Indigenous Tourism Coordinator Project Coordinator
Frank Antwon was hired as the Indigenous Tourism Coordinator in August/September for this 2-year project. The communities of the Adams Lake Indian Band, Little Shuswap Lake Indian Band, Neskonlith Indian Band and Splatsin First Nation are involved in this, as well as Shuswap Tourism and Community Futures. The Indigenous Tourism Coordinator will look at business development opportunities, working with indigenous partners and the community. Shelly Whitsky has been working with aim as well. R. Cyr's role is to be on the advisory committee.
P. McIntyre-Paul arrived at 9:22 am.
R. Martin arrived at 9:24 am.
Secwepemc Landmark Project
Local First Nations and the Shuswap Trail Alliance are working together on a project to implement signage indicating first nations landmarks in the Shuswap. Local Indian bands, through the Sexqeltkemc te Secwepemc, have already secured $30,000 for the project, and the plan now is to pursue additional BC Rural Dividend funding. A memo, prepared by Councilor Shelly Witzky of the Adams Lake Indian Band, Phil McIntyre-Paul and Jacob 'Sutra' Brett of the Shuswap Trail Alliance, is attached to the HTML version of these minutes with more information. P. McIntyre-Paul shared their progress on this project with the Committee. Chase has a monument in front of the Chase Museum that is representative of all communities and is an example of what is proposed. This is a reconciliation project that will contribute to the cultural tourism process. Shuswap Trail Alliance is working with elders in the community to know more about what stories need to be told and the presence to be shaped. Shuswap Trail Alliance has applied for grant funding from the BC Rural Dividend for the potential to extend the project for more cardinal/sentinel locations and to showcase trail heads.
The City of Salmon Arm was pleased to approve the potential placement of the first cardinal landmark in the Marine Peace Park and provided a letter of support and contributed $1500 to leverage support through the BC Rural Dividend Fund. K. Flynn hopes that this can be an example of reconciliation and working together.
Launch of the BC Ale Trail
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=6&v=8t5Rzbim-p4
BC Ale Trail was created by a dedicated team of craft beer allies to connect BC's world-class brewing scene with tourism organizations across the province. BC Ale trail started on the sunshine coast. The video showcased local craft breweries Crannog Ales and Barley Station.
Salute to the Sockeye
The Adams River Salmon Society coordinates the celebration known as the “Salute to the Sockeye” during the dominant salmon run years. This festival includes an artisan’s market, food vendors, live music, indigenous activities, underwater camera viewing, etc. The official 2018 Salute to the Sockeye celebration will be held from September 28 – October 21 in Tsútswecw Provincial Park (formerly Roderick Haig-Brown Park).
R. Cyr encouraged everyone to come and experience the Salmon Run. R. Cyr sits on the board of the Adams River Salmon Society and has been doing some of the planning. The response from outside of our region has been overwhelming. A. Maki reported that the Chase Visitor Centre has been working hard to help the visitors coming through. A. Maki noted her kudos to the society for their work and pointed out that they did a great job. A. Maki did note that it would be helpful for the Adam's River Salmon Society to get out and inform operators with answers to frequently asked questions; the salmon run brochure is helpful but there just aren't enough. Recommendations for next salmon run: have a schedule of events for what's happening on site; there was a notice yesterday about chefs cooking salmon on site - very short notice.
An event like this is a benefit to the entire region, there weren't even enough hotel rooms for the media that wanted to cover this.
Department of Fisheries and Oceans has advised that this year is supposed to be a large run but have not given an indication of actual numbers.
K. Dearing left the meeting.
Salmon Symposium
Wild Salmon Caravan hosted the Spirit of Wild Salmon Celebration September 22-29, 2018. The final day was in Chase on Saturday with a parade and feast in the park. The Salmon Symposium was on the Sunday and Monday. Sunday's activities included the Tsu’tswecw (Roderick Haig-Brown) renaming ceremony, tours of Tsu'tswecw Park, as well as a showing of "Uninterrupted", a video filmed in 2017 near the Cambie Bridge showing the connection between the Shuswap region and Vancouver with the salmon as they make their journey back to the Adam's river. Monday's activities included meetings and discussion between various organizations, local government and first nations about community development and land management. It looked at the shift with climate change and economic development / land use planning needs to shift a bit to accommodate changes.
The organizers did a great job, excellent mix of Secwepemc led, indigenous and non-indigenous. Quaaout Lodge was a great host: great food and environment. Thanks to Carmen Massey of Adams River Salmon Society and Julie John of Little Shuswap Lake Indian Band.
J. Ziercke commented that Quaaout Lodge had a videographer on site at the symposium to help display the cultural relevance of Quaaout, bringing about a sense of community.
K. Flynn noted that for conferences he's attended, some organizers don't let the hospitality industry know that there is an event and the operators are blindsided and run out of food, etc. He suggested that the Shuswap Tourism Advisory Committee needs to take a role in trying to help communicate to chambers and the business community about events. The Adams River Salmon Society is volunteer run, the Salmon Run event is almost too large to be run by volunteers. The Adams River Salmon Society volunteers like to take ownership and all that the committee can do is offer to help and continually follow through if asked in order to help build trust.
