The B.C. government is creating a new fund that will support meeting venues, with other money going to fund recruiters in the tourism sector.
Its Business Events and Conferences Restart Fund will provide up to $5 million in the fiscal year that ends March 31, and another $3 million next year to cities' destination management organizations, such as Destination Vancouver.
Meeting venue operators can then apply to destination management organizations to receive grants.
"B.C.'s meetings, conferences, and events sector sustains a significant network of businesses across the province and is critical to the complete rebuild of our provincial economy," said BC Hotel Association CEO Ingrid Jarrett.
Victoria is earmarking a total of $1.3 million to a different fund that will pay human resources specialists across the province this year and next. That means that in total, the province announced $9.3 million in new funding for the tourism sector today.
It has been dribbling out money in small parcels with different announcements throughout the pandemic. Last month, for example, Victoria announced that it would provide $3.7 million to Indigenous tourism operators.
Friction between the sector and the government was palpable in mid-2020, when the industry sought $680 million in government support, but the Horgan administration provided only $100 million, including $50 million for a tourism task force.
The B.C.'s Tourism Task Force then released a report in December 2020, with a long list of requests for the beleaguered sector.
The government then early in 2021 came through with an additional $55 million in support, including $5 million to support Indigenous tourism businesses.
The government said today that, since the start of the pandemic, its count is that it has invested more than $570 million in supports for the tourism sector, including the Small and Medium Size Business Grant and Circuit Breaker grant, providing funding to nearly 8,200 tourism and hospitality businesses.
