Posted on 10/29/2021 2:18:25 PM PDT by Oldeconomybuyer
Portland’s “badly damaged” reputation – marked by months of destructive protests, a homeless crisis and record year of homicides – is hurting the standing of Oregon’s largest city, according to the city’s main tourism promoter.
Travel Portland, the city’s tourism promotion group partly funded by taxes, presented data to the City Council and mayor this week showing the city has declined to its “lowest level” of being a likely destination for delegates to attend conferences. Just 64% of surveyed tourists said they would visit Portland again.
“There’s an old old saying, ‘It takes a lifetime to build a reputation and you can ruin it in an instant.’ That’s true of cities, as it is people,” Portland Mayor Wheeler said in response to the Travel Portland data. “And we’re just going to have to commit to that long term process of improving the safety and the livability and the economic prosperity of the city.”
The data shows that more than half of event planners and two-thirds of attendees indicated that their “likelihood” to book or attend meetings in the city over the next two years was heavily influenced by the “visibility” of racial and social protests.
“The impact of this is that we likely won’t even get the opportunity to bid on many conventions for the next two years, which will affect our long term successes well into the future,” said Jeff Miller, the president and of Travel Portland.
City Commissioner Dan Ryan said one of his friends who recently volunteered at a convention texted him about her experience with visitors who felt unsafe in the city.
The woman told Ryan “it was really depressing to have so many people approach her, that looked angry, that we allowed ourselves to even host a big convention... like we weren’t ready for it.”
(Excerpt) Read more at apnews.com ...
Good luck. I’m in one of the saner parts of the Oregon coast, and there was an assault on an “elderly” vet and his service dog in a local park. Coos won’t do anything because no weapon was involved. The local commies are saying we need to recall the sheriff, who is pretty damn good, and bring more progressives into the area. Yeah. That’ll help.
Yeah, I agree that’s probably the case.
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