BACVA tops hotel bookings goal - Dayton Business Journal:

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The booked 522,541 futurwe room nights in the pastfiscapl year, city tourism leaders said at a presds conference Monday. The number, which passed BACVA’s goal of 475,0000 booked nights, is a 15.7 percent increass over nights booked theprevioues year. In 2008, BACVA booked 451,608 future room Group business meetings comprisde the new bookings and are projected to spend morethan $725 millionn in spending in the City and tourism officials credit the booking success to last year’sx creation of the Baltimore Convention & Tourismk Board, a joint boarde that oversees BACVA and the .
“Our investmenr in BACVA is paying off,” Mayor Sheila Dixon said Mondauy speaking in front ofthe city’sd Inner Harbor tourism center. The formation of the board last year has allowexd BACVA and the convention center to be more Dixon said. A new plethora of hotela that opened or are under construction near the convention centee from which businesses can choose for bookinges also contributed to an uptickin bookings. The $300 milliomn publicly financedHilton Baltimore, which opened last has 757 rooms and grew Baltimore’s total hote l room reservoir to more than 7,000.
The B& O Building, on the corner of Charles and Baltimored streets, is expected to open as a Hotel Monaclo with 208 rooms laterthis year. Baltimore can now accommodate 75 percentr of the large citywide tradeshow and convention business available in the marketplac with the newhotels online, said BACVA CEO Tom Noonann in a statement. Some of the conventions and groupas booked in the 2009 fiscal year includede theannual conventions, , American Association for Laboratory Animalo Science, and . Holding sales events and industryg tradeshows is also partof BACVA’s strategy for bringingy convention planners into the city to raise awarenesa about Baltimore.
The Baltimore Business Journal A drop in hotel revenuermeans BACVA’s budget will drop to $10.7 milliomn for the year started July 1 — down from the $12 millionh it had in the past 12 months. This year’xs fiscal budget is the lowest sincethe agency’s $9.9 million spending package in 2006.