2021-04-09 00:00:00 - Joint Committee on Tourism, Arts and Cultural Development
2021-04-09 00:00:00 - Joint Committee on Tourism, Arts and Cultural Development
SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Yeah, mm.
Mhm. Yeah,
mm. Well, um it's just after 10 o'clock on friday april 9 2021.
SEN KENNEDY - And this is the first meeting of the Tourism Arts and Cultural Development Committee newly formed. And the purpose of today's meeting is to hear from industry leaders on their perspectives on the impacts of Covid 19, you know, rebuild and rebuild that will guide committee priorities this session. Um, I want to thank everyone for joining us at this40 important hearing regarding the impact of COVID-19. The COVID-19 pandemic on tourism odds and cultural sectors. Um as you are aware, the pandemic has been devastating On tourism, arts and culture and restaurant industries, not just economically, but also it's affected the quality of life. For the people who live in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The most recent figures from the Mass Cultural Council, for instance, reflect the loss of $588 million dollars to our arts and cultural institutions alone. And prior to the pandemic. Arts, nonprofits in the Commonwealth supported more than 73,000 full time jobs, Which generated more than $2.2 billion $100 million dollars in state revenue.
Um when you add in the lost tourism and restaurant revenue, we're looking at a multi billion dollar hit for the commonwealth of massachusetts. Mhm. This committee has a lot of work to do as we make our way out of the pandemic and begin rebuilding these industries. I can speak for my colleagues on the committee today and saying that we are all looking forward to the testimony of115 of uh more than a dozen leaders and the arts, culture, tourism and restaurant industries today. Your experiences, your expertise and needs will be critical in helping us as legislators to to uh guide the commonwealth through the recovery. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
And with that, let me just do a roll call for the Senate members before I turn it over to uh Micah chick. Representative carroll Feola. The senate members with john Cronin, here's senator. Okay. Susan miran here, mr. Chair walter Tumulty
join villas,
Ryan batmen and and I'm here. And with that, let me turn it over to my co chair. Representative Feola.
REP FIOLA - Thank you. Senator Kennedy! Welcome everyone for what's going to be a long day for our first hearing of Tourism arts, cultural development. And I'd like to throw in at the end, hospitality uh to pick up the slack there. Uh We are185 all been hearing the cry of this industry and uh um today it is our hope that as we begin, our committee work that we will get a really better, deeper understanding of what we have been learning201 is a devastation of an industry that had been booming and thriving prior to this pandemic and there's never been a time for more attention to this industry than210 right now. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
And so we welcome the five panels that will be here today, How we're going215 to work is approximately 10 minutes, everybody is aware, each Panelist is aware of the time frame. Uh once that panel is all the speakers from that panel have concluded their remarks will open it up to the committee uh members to raise their hands and ask any questions they would like them will proceed to the next panel. Um I'd like to also do a roll call and welcome to239 my house colleagues today and I'll start with our vice chair, Dylan Fernandez, Good morning madam Chair. Thanks for hosting you bet. Thank you. Representative
Tricia volleyball veer from Pittsfield
represented mary keith from Worcester,
Representative Nathalie Blais from Sunderland's Good morning madam chair. Good to see you. Good morning Representative Tommy Vitolo from Brookline.
