Panel awards $414,854 in grants for rural tourism
Several Southern Nevada tourism enterprises got early Christmas presents Wednesday when the Nevada Tourism Commission unanimously approved $414,854 in grants for programs and activities designed to deliver more tourists to rural Nevada.
The commission has $1.4 million designated in its budget for grants to assist in the marketing of destinations away from Las Vegas and Reno. The commission splits the grant awards into two distributions with this month’s awards being smaller than the first earlier in the year.
Grant recipients must provide a 50-50 match in funds or volunteer hours to be eligible. The commission distributes the grants in the form of reimbursement after the projects are completed and labor and funding details are documented.
In Southern Nevada — termed the Las Vegas Territory by the commission — the Dam Short Film Festival in Boulder City received $8,000 for its 2015 festival.
The Boulder City Chamber of Commerce is getting two grants, $3,120 to print brochures to be distributed along Interstate 40 and in Southern Utah, and $900 for advertisements in the March-April and May-June editions of Nevada magazine.
The Moapa Valley Revitalization Project was authorized $9,072 to print rack cards and distribute them in Southern California, Southern Nevada, Southern Utah and Arizona.
The town of Pahrump scored five grants totaling $24,000 for media buys, a website upgrade, familiarization tours and other promotional materials. The Pahrump Valley Chamber of Commerce is getting $8,000 for expenses associated with the Pahrump Balloon Festival.
Other smaller grants went to the Lincoln Communities Action Team in Lincoln County and the chambers of commerce of Beatty and Goldfield.
The commission received $642,120 in requests for grants.
The grant that may have the highest profile was the $10,000 going to the Elko Regional Airport to develop a program to persuade airlines to offer commercial air service to the northeastern Nevada airport. Elko, which is in the middle of one of the state’s top gold-mining areas, has lost its commercial air service to Reno and Salt Lake City because airlines are upgrading planes to sizes that aren’t economically feasible to fly there.
“Competition for these grants is intense because the opportunities to leverage this funding into new revenue opportunities and new tourism-related assets are substantial,” said Lt. Gov. Brian Krolicki, who is the Tourism Commission’s chairman. “Working with rural Nevada to increase visitation to some of Nevada’s hidden treasures is one of the commission’s main objectives and a real passion of mine.”
It was a bittersweet meeting for Krolicki, who was chairing the commission meeting for the last time. He’s been term-limited out of office and will turn leadership of the commission over to Lt. Gov.-elect Mark Hutchison.
“We could not be where we are without your extraordinary support as an amazing source of information,” Tourism Commission Director Claudia Vecchio said to Krolicki at the meeting’s conclusion. “No one could have done it better. You inspired us and you put your arm around us when we needed it. You’re incredibly special and important to us.”
Contact reporter Richard N. Velotta at rvelotta@reviewjournal.com or 702-477-3893. Find him on Twitter: @RickVelotta
