opportunity to speak to you today and thank you for your consideration of this funding request to assist in the recovery of our state's meeting and convention industry thank you for your great testimony and yes we have to uh we have to get over this and and uh this this idea of virtual is all fine and dandy but when you're on virtual you don't spend much time you don't spend any money at the restaurant you don't spend any any money at the uh the touristy businesses that we should be doing when we visit uh different cities so there's no question about it that's a that's a big big difference in in our economy so thank you for that uh next up randy uh dewitts thank you mr chair and uh fellow senators i'm randy dewitts and i'm part of the minnesota festival events association i'm representing them on a variety of levels i'm asking for the support of the event assistant grant program i've been involved with the festival industry for over 37 years i have my own company that is a small business has been around for 27 years one of my career choices is teaching festival planning and risk management at the university of minnesota tourism center i have students from all four corners of the state of minnesota they have many questions and many concerns and and uh learning a lot about how festival management works i have students from fairboat mankato rochester ely duluth moorhead the la delano not delana but delano uh the metro area along with many other communities i do major events from saint paul to minneapolis i have done st paul warner carnival which we just did a few weeks ago we've had i do twin cities pride in minneapolis it's one of the largest events in the city of minneapolis uh we've done i've done irish fair minnesota and say good de mayo so i've done a lot of different types of events and i've also taught a lot of event planners throughout the state on how to do their community events their street fairs their park festivals and those other support events that help build community there is over 2500 strong festivals in the state of minnesota many of these have parades and as you know everybody loves a parade if you've been in a parade you know the excitement the energy shaking hands kissing babies faces you know those are the biggest things about parades but they're all gone we don't have any parades and that's a big concern no festivals everything went dark ever since the the pandemic we have not had an ability to bring community together we were the first ones to close and we will be one of the first last ones to open those are big words that are big concerns for our community there's a lot of professions within this industry that have been built through community festivals and events my company is one i work with many non-profits most of my business is non-profit based uh their business associations there's other non-profits all these non-profits do more than just community-based festivals they support support their communities it could be done throughout state minnesota in greater minnesota it's cbb's and chambers that help support those events in local areas it's a business association or another non-profit that's supporting that community for example winter carnival their foundation is to support uh winter in the state of minnesota along with supporting other festivals such as cinco de mayo in in the uh other areas like quincy's pride they are the hub of many many organizations that at non-profit support and seek out since they are a big organization they are supported by all these small non-profits and they're the ones that help make our economy go it's sad that we can't get together um our community families have been shuttered as i said for a long time the funding of the event assistant grant program can be critical in keeping our brand alive and that's critical because once we're not in the scene for a couple of years which is now we're going on year two for many of these um we have lost some of those opportunities for example highland festival is no longer in existence um right now we're having challenges with a grand old day and they were the beginning of of every uh summer event you know that was kickoff for they called the state fair you know so those are really critical um organizations that are starting to lose lose track within our communities with that two examples uh they were brought economic impact study back in 2019 those two major events did over 300 million in economic impact that's pretty significant i think it had 2500 other festivals in the state of minnesota not close to those sizes but they all bring a small amount of economic impact which creates a greater impact to our great state of minnesota so i am asking that you as an organization as senators will help us in creating an opportunity in providing event assistant grant program for us the state of minnesota in our community events and so that we can all go back to waving and shaking hands and participating in all the parades across the state of minnesota thank you mr chair thank you mr what's this uh that was great and you're right every little town has got their event and by golly it's important to them uh and and we who who who love parades kissing babies we all know about that if you miss them if you miss that parade you're going to be in trouble so but that is really this is really something that's missed in minnesota and hopefully we can help you out uh thank you next we'll move on to joel carlson thank you mr chair and members i'm joel carlson i own a legal research and government affairs business here in saint paul and since 1997 i've had the pleasure of representing the community of minnesota resorts which is our family-owned small resort industry in minnesota and i couldn't be more proud of this organization uh than watching them operate through the