You think that and you know he's here. I saw I saw evidence of him being here, I'm not sure. Representative Vitolo. Okay we'll move on for a minute. Representative Pignatelli from Lenox,
Representative Rogers from Norwood. Good morning madam chair, Good morning to my house in santa colleagues. Morning Representative Chip digs from Ostrow, ill. Good morning madam chair. Thanks for having me here. Thank you. Representative Matthew moratoria ranking minority member from Plymouth and Representative David Vieira from Falmouth. Uh we'll be introducing members at314 the beginning of each panel. Those who join us in the meantime, why don't we get started with? Panel 1? Um Panel one we have comprised of the massachusetts office and travel and tourism undersecretary Mark Fuller will will be present with from the Executive Office of Housing and Economic Development and of course Executive director keiko Oral who heads up the office of travelers and Tourism. We have also joining them because of the funding mechanism within them. The Regional Tourism Councils, Representative by Martha Sheridan from the Greater boston Convention and Visitors Bureau Emery Casey, co chair of the mass regional tourism Councils and nancy gardella, co chair of the mass regional tourism Councils. And I'd like to begin with the Under Secretary Fuller if he's here and Executive director keiko. Uh Yeah. Mhm Great, well thank you all very much for having us this morning. I knew my colleague Royal Hamlin was going to display a couple slides for us that we can walk through quickly and then certainly excited to get to, to question answer. Rory, could you pull up those slides
right
and kato and I will be will be sharing the slide deck here so we'll pass pass the mic accordingly.
MARK FULLER - MASSACHUSETTS OFFICE OF TRAVEL AND TOURISM - So as we think about tourism, arts and culture, I want to give a little bit perspective on where we've been and where we're going with reopening. So if we go the first slide, it's clearly been an incredibly long year for our communities for many of our businesses and for all of us in our personal lives and the pandemic has really forced us to think differently about how we operate and how we keep each other safe. I think the perspective on the slide here and I certainly won't go through all these different phases and steps, just reminds us how far we've come in many ways. You know, early in this pandemic, in sort of, you know,444 March of last year, we were one of the hardest hit states in the country with over 100,000 confirmed cases and tragically over 8000 deaths in sort of mid July.
That response to the pandemic and are sort of phased459 reopening and recovery approach was really driven with that balance between public health and day to day life continuing at pace. So we've been moving through our phases, clearly, phase one was back in May of 2020, we're currently on the right side of the slide here on March 22nd when we moved into phase four step one and there are lots of different pieces of guidance that485 have come out over time and we've learned more about the disease and have learned more about what we can do to keep each other safe and anyone who is looking for494 that guidance that's put out496 with our colleagues at the command center, you can go to bounce dot gov backslash reopening that always has the latest industry guidance and useful resources for everyone. You know what I would say, tourism has been particularly hugely disrupted by COVID-19.
Travel and tourism as a whole, lot more cultural institutions have been particularly battered by just given the nature of, you know, what they provide to our communities and require people to be together526 and gather and often move around the state. So we are529 keenly aware of the challenges they face and that's true across the entire commonwealth. Clearly, safe reopening is the most critical thing for recovery so we can get these institutions back up and running, their employees can return in full force and they can continue to provide great experiences for all of us. As we move to the next slide, huge part of that is, you know, consumer behavior and our behavior as people who enjoy going out and going to interesting places and being together socially.
The slide here just talks a little bit about consumer spending, which is certainly one way to think about and measure our behavior as a community and what you'll see here is that spending levels are beginning to recover sort of at their depths here the bottom is re greening, that's entertainment and recreation spending, you know, in step that had fallen off over 100% compared was in January. Right now, it's still considerably depressed at sort of nearly half of what it had been sort of pre Covid and you see a similar trends in restaurants, hotels maybe a little less dramatic but still hugely painful dislocation while overall spending has started to return to more normal levels. But this is a huge dynamic impacted by605 the spread of Covid, impacted by the restrictions and phased reopening. Of course, impacted by how people perceive the safety of those activities. Are they excited to go out and spend? Are they excited to travel? Do they feel comfortable doing that?
So much of the recovery here as we look towards the future is about that consumer behavior and making people feel comfortable returning to some level of normal activity with of course Covid in mind and all of our public health in mind. That's reflected in a lot of the data around travel, we pulled some statistics here, there are lots of sources for this, but the US travel Association has sort of domestic and international travelers, you know, across Massachusetts declining by that half in 2020, so that's obviously a huge dislocation and that's also reflected in things like hotel occupancy rates. We had sort of right now based in Boston, hotel occupancy rate of just around 40%.
