BILL NUMBER: AB 287 CHAPTERED 08/11/03 CHAPTER 204 FILED WITH SECRETARY OF STATE AUGUST 11, 2003 APPROVED BY GOVERNOR AUGUST 9, 2003 PASSED THE SENATE JULY 24, 2003 PASSED THE ASSEMBLY MAY 8, 2003 AMENDED IN ASSEMBLY APRIL 2, 2003 INTRODUCED BY Assembly Member Firebaugh FEBRUARY 5, 2003 An act to amend Section 15372.61 of the Government Code, relating to tourism. LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST AB 287, Firebaugh. Tourism: marketing plan. Under the California Tourism Marketing Act, the California Travel and Tourism Commission is required to annually prepare a written marketing plan to promote travel to and within this state, as specified. This bill would require the commission, no later than July 1, 2005, to make recommendations to the Governor, the Legislature, and the Secretary of Technology, Trade, and Commerce regarding an implementation strategy and timeline for revision of the annual marketing plan to include promotion of the state's artistic, cultural, historical, and ethnic resources. THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA DO ENACT AS FOLLOWS: SECTION 1. The Legislature hereby finds and declares all of the following: (a) California's tourism industry created 6,000 new jobs in 2002. (b) According to the California Travel and Tourism Commission, the percentage of tourists to all the United States who chose California as their destination increased from 9.7 percent in 1998 to 11.6 percent in 2001, representing billions of dollars in additional tourist spending and hundreds of millions in tax revenue for the state. (c) The wide range and diversity of historic, cultural, and ethnic resources and artifacts at California's historic sites represent a largely untapped opportunity to increase the state's promotion of these sites as desirable tourist destinations. (d) In a December 1988 report entitled "Five Views, An Ethnic Sites Survey For California," the Office of Historic Preservation within the Department of Parks and Recreation identified historic sites in communities across the state that represent the culture of the five largest ethnic minority groups in California during the first 50 years after the signing of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848, which led to California statehood. (e) The ethnic sites identified in the 1988 report, in addition to other sites representing the state's rich ethnic, historic, and cultural diversity, are valuable resources for inclusion in California's tourism marketing strategies. (f) The California Arts Council has funded a cultural tourism grant program for county arts councils to test locally designed marketing programs. (g) The California Cultural Tourism Coalition, comprised of arts and tourism organizations, has coordinated efforts to promote the rich cultural diversity of the state. (h) It is the intent of this act to expand California's current tourism marketing strategies to include tourist destinations representing the state's cultural and ethnic heritage, including, but not limited to, the arts and humanities, community folk life, museums, festivals, and historic assets. SEC. 2. (a) No later than July 1, 2005, the California Travel and Tourism Commission shall make recommendations to the Governor, the Legislature, and the Secretary of Technology, Trade, and Commerce regarding an implementation strategy and timeline for revision of the annual marketing plan required by Section 15372.75 of the Government Code to include promotion of the state's artistic, cultural, historical, and ethnic resources with a goal of expanding the economic benefits of tourism to more communities, both urban and rural, in California. (b) In preparing the report required by subdivision (a), the commission shall consult with other organizations, including, but not limited to, the California Arts Council, the Office of Historic Preservation, the Department of Parks and Recreation, the State Historic Resources Commission, the California Association of Museums, and the California Cultural and Historical Endowment in the State Library. SEC. 3. Section 15372.61 of the Government Code is amended to read: 15372.61. The Legislature hereby finds and declares all of the following: (a) Tourism is among California's biggest industries, contributing more than seventy-five billion dollars ($75,000,000,000) to the state economy and employing more than one million Californians in 2001. (b) In order to retain and expand the tourism industry in California, it is necessary to market travel to and within California. (c) State funding, while an important component of marketing, has been unable to generate sufficient funds to meet the threshold levels of funding necessary to reverse recent losses of California's tourism market share. (d) In regard to the need for a cooperative partnership between business and industry: (1) It is in the state's public interest and vital to the welfare of the state's economy to expand the market for, and develop, California tourism through a cooperative partnership funded in part by the state that will allow generic promotion and communication programs. (2) The mechanism established by this chapter is intended to play a unique role in advancing the opportunity to expand tourism in California, and it is intended to increase the opportunity for tourism to the benefit of the tourism industry and the consumers of the State of California. (3) Programs implemented pursuant to this chapter are intended to complement the marketing activities of individual competitors within the tourism industry. (4) While it is recognized that smaller businesses participating in the tourism market often lack the resources or market power to conduct these activities on their own, the programs are intended to be of benefit to businesses of all sizes. (5) These programs are not intended to, and they do not, impede the right or ability of individual businesses to conduct activities designed to increase the tourism market generally or their own respective shares of the California tourism market, and nothing in the mechanism established by this chapter shall prevent an individual business or participant in the industry from seeking to expand its market through alternative or complementary means, or both. (6) (A) An individual business's own advertising initiatives are typically designed to increase its share of the California tourism market rather than to increase or expand the overall size of that market. (B) In contrast, generic promotion of California as a tourism destination is intended and designed to maintain or increase the overall demand for California tourism and to maintain or increase the size of that market, often by utilizing promotional methods and techniques that individual businesses typically are unable, or have no incentive, to employ. (7) This chapter creates a mechanism to fund generic promotions that, pursuant to the required supervision and oversight of the secretary as specified in this chapter, further specific state governmental goals, as established by the Legislature, and result in a promotion program that produces nonideological and commercial communication that bears the characteristics of, and is entitled to all the privileges and protections of, government speech. (8) The programs implemented pursuant to this chapter shall be carried out in an effective and coordinated manner that is designed to strengthen the tourism industry and the state's economy as a whole. (9) Independent evaluation of the effectiveness of the programs will assist the Legislature in ensuring that the objectives of the programs as set out in this section are met. (e) An industry-approved assessment provides a private-sector financing mechanism that, in partnership with state funding, will provide the amount of marketing necessary to increase tourism marketing expenditures by California. (f) The goal of the assessments is to assess the least amount per business, in the least intrusive manner, spread across the greatest practical number of tourism industry segments. (g) The commission shall target an amount determined to be sufficient to market effectively travel and tourism to and within the state. (h) In the course of developing its written marketing plan pursuant to Section 15372.75, the commission shall, to the maximum extent feasible, do both of the following: (1) Seek advice and recommendations from all segments of California's travel and tourism industry and from all geographic regions of the state. (2) Harmonize, as appropriate, its marketing plan with the travel and tourism marketing activities and objectives of the various industry segments and geographic regions. (i) The commission's marketing budget shall be spent principally to bring travelers and tourists into the state. No more than 15 percent of the commission's assessed funds in any year shall be spent to promote travel within California, unless approved by at least two-thirds of the commissioners.