Local tourism feeling the recession as weather puts a damper on spring break numbers (PHOTOS)

The bad economy is the biggest reason people in a recent online survey gave for not vacationing in Okaloosa County.

“We need to make sure we push the affordability of the area,” Darrel Jones, executive director of the county’s Tourist Development Council told the TDC Wednesday.

Jones said 55 percent of the people who responded to the TDC survey said they’d visited in the past year; 45 percent said they hadn’t come in the past two years; 77 percent said they planned to visit this year. Those who weren’t planning to visit said the economy was the main reason.

Jones said the “occupancy percentage rates” for the area were also hurting: Destin’s rate was 51 percent in February compared to 62.9 percent in February 2008, and 47.4 percent for March compared to 58.5 percent. Holiday Isle’s February 2009 figures were up — from 75 to 85 percent — but the March rate was 62 percent, down from 68 percent in March 2008.

Okaloosa Island and Fort Walton Beach saw the rate drop both months.

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To see spring break photos from across the Emerald Coast and Destin, click here.

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“We had the weather working against us for a big chunk of spring break this year,” TDC Chair Ken Paine said “Too rainy, too cold.”

Other topics at the meeting:

•Jones said that if Emerald Coast Convention Center uses the county land behind the center to host outdoor events, the county wants a share of the center’s income from such events turned over to the Parks and Recreation Department.

“So the $4 million we spent on Marler Park wasn’t enough?” Paine asked, pointing out that the TDC already maintains and improves county parks in the south county area that pays bed taxes.

“It’s a fundamental misunderstanding,” TDC attorney Steve Hall said. “This is the county talking about the county paying money to the county.”

Paine said it sounded like a ploy to turn the TDC’s bed taxes, which can only be used for tourism-related expenses, as a cash cow for the park system outside the bed-tax districts. Hall and Jones said they’d talk further with county officials and County Attorney John Dowd about what the county had in mind.

•The TDC decided to cut back its monthly meetings to quarterly, with extra meetings scheduled if the board needs to make an urgent decision. For example, members said, they’d probably have to meet in May to prepare for the county’s budget workshops.

•Okaloosa Island resident Rebecca Sherry said that the sand sweeper from the county’s beach-cleaning service was driving over the island dunes for the second year in a row. Jones said he’d already contacted the contractor about that.

•TDC member Richard Geron said he’d been asked if the TDC handed out bonuses or cash rewards to its staff, and would like to get it on the record that the council did not.

“I didn’t get any cash,” board member Nick Nicholson joked.

“There have been no bonuses paid to anybody in the 19 1/2 years that I’ve been here,” Jones said.