pandemic and all their motto is resorters helping resorters and that couldn't have been more evident during the pandemic and all the steps that they took to help each other through this very challenging period i couldn't be more proud to represent this group you know over the years we've come to the capitol to ask for things that can make small resorts viable and to make sure that they remain part of the tourism fabric we used to have over 3000 resorts in minnesota we're down to under 800 and the things that you do can really make a difference in whether or not they're able to stay in business you know we don't ask you to make the fish bite or the sunshine what we ask you to do is try and invest in things that will make it better for tourism in general and resorts in particular because that is the access for thousands of minnesotans to our great outstanding resources in minnesota mike schweiter from boyd lodge is going to talk to you about one of the programs the co-op marketing program that the organization has benefited from over many years we're asking that you consider putting some extra money into that program to help bring people back when senator rood talks about 41 000 jobs that were lost in december the only way those jobs come back is with people people coming to our communities people staying in our resorts and in our hotels and that's what mike's going to talk about we could really use your help and it will return we believe um i can't say tenfold but it's going to return back to the state i think well in excess of what you invest in this program thank you mr chair and we'll be happy to answer questions at the end thank you mr uh mr carlson mr sweeters uh thank you mr chairman and uh senators uh my name is mike sweeters uh i am from boyd lodge up in cross lake and i am on the legislative chair for the community of minnesota resorts uh honestly all provisions all four provisions in this bill help tourism in throughout the state and in the area i'm in in the areas that our resorts are in the cmr community minnesota resorts has utilized that co-op program every year that i've been on the board and i've been involved with them for i think this will be my eighth year serving on the board uh of the communist resorts of our 180 plus members just give an idea of who this really helps 92 of our members have less than 10 cabins these are the true mom and pop resorts of minnesota most have six to eight cabins and that's it budgets for them for marketing are in hundreds of dollars not thousands and this is the beauty and where this co-op program is such a benefit for for us many of the programs allow participation uh for less than a thousand dollars for example i think this lowest one i found the iowa sportsman magazine which i know a number of our members utilized uh for attracting especially fishing clientele and that out of the state of iowa for 285 bucks they can get a one six page ad in there and again this is through the explore minnesota tourism co-op program uh without that it would cost them approximately five to six times that amount to do the same level of advertising on their own this um this program also has it's not just print it with uh for the cmr we've used it for doing uh television spot advertising and prime markets we've used it for online uh targeting uh of clients and that and the beauty of some of that is that it also goes a lot of it goes out of state uh we use iowa uh north and south dakota wisconsin uh kansas nebraska bringing folks to minnesota to to vacation experience what we have to offer here and this program allows us to reach those areas that we could never possibly do it on our own and as i said some of these smaller resorts they don't even market they rely solely on the cmr's uh marketing to bring folks to their place that's the only way they can do it a lot of them work second jobs third jobs even just to make it go and they just simply do not have the ability to spend hundreds or thousands of dollars to market to their place and that's why they rely on the cmr and that's why you know we're so vitally important uh to them and we really ask for your support on that one of the things i'd like to just say is that the emt has been an extremely extremely wonderful partner to work with they have actively gone out and looked into markets that we couldn't do without their support and it allows us to to kind of pigtail on their expertise and that changes and evolves every year um we understand budgets are extremely difficult and i think as joel mentioned earlier i look at it as an investment in something that you would get a solid return uh in that money spent it is vital for these smaller businesses to to get their name out there and get people to their places and it as an organization cmr that's what we're trying to do as well so again i thank you all for your time and appreciate your support on that thank you very much uh that completes the testimony on senate file 511 although john edmond is from explorer minnesota is available for any questions members if you have any i know he's on he's online here with us members any questions at all senator taurus ray thank you mr chairman and uh thank you to all the people who presented very definitely we're going to have to do a lot of work to promote minnesota and make sure that we we do our part um especially with this weather but hopefully all of the promotion will happen in the spring so people will be inspired to come here after all of this cold spell is gone um and we forget very quickly how cold it is because our spring and our summers are so beautiful so i would like to ask uh i don't know who in the group or um the perhaps you know in the state um there are a couple of things that that i'm thinking as i hear your presentations i think terry said something related