664 That's664 well664 off where was in the past but again, sort of reflects that notion of travel and consumer behavior, driving a lot of the recovery all that is also reflected in what we see are from Logan Airport flight and operations and just a691 huge fall off in travelers. I think all of us would expect to see that the numbers there, so sobering when you look at them. You know, I would say there are some sort of some hope in, there are some green shoots, as people are surveying Americans as what they're planning to do in the707 future as the vaccine rollout continues and we feel like we're better footing, 87% of American travelers have plans in the next six months and that's a huge increase. So people are looking to the future, hopefully can return to safe travel and get back to some tourism activity that I know is badly needed across the state and so many folks who rely on that for their income and to support their life.
Just a quick overview of the recovery effort. This is certainly not comprehensive, but one to highlight a number of programs the states put forward as well as the federal government. There are many tools that the state is trying to make available to businesses and our institutions. I'd call out several that are here, the Mass Growth Capital Corporation has been offering business relief grants, those over $650 million in direct financial support have been given to over 14,000 businesses across the Commonwealth. There's been a huge demand for that and we're happy to provide it. I believe this is the largest program of its kind across the country so we can continue to give folks a lifeline as they hopefully bridge to the new normal.
Similarly, we have the Cultural Organization recovery Grant program, 183 cultural nonprofits were able to786 benefit from those grants, again, a $10 million program. Similarly, we've been trying to support our local governments as they plan to recover and those local planning grants have been made available. Similarly, we've been trying to let municipalities and organizations partner to start thinking about recovery and804 that's that regional grant pilot program you see the fourth bullet there. What I just810 say is we are trying to deliver resources to people so they can plan and act and support their businesses and people around them and there are some more programs to come. I would also just be remiss, not to mention quickly the enormous amount of resources that have824 come to the state from the federal government, the Paycheck Protection Program or PPP as most people refer to has been a huge benefit to lots of businesses across the commonwealth. So far, almost $20 million have been used both in 2020 and currently in 2021 to lots of different businesses.
I think it's almost 200,000 loans and we really do help as many businesses as possible take advantage of those programs. Additionally, the shuttered855 venue operators grant program opened yesterday. We think that's going to have a huge benefit to a lot of businesses and menus across the state and looking forward to helping support them apply and get those resources. The last one, I just want to point out is also the restaurant revitalization fund that's part of the American Rescue Plan Act. We're looking forward to learn more details of that program as it rolls out and what I just said is taken as a whole. We are trying to be just as completely responsive as we can be to so many businesses that are that are struggling to their employees and to all these mainstream communities who rely on these businesses being open and thriving to really contribute to their towns and their900 cities. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
and with that maybe where we could go to the next slide and I think can't get, we'll take it from, take it from him. And
KEIKO MATSUDO ORRALL - MASSACHUSETTS OFFICE OF TRAVEL AND TOURISM - With that, I'll just continue in the vein of recovery and specific to the Massachusetts Office of Travel and Tourism. We have launched a new grant program and have been able to fund over $1.5 million in marketing funds for over 59 organizations across the state. As far as recovery, that was a grant program that was born out of Secretary Kanell's biweekly calls for the industry and it was really listening and I think that that's what our agency and what undersecretary Fuller is trying to convey that we're trying to listen to what the industry needs are. We're trying to meet those needs. As far as support for tourism assets, we're going to be launching another program short soon that will support capital investments in tourism assets and it will complement this existing recovery grant and it970 will be offered to organizations and municipalities across the commonwealth for capital investments and some destination development.
The next piece I would just call attention to is the Economic Development bill that was signed, where as part of that, a new tourism destination marketing district was created where lodging businesses will be able to generate revenue for marketing. What our agency is funded through1001 the Tourism trust fund and 60% of the $10 million dollars that is coming from room occupancy tax is put towards our regional tourism councils.1013 Those are our partners in marketing the state, and by statute, there are 16 of them across the state,1022 each one markets their own unique region. So we are the administers of the Tourism Trust Fund. Again, we've really tried to listen to what the industry is saying and we've developed I think a good working partnership to really be team Massachusetts. We have waived matching requirements for the RTC's during the pandemic and we've adopted a more user friendly digital application and reporting process.
