Funding available — State tourism office consultant urges county to claim funding

Weston County can climb from the bottom of Wyoming’s visitor-spending rankings — reducing the tax burden on local residents — by focusing on what sets it apart and converting drive-through traffic and business stays into longer visits, a Wyoming Office of Tourism consultant said in an Oct. 20 work session with the Weston County Travel Commission.

“Our goal today is to do an assessment with you guys so that we are leapfrogging Weston County — we’re getting you all to the head of the line to get some money from the state,” Young said.

Lodging tax boards may apply for funding for projects that draw more visitors, such as destination marketing, signage and workforce recruitment initiatives.

Weston County ranked 22nd out of 23 counties for visitor spending in 2021 and again in 2024, according to Berkeley Young, the president of Young Strategies, a Charlotte, North Carolina, company.

Young said the state sought to assemble two or three strategic initiatives to focus on in the three-to-five-year strategic plan it will craft for the county. That way, according to Amy Larsen, the office’s destination program manager, the county can apply for funding through the state’s $5 million Destination Development Program. 

The group gathered on Oct. 20 at the Upton City Hall included county travel commission members and Chad Blair, who is with Black Hills-based TDG Agency, the travel commission’s marketing agency.

They discussed reasons people decide to visit Weston County, such as hunting, outdoor sports, events, business travel and the highways. When Weston County residents take “insanely good” care of business travelers, they encourage those visitors to spread the word that people should visit Weston County, Young said. Another strategy is focusing on “heads in beds,” or filling hotels.

“Lodging tax is the fertilizer to sell heads and beds, and you sell a head and bed and you get more money back in your budget that helps you grow more and you’re putting more people in restaurants and everything,” he said. “So don’t eat your fertilizer.”

Weston County approved the local lodging tax in 2024, and it will next appear on the ballot in November 2028. Visitors, not local residents, pay the tax.

The commission currently has a $140,000 budget, and Young said that if the commission approaches having a $200,000 budget, it will have enough money to acquire a full-time staff member who could focus on working with an agency, increasing productivity.

According to Young, the board should be focused on strategy, and agencies should focus on tactical work — with the caveat that the board should have a good sense of what residents want to see. Until the commission has that staff member, board members should divide responsibilities among themselves and develop expertise in areas that are crucial to meeting goals, such as finance and marketing, according to Young.

“You have the fiduciary responsibility to make sure that tax is put
to its highest and best use,” Young said. “There’s a million good ideas. It’s your job — because you only have $140,000 — to find the very best uses for it.”

Piper Singer Cunningham, communications senior manager for the Wyoming Office of Tourism, told the News Letter Journal on Oct. 27 that Weston County’s strategic plans through the Wyoming Best Program are being finalized and it is up to the Weston County Travel Commission to directly approve it and decide when to release it.

Travel Commission president won’t comment

Brittany Trandahl, the president of the Weston County Travel Commission, refused to respond to questions the NLJ submitted to her for this story because she objected to the News Letter Journal’s manner of covering an alleged series of thefts she is accused of committing at Walmart in Gillette. Trandahl has been charged with a felony in relation to those thefts, and has requested a jury trial in Campbell County which is scheduled to begin on Dec. 15. Three days have been set aside for that hearing.