to the struggle of businesses in saint paul the proportion of impact of a small business in a small town is so significant for that town right because you have a small hotel that employs a lot of people in the area that relies on you know grocers in the area so the proportion of the impact of that business in that small town is very important and i think that we need to analyze what that means in terms of tourism for certain areas in our small towns in rural minnesota and suburban but i would like to know if you have the numbers related to the impact to the general fund and in general our tax budgets when businesses don't do well in areas with high density so when you have uh you know impact in rochester uh saint paul minneapolis areas suburban areas where we have high density and high tax uh payment what is the impact of that um of that problem when those businesses are not paying taxes i would like to have that number i would like to work with you to figure out what is the impact to the entire entire state of minnesota again remember i am understanding the impact of the small businesses in in small towns is so significant in proportion but i am asking for the significance of tax payment to the entire state of minnesota when areas like saint paul and minneapolis are struggling could you tell me how we can put these numbers together john edmond i'm gonna call thank you senator i'm gonna call on john edmond for those figures i think you'd have a broad overview of the whole state of minnesota with regards to that question john uh yes mr chair uh uh senator my name is john edmond i'm the director of explorer minnesota uh senator we we should be able to get you that information the the normal years the leisure and hospitality industry is a 16 billion dollar industry and brings in over a billion dollars in state taxes to the state of minnesota that can be used for other kinds of programs we have some information that will show you by county the uh revenue that's generated from the leisure and hospitality industry on a county-wide basis as well as that as well as the tax revenue uh that can be generated uh that's generated from from tourism as well so would if that answers your question i'll be certain to get that to you after this hearing thank you yes mr chair i would like to get that information by county and if possible by city especially with the larger cities st paul and minneapolis again i'm more interested in the proportion that they generate to pay taxes um so i want to be clear you know not on the overall proportion of the industry but targeted areas thank you thank you that's what i need that was that was a good question and and mr mr edmund would send that out to to the members it would be very helpful for us uh especially when it comes down to putting uh numbers into the into the uh into the system here at the end of the session so that would help a lot those are big numbers those are big numbers and and uh without without uh the the work that you folks do out there uh we'd be without that million dollars so that's you know that's that's huge so if you get those out that'd be great members any other questions at all or any comments senator rood any final comments on 511 well mr chair um i would just like to speak to senator torres ray i know she's hoping for spring i know that she's tired of the cold but i have to tell you that tourism in in the winter is a tremendous economic driver with skiing and snowmobiling and snowshoeing and ice fishing and so um tourism in the winter and marketing in the winter is um as important as the beautiful spring weather in the summer that that that we enjoy so um i have to tell you that the the ice castle fish houses that are rolling up the the 371 corridor every weekend to go ice fishing up north um are very important to the economies in in all of minnesota um with that mr chair i would appreciate the committee's support and your support of senate file 511. um we need to jumpstart our economy as we start healing and the vaccines start to work and and people start to be feel safe going out and so um we need to support the economic engine that is tourism so thank you mr chair and thank you for all our great testifiers today yes thank you to all the testifiers thank you senator rood i will be holding over uh senate file for 511 inclusion senate file next to senate file number 514514 senator rood mr chair and members this is the 2020 lands bill and so we have really um seen this already and it has gone through it just um got um tangled up in uh the covid shutdown and so we already have the 2021 being introduced and we thought it would be a good idea to get this off our plate and and get it going before the this year's bill comes in and so with that um uh susan damon is here with us today to go through the bill thank you senator rude mr chair members uh as senator rood mentioned that this is the 2020 lands bill and uh our lands bills typically cover items such as policy changes relating to land transactions changes in state parks state recreation area state forest boundaries and then uh they authorize certain sales uh for example um private sales to specific uh entities or individuals um and they i'm sorry guys can i interrupt please i'm sorry it's my fault i you have to identify yourself please for the record i apologize susan damon assistant director dnr division of lands in general very much and welcome yeah thank you but go ahead you you you're in a ways already so go ahead and continue uh thank you mr chair yes and uh so uh as i was saying uh the lands bill um uh authorizes certain private sales to specific individuals or entities and we require authorization for public sales of riparian land and the dnr lands bill also becomes a vehicle it becomes the omnibus lands bill uh and items such as uh