Becky Nave, mayor of the City of Bristol, Virginia and Virginia Tourism Corporation's director of destination development, speaks at the groundbreaking for the Explore Bristol Visitor Center.
Montgomery County issued a short statement Wednesday saying that it is up to Christiansburg to decide if the town will continue working with the county and Blacksburg in a joint tourism program that the three localities have run for a decade.
Responding to allegations that the joint tourism program is somehow invalid because its operating agreement was allowed to lapse, the county statement said that the agreement's renewal was paused until Christiansburg settles what it wanted to do.
The joint tourism program was criticized during three Christiansburg Town Council meetings this month, with council members saying that the town has been unhappy for at least the last two years about how it was represented in the program's marketing. In March, Christiansburg council members approved giving the tourism program a 12-month notice that the town would stop participating - and also stop its financial support.
The three localities fund the tourism effort with a share of lodging tax revenue. Christiansburg's support during the current fiscal year is projected to be about $179,000.
This month, Christiansburg council members Johana Hicks and Kim Bowman pushed for the town to immediately cut off support for the tourism program, saying its organizing agreement was no longer binding because it hinged on satisfactory performance.
Also, Hicks said that the tourism program's organizing agreement ended last year. Without it, she said, there was no obligation for the town to contribute money.
At a Tuesday council meeting, Hicks and Bowman asked colleagues to approve ending payments to the tourism council at once, but council voted 4-2 against Hicks' motion.
Hicks said Tuesday that the town should seek the return of money sent since the end of July 2023, when the most recent extension of the operating agreement ended.
Other council members disagreed, with Mayor Mike Barber saying that he was not sure the agreement is no longer in effect.
Councilman Tim Wilson said that though he had criticized the tourism program, he thought that council needed to move past complaining and articulate what it wanted from a tourism effort. Council members agreed to continue discussing their tourism goals in a future work session.
Also at Tuesday's Christiansburg meeting, town resident and frequent local government critic Chris Waltz told council members that they were misusing taxpayer money by sending it to a program whose operating agreement had ended. Waltz made similar comments Monday at a Montgomery County Board of Supervisors meeting.
On Wednesday, county spokeswoman Jennifer Harris issued a brief statement:
"Based on the existing tourism agreement, it is our understanding the tourism partnership is in place until the parties involved take action to terminate it," Harris said in the statement. "Since 2023, conversations with the Town of Christiansburg related to the future of the tourism partnership have been ongoing. As a result, any discussion related to renewing the tourism partnership have been paused until the Town of Christiansburg makes a decision as to how they want to proceed."
The agreement that established the joint program was signed on July 30, 2014, and was to run for three years, with two three-year renewals. The agreement laid out how the county and two towns would pay for the tourism program through lodging taxes, said that the county would act as the fiscal agent for the program, and established two boards to steer its activities.
An operating board made up of the two town managers and the county administrator, or their designees, would oversee staffing, budget and general operations of the program. The operating board would appoint an executive director.
The agreement also set up a nine-member advisory tourism development council that was to include one member each of the board of supervisors and two town councils, a representative of the Montgomery County Chamber of Commerce, and five members who were owners, operators or employees of local hotels, restaurants or attractions. Additionally, a representative of Virginia Tech was to be a non-voting member.
According to agendas posted on the tourism group's website, its operating board met eight times this year, most recently on Friday. The tourism development council met three times this year, most recently in June.
Minutes for the tourism development council's June meeting were not posted online. However, minutes were available for the meeting before that, on March 25.
Present at the March meeting was Christiansburg Town Manager Randy Wingfield, who shared that Christiansburg was giving a one-year notice that it would withdraw from the tourism program, the minutes said. Asked what could be done, Wingfield said there should be a greater focus on sports tourism, the minutes said.
Among the tourism development council's decisions in March was to reappoint Christiansburg Councilman Sam Bishop as the council's chairman for a second year running.
The minutes said that Bishop acknowledged "a definite lack of communication" between Christiansburg and the tourism effort, and said that it would be addressed.
Mike Gangloff
(540) 381-1669
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