Experience workshop report
Destination Think! conducted a strategy review to design and develop a four-season Shuswap Experience. To this end, there was an experience workshop conducted to give industry and stakeholders the opportunity to provide input. R. Cyr provided the committee with a report from Destination Think! containing the experience workshop findings and recommendations (view report). It looked at building the big picture: operators need to be open if Shuswap Tourism is promoting the winter experience. As far as the maturity of the product, there is work to do to get closer to a four season experience.
Digital Marketing – Spring 2018 report
Destination Think! conducted a digital marketing campaign in spring 2018 to work towards the development of year-round experiences to drive visitors to the region during low-season periods. Based on the experiences Destination Think! identified in the Experience Workshop, it was able to prioritize the seasonal experiences for development and promotion. The 2018 Spring Campaign Report from Destination Think! is attached to the HTML version of these minutes. The report goes into more depth about key performance indicators and the cost effectiveness of the campaign. R. Cyr noted that this was a great place to start and that Shuswap Tourism has room for improvement. In the absence of a Tourism Marketing Coordinator, K. Dearing has been working on social media for Shuswap Tourism on a separate contract.
Digital Assessment Project
Shuswap Tourism created a package requesting proposals for the development of a new website to amalgamate the existing Shuswap Economic Development website, the Shuswap Tourism website and the Columbia Shuswap Film Commission website. The Request for Proposals (RFP) package was sent out to four companies on September 14th based on recommendations from other tourism organizations and proposals will be received until 4PM on October 5, 2018. A copy of the RFP has been attached to the HTML version of these minutes. Rural Dividend grant funding will fund this project as well as Destination BC for the content development. Hoping for the new website to be ready next spring.
The committee discussed event calendars on various community sites like Shuswap Trail Alliance, Shuswap Trails and Shuswap Culture and whether there might be a way to integrate the calendars to help avoid fragmentation. There is the issue with capacity to manage a calendar of that scope. P. Demenok, R. Martin, P. McIntyre-Paul and A. Maki will look into the option of bringing multiple organizations calendars together.
Festival Seekers – Partnership with Roots and Blues, Waterway Houseboats, Shuswap Tourism
Festival Seekers (a private company that works on promoting festivals throughout BC) facilitated a partnership between Roots and Blues, Waterway Houseboats and Shuswap Tourism to publish articles in the Winnipeg Free Press, Okanagan Weekend and Lethbridge Herald to promote Roots and Blues and the Shuswap. The articles provided good exposure across Canada.
Contest – Partnership with Waterway Houseboats, Roots and Blues, Quaaout Lodge, and Shuswap Tourism – Roots and Blues weekend
Waterway Houseboats, Roots and Blues, Quaaout Lodge, and Shuswap Tourism partnered to provide a memorable Roots and Blues weekend experience. There were some logistical challenges but there was a great dinner and a great experience for Roots and Blues. The contest winner invited their family members. Great chance to bring businesses together to showcase the Shuswap experience. Video to come.
“Travelling Mom” Media Tour
https://thetravellingmom.ca/shuswap-houseboat-rentals/
Claudia Laroye writes a travel blog and has 100s/1000s of followers; she writes about family adventures. David Barritt (Columbia Shuswap Film Commissioner) got her a media tour with Waterways Houseboats. C. Laroye became a stay at home mom and writes about the best ways to look after kids, how to travel with kids and her blog has grown into a machine. Her kids are in their late teens, 18 and 20. This is like her last hurrah. C. Laroye got two days out on the water and posted quickly and her blog post received a favourable following. She got questions like where was that, how do we get there? Pleased with response. D. Barritt talked about her expression of gratitude for the experience. She made it clear that anyone can go on a houseboat trip. Great promotion for Waterway Houseboats and the area.
Cultural Tourism
R. Martin brought up the recent events near Three Valley Gap that have brought cultural significance to the area. There were Japanese internment camps from 1942 to 1949 that were located there to build highways. There wave been eight signs erected to commemorate the 75th anniversary of internment, the last of which was erected on September 28th. There are six signs between Three Valley Gap and Solsqua. Internment camps were located in Yard Creek, Griffin Lake, New Denver, Kaslo and Malakwa to name a few. R. Martin talked about the unveiling ceremony and the stories of those who got up to speak about their experience being interned in the camps.
Shuswap Culture – Update
Item tabled for the next meeting of Shuswap Tourism Advisory Committee - Karen Brown absent from this meeting.
Destination Think FAM (familiarization) Tour – May 22-24
Shuswap Tourism hosted a FAM tour with Destination Think! so that they would understand the expanse of our region. Waterways Houseboats lent a boat for the tour. The tour gave Destination Think! a good perspective of the region.
Thompson Okanagan Tourism Association (TOTA) Travel Trade and Media meetings
R. Cyr introduced this item. TOTA has a lot of new staff and are working with Destination BC (DBC) on media tourism. This is a challenge as they set deadlines for marketing opportunities that are unrealistically short and Shuswap Tourism could miss out on these opportunities. R. Cyr is hoping that Shuswap Tourism can have better media in order to aid in responding to marketing opportunities from DBC and TOTA.
The declaration of a state of emergency in the province affects tourism operators. The tourism industry is a big contributor to the BC economy, are TOTA or DBC trying to find a better way of dealing with the necessity to declare a state of emergency for funding opportunities?