tax forfeited sale provisions from the counties are added to the bill so the 2020 lands bill actually has four provisions that will have some revenues and they are sections six seven nine and ten uh sections six and seven are dnr uh provisions that authorize um the private sales of small acreages of of surplus land and then section 10 is a riparian parcel that is surplus dnr land authorizing the public sale of this provision we expect the total dnr revenues from these sales to be approximately 34 000 as noted in our our fiscal note there is also a provision section 9 and that is authorization for st louis county to sell by private sale two parcels of tax forfeited land and st louis county expects revenues of about six thirty six thousand dollars from those sales so with that i would be happy to answer any questions that you may have missed even it's just just in general most just for the just for the the information for the committee most of these properties are small properties that are that are sold to either counties or or uh for for development purposes uh uh small parcels is that fair to say uh roads and and uh what not mr chair um uh some of them are small parcels we do have one parcel in section 10 that is 39.5 acres of surplus state land uh which will be sold by public auction sometimes the dnr sales are 40 to 80 acres it just depends on the particular year the particular auction and what we do is estimate a value or have it appraised and then the the public is entitled to bid on those parcels um in the past couple of years we have had some uh auction parcels that have actually sold for substantially higher than uh the minimum sale amount sometimes even double or more so yes they are often small parcels but sometimes they are a little bit larger acreage and again for the committee's uh knowledge here uh specifically on section 10 um the this particular parcel of land has been owned by the state of minnesota for how long do you have an idea uh yes uh mr chair that has been owned by the state uh since 1969 and the parcel was acquired by the dnr it was actually a county board resolution it must have been tax forfeited land that the county decided to turn over to the state of minnesota dnr and for that 40 plus years the state dnr must have thought it was uh a good natural resource i mean for good natural resource purposes i see that's the reason it's being sold now is not needed for that so um yeah that's just seems to be a long time it's kind of interesting how long we hang onto property and and uh and what the reasons for it so members have any other questions at all senator rood uh thank you mr chair um this is the 2020 bill um and so uh it is um uh it is moving it has already moved through the house this identical bill um and so um i guess my preference would be to send it to the floor because it uh so that we can get this off our plate and um before we have to deal with the 2021 bill okay um i'm being told by uh by senate nonpartisan that it should be laid over for now uh senator rood uh it would have to go to uh and have to go to finance finance okay we could send it to finance and that would be great okay thomas sony is senator thomason you have a question yeah mr chairman thank you um ms navy can you just tell me where these parcels are in st louis county that um it's really hard to tell by the by the legal description that's in the bill can you just give me an idea of where they are mr chair uh senator thomasoni yes uh these are actually in a new independence township and uh uh the parcel so oh they the are you talking about the the the sales from the um for the county tax forefoot land or are you talking about the dnr parts thomas let's do both um mr chair uh senator thomasoni section 8 is in new independence township and i will have to get you the specific information i did provide a map for previous hearing but i will go back and get that information for you and make sure that you know the location of the other two parcels the new independence i get that okay then um so the other two you're not sure on exactly where they are i would madam yeah i'm sure um damon i'm just wondering if a map would help senator thomas sony just just a brief map and where exactly that is on the map each senator has their own uh districts and they at least give them an idea where this is and and uh or we could have senator uh senator rood read the description for you senator thomason if you'd like uh i i can read it mr chairman and i'll understand it just as good when when when senator rude reads it mr chair and senator tomasoni um i do have us ms damon did provide a map for the for the policy committee and so um i can provide that uh for you senator thomas sony so you can see where it is thank you very much mr meyer from the dnr mr chairman members for the record bob meyer department at resources i was just going to show that map but if senator rude is going to send that or i can send it to senator thomasoni as well but i could display my screen whatever you prefer mr chairman um senator thomas sony what would you suppose you should send it to me mr meyer on its way sir thank you and members and senator uh senator rood i am being advised that this has to be late this should be laid over at least at this point so uh do you have any final comments i know mr chair i guess my preference would be go to finance but if you're gonna lay it over i uh you know we we need to get this done and and out the door it's been hanging around for a very long time i agree and we can we can talk about that uh uh offline but uh at this point that's what we're gonna do so um senator rude let's see senate file 5 5 14 will be laid over for possible inclusion members uh that's all there is before the committee uh so we stand adjourned thank you [Music] you
2021-02-26 05:14
