RSS Feed
Print Story
E-mail Story
Tourism revenues down from last year
| Thursday, Apr 24 2008 6:05 PM
Last Updated: Friday, Apr 25 2008 7:27 AM
Tourism revenues in unincorporated Kern dropped by nearly 4 percent last year, the head of the county Board of Trade reported Thursday.
BAKERSFIELD.COM HOT TOPICS:
Loading Stories
Advertisement
Related Stories:
In 2007, a 6 percent hotel bed tax generated about $1.51 million for the county’s general fund. The year before, the total was about $1.57 million, a nearly 15 percent increase from 2005.
The numbers do not take into account tourism revenues from Bakersfield and other Kern cities, which keep proceeds from their bed taxes.
The agency has responded to last year’s decrease by more closely targeting its marketing efforts on Southern California, Kern’s biggest source of tourists, executive director Rick Davis said.
“There are 20 million people there (in Southern California) we know would love to experience all the wonderful things you can do in Kern County,” Davis said.
The agency’s budget last year was about $850,000.
Davis released news of the tourism revenues at a board meeting of the Kern Economic Development Corp. Thursday morning in Taft.