Our current campaign launched in late August of 2020. It's my local MA and I know that Chair Fiola and Kennedy and many of the members on this tourism committee have been supportive of the campaign by using the hashtag my local MA by using some of the tiles that have been pushed out. We're going to ask you to continue to do that to follow the travel and tourism feed on our social media feed, Facebook, twitter, Instagram and we're about supporting our local businesses and that's what we're hoping with this campaign to1091 do and we'll continue it through June, probably thereafter to shop, dine and Travel local.
Chairman Kennedy was part of our restaurant promotion commission and we will also be plugging in some of those marketing dollars to support our local restaurants in a campaign that will be coming out soon. It's a statewide effort to really try to help and listen to the industries that are so hard hit at this time. With that Madam Chair, that wraps up our presentation and we would welcome any questions Undersecretary Fuller and I welcome any questions. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
right, we're just gonna rush over to Regional Tourism Council's first if you don't mind Executive director because we want to just keep this panel as as it's related. So I'd like to do that for the next 10 minutes. Um Martha uh Marie and nancy if you could um because this is panel one and we're trying to keep on that kind of format, so I'll turn it over to whoever is going to take it for your regional tourism councils. Well,
NANCY GARDELLA - MARTHA'S VINEYARD CHAMBER OF COMMERCE - Good morning, everyone. My name is Nancy Gardella and I'm the Executive director of the Martha's vineyard chamber of Commerce. I'm joined with my colleagues and I'd like to start by thanking Senator Kennedy, Representative Fiola and all the committee members and our tourism partners for being part of this conversation today. We do have a slide deck and I believe that there may be an opportunity to bring that up or allow Martha Sheridan to share that. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Could I request control of the
Okay.
Yeah.
Hello
Martha, you should be able to see uh arrow pointing at the top of your screen that says share content and you should be able to share. Yeah. Ok. Yeah, I1237 do see that. Thank you.
Uh huh.
So is Martha pulls up? Mm, Can we all see it? We can. Thanks Martha. Yeah, no problem.
GARDELLA - So, I just want to get started by um making sure that everyone on the committee is familiar with the Massachusetts. Regional tourism councils. We are a cohesive, wildly enthusiastic and fiercely independent group of 16 destination marketing organizations across the state. Why 16? Because Massachusetts has so much to offer and we all love our regions so much. Sometimes we get confused with the Mass Cultural Council who are great organization that we work in partnership with but just to make sure we all know the difference. Regional tourism councils, RTCs promote the destination both Massachusetts and on my end for Martha's vineyard. Our partners at the Mass Cultural Council, MCC do a great job promoting the products that people can visit while they're in our regions, so it's a great partnership but it's not the same thing. Why is tourism important and why is it important to have us as marketers boots on the ground? Because tourism means money for the state of Massachusetts. Not only visitors spend but valuable tax revenue paid by visitors into the commonwealth, critical dollars that we've really seen the effect of losing in the last year. So I thank you so much and I want to remind you that as regional tourism councils, we represent thousands of small businesses across the state of Massachusetts. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
and I'll hand it over now to my co chair and Marie Casey.
ANN MARIE CASEY - NORTH OF BOSTON CONVENTION VISITORS BUREAU - Thank you, Nancy and thank you to the members of the committee. My name is Ann Marie Casey and I'm the executive director of the North1372 of Boston Convention Visitors Bureau, and obviously my role is to promote the 34 cities and towns in Essex County to all travel segments. Today, I'm going to run through some slides, I know you've heard some statistics from Keiko and from Undersecretary Fuller, but these slides again, they are about the impact that COVID-19 has had on the tourism industry in our country and specifically in Massachusetts. These slides contain a lot of information, I'm just going to go over the highlights and I understand that the committee has a copy of1410 this for you to go over at your leisure.
This first slide illustrates travel spending losses in the United States over the past year, and you can see that the losses are at 38% translating to more than $562 billion dollars in lost revenue. The next slide illustrates jobs lost in the United States, clearly showing that the leisure and hospitality losses are the highest, with 20% of these jobs lost, representing 36% of all job losses during the pandemic. Speaking1437 directly about Massachusetts, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that from November 2019 to November 2020, Massachusetts lost 337,900 jobs with the leisure and hospitality industry experiencing one of the highest percentages of loss. So Massachusetts, leisure and hospitality workforce, it's significant and diverse and we want to work with all of you to help get these people back to work.
The next slide focuses on domestic leisure tourism, which is the beginning of our1469 road to recovery for our industry. Travel segments like Corporate, Group tour and international travel are going to take longer to recover. Tourism Economics predicts domestic travel to attain 2019 levels at the end of 2022, but we will not see a full recovery of the tourism industry in its entirety until after 2024. The next slide is a direct comparison to the first slide that I showed, which illustrated the 38% loss in travel spending for the country but you can see that Massachusetts has been it much harder. We've experienced a1505 53% travel spending loss translating to more than $15 billion in spending losses, $451 million dollars in loss of state taxes and $234 million dollar tax losses to our cities1517 and towns. For my final slide, I've listed the most impacted states with1524 respect to travel losses and you can clearly see it. It's Hawaii, DC, New York, Massachusetts and Puerto Rico.
Right below that, you can see a clear economic indicator for our industry segment. The rooms tax collections from 2019 to 2020 were down 42% and I know this is tax revenue that our state and our cities and towns rely on year over year. We want to work with all of you to safely and responsibly put heads and beds,1553 generate this money back ultimately exceeding pre pandemic levels. Thank you for your time. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
I'd like to turn this presentation over to my colleague, Martha Sheridan who will discuss how we can work together and turn this around to the benefit of all. Thank you and Marine.
MARTHA SHERIDAN - GREATER BOSTON CONVENTION AND VISITORS BUREAU - Good morning, everyone. It's a pleasure to be here. Thank you, Chair Fiola and Chair Kennedy. I'm Martha Sheridan, the President and CEO of the Greater Boston Convention and Visitors Bureau and I just want to run through a few slides to talk about how the commonwealth, the legislature can help with recovery of this vital industry. I really want to make it clear that you'll see in the slides that a lot of them are about asked for funding for the RTCs. You should know that funding your RTCs is an investment, it's an investment in the future and it's an investment in bringing jobs back to the commonwealth and bringing an economic recovery back sooner rather than later.
These funds would be deployed in a meaningful way to impact the economy, and as I said jobs. The fact of the matter is we're not going to be able to wish pray and hope our way out of this pandemic, it's just not going to happen. The only way we're going to get out of it is if we remain competitive with our competitive set around the country and invest strategically in tourism promotion, which is what our RTCSs are advocating for. So first and foremost, in the Economic Development Bill that you wisely past in the last session, there is a $4 million allocated to the tourism councils for short term promotion. Actually, this is within the same language um that Keiko referred to for1646 the $10 million for the capital infrastructure grant.
Today, these funds have not been released despite of the1652 fact that timing is of the essence. So we're hopeful that you can assist us in getting these1659 funds released to the RTCs so we can deploy them in our meaningful tourism promotion efforts. Other efforts that were requesting for the short term are asking the administration to apply for new federal tourism Recovery grants. We know that these grants are available for the specific purpose of tourism recovery and we would welcome the opportunity to work with Undersecretary Fuller, Secretary Kennelly and executive director Keiko Orrall on applying for these funds and deploying them for a comprehensive recovery program for the tourism sector. The next few slides are specific budget ask and I'm not going to get into them in specific, you will see them come through specific legislative requests, but we would request an additional infusion of cobra recovery, marketing and promotional investment in the amount of 15 million with five million dedicated to the RTCs and1714 I know that Director Orrall referenced our Grant program that the RTCs receive a portion of, we divide $6 million dollars up 16 ways, not evenly,1724 but 16 ways.
In fact, those funds have not been increased in seven years at least. So in fact, it nets out to be a loss for us each year as our expenses continue to increase but the investment from the Commonwealth1740 does not increase. So we really feel like it's vital that right now we infuse short term investment into our efforts so that we can in fact compete. I think Secretary Fuller put it very well that, you know, the fact is fewer people are going to travel, but they are starting to travel. We're seeing pent up demand and now it's the time to ask people to come to Massachusetts, to come to our respective regions. Our destinations around the country are all suffering, they're all doing the same thing right now and if we don't get out there soon and invite them to the commonwealth, we will be missing1779 the boat, so additional funding will help us significantly.
In the long term, we would love to think about how we can increase that base amount of the Tourism Trust Fund. As I said, it has been stagnant at $10 million dollars for many, many years, it's just not an effective way for us to plan and promote when we can't have increases reflecting the increase1801 in expense related to this important marketing that we do. We thank the Secretary1806 for waving the matching grant program waiver, this is important for us because we are bleeding private sector money as our small businesses continue to have significant funding losses themselves, so we really appreciate the fact that they've done that this year and last year and we are asking that we continue that waiver program into the future and then we also asked for the distribution of our funds in a very kindly manner.
Finally, my last slide is less related to the marketing of the state, which we know is vital and important and necessary right now, but it's really related to the need for our industry to have greater predictability around the loosening of restrictions, and in particular, we're looking at restrictions on gathering limits. Right now, we have no future prediction as to when we will be able to host large scale gatherings. I see David Gibbons was on this call and I know he's going to speak later, but events, conventions meetings, wedding, social gatherings that are well planned and professionally planned require time to book and to plan, and right now we don't have any predictability in when those numbers will increase.
Currently, there at 100 indoors, 200 outdoors. Boston and Cambridge have even greater restrictions on those numbers and we're asking that you consider and that we work with the administration on considering this California model which allows us to look at measurements of vaccines and of infection rates as a predictor of how large gatherings can be. It will allow our hotels to work with their clients, to retain the business they currently have on the book and also access new business. So it's really important that we work more closely with the administration in how we can assess these gathering limits and reopen the economy safely, which is what we all want to do but really with some foresight.
You know, as a matter of fact, I met with a couple of event planners from Boston yesterday and back in my home state of Rhode island for the weekend and I noticed that they've announced the jazz and Folk festival here in Rhode Island. They are going on, we know that they're happening and we really feel like across the commonwealth we need to1953 start moving the needle on those announcements and on the ability to gather safely. So, I think that pretty much concludes our comments, we did have a few more slides on what we're currently doing now, but rest assured, the RTCs are working long days, lots of hours to recover this industry. We are working alongside Keiko and her team at MOTT, we appreciate that partnership and we really do hope that we can in fact, see some future investment and larger investments in recovering this vital economy. So thank you very much. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Uh, thank you. Panelists from panel one. You you were very well behaved, I might say because of our time limit or a few minutes over. Uh so for that, I want to applaud you and you really packed a lot of important information into this panel before we open it up for questions to the Under secretary1999 to keiko into the RTC team. Um I want to just also introduced three other House members that have joined us and that is from Pittsfield, Representative Tricia folly bouvier from Lenox, Representative Smitty Pignatelli, and I believe we also have mary keith from wester, so thank you for joining us Representatives. And with that, I know there was a hand raised and I'm going to, you know, you gave us a lot Very good, specific uh guidance from you of what you believe is needed and we've had a chance to talk as well about this, but I want to immediately open it up for the next 10 minutes for questions and I2039 know representative Pignatelli had2040 his hand up so I'd like to go right to him and anybody put your hand up, please. Representative kelly welcome. Mhm.
