(The Center Square) – Seattle and Washington state’s tourism industry continued to be uneven in 2023, but Port of Seattle officials expect the region to surpass 2019 numbers across the board with boosted tourism grant funding.
One positive outcome from last year was the cruise season, in which 1.7 million passengers came through Seattle. That is the biggest year ever for the region’s cruise season, according to the port’s presentation on Tuesday.
However, more of those passengers were from the local area and average length of hotel stay for cruise passengers was down, according to a passenger survey conducted last summer.
According to research provided by the U.S. Travel Association, Washington is slightly behind the U.S. average in overseas arrivals and travel spending. In the case of travel spending, the state has reached pre-pandemic levels, but the number of international passengers is sitting at 74% of 2019 numbers.
The port cites the slow recovery in Asian markets for the lack of international passengers as Europe and Australia have recouped over 90% of their pre-pandemic passenger counts.
Tourism grant programs through the Port of Seattle supported local partners to help drive out-of-state visitation. The Tourism Marketing Support grant program in particular distributed more than $185,000 in funding for local marketing projects aimed at driving out-of-state visitation.
The port’s Tourism Marketing Support grant program provides grants of up to $10,000 for tourism marketing projects. The awarded projects must drive out-of-state visitation.
Following discussions with current, former and potential tourism grant recipients, it was revealed to Port of Seattle officials that there is a need for greater funding, a new timeline for applications, and a revamping of how the applications are evaluated.
The port’s tourism development team is proposing changes to the program including increasing the maximum award for grants from $10,000 to $20,000.
“Obviously $10,000 doesn’t go as far as it used to,” Seattle Port Director of Tourism Development Nick Leonti said at Tuesday’s Port of Seattle Commission meeting. “Inflation has impacted the value of the grants.”
The proposed changes would also create two tiers of grants. The first tier would offer up to $20,000 per applicant. The second tier would provide up to $10,000 per applicant with more flexible match requirements.
The proposed changes to the Tourism Marketing Support grant program could be authorized at the Seattle Port Commission meeting on Feb. 13.