Okay. Um the next hand that I saw, I believe was Representative Blais. So Representative Blake,
REP BLAIS - Good morning madam Chair and thank you for your diligent work in bringing today's testimony in these panels together. This is incredibly helpful. The data that Mark Fuller shared shows that people want to get out and travel as we get more shots and arms and we just can't hope that people will come to massachusetts. So I want to take this opportunity to thank the RTC's for your efforts to stretch every dollar, not only in this last year, but every single year to bring visitors to every corner of our state because these visitors support our small businesses and they create jobs. Uh, so I'm grateful for RTC Advocacy in getting the ego dev bond bill funding released. I think this funding would go a long2143 way right now and I'm hopeful that the administration will support the release of these funds and and respond to your request. I also want to thank you for sharing your very concrete short and long term recommendations or state and federal funding for committee consideration and just say that we really look forward to working with you to support this vital industry. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Thank you. Representative Senator Moran, you had the next hand and then we'll go to rep digs. Okay,
SEN MORAN - Thank you, Madam. Chair. I greatly appreciate all of the information. I've got a strong tourism history. I've, I've run uh, inns2187 B and Bs. I've chaired tourism committees. My district is on both sides of the canal between Plymouth and Falmouth. and, you know, it's incredibly foundational. I really think the planning element is absolutely necessary. I like the California2209 model. It's not only important for the business planning, but it's important for, you know, the travelers and anything that we can do in massachusetts to, to put, um, you know, kind of some stability under, you know, that what our future is going to be is going to be hugely helpful. I think2230 it's a very good balance with looking at health measures. Um, so that, that's something I'm really happy to put an order in the water and work toward.
The question I have, and, you know, to whomever might make sense. On the Cape side, you know, there really is a full season coming which is a terrific thing. It's going to be great for our hotels, it's going to be great for our restaurants, all of our small businesses, we're so looking forward to it. We don't have the exact same predictability on2266 our workforce and so I'm curious what you see going forward with the funding that the government has provided, lots of folks are looking at I'm able to afford to stay home and so do you find that there is going to need to be increase in wages, right now we're looking at lots of different benefit models to really get the workforce up and moving to the areas that2296 are looking to a really2298 bright summer season for one thing. So that's my question. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Mhm. I'll step in and take that.
GARDELLA - Thank you, Senator. So, yes, of course, we are concerned about workforce as you all2312 know, well2314 the Cape and Islands has a high retirement population and so we rely on people to come into our area to work including international students, J1 Visas and H2B Visas and obviously, this year those programs are competitive. However, what I can share with you is that areas on the Cape and Islands are being very innovative, trying to incentivize work options, recruit more diverse folks back to work both retirees, high school students. Each area is doing their best to support the needs of the businesses which we hope, you know, it's kind of an interesting problem to have right. There was the scare last spring that we wouldn't have any visitors and now2370 the concern is will have so many visitors and we won't have a workforce available to be working all the jobs that come online, especially May through October. So it is a challenge, we've had a lot of notice to be aware of it and we're trying to get very creative about that.
SHERIDAN - I would just add that the ability to have greater predictability and gathering numbers will go a long way towards bringing our workforce back because, you know, I think it's a misnomer that tourism jobs are low wage jobs, in fact, many that work in the banquet sector, even in housekeeping, you know, with a full slate of rooms and with a full slate of events to service make significant revenue but if those employees don't see that2423 gathering numbers are going up and in fact the number of people they will be serving is increasing, which will have a direct corresponding effect on their wages, the desire for them to return to work might be less. So I think it all goes hand in hand, having predictability, knowing that we are promoting the commonwealth in each region to bring higher volume of visitors back, and showing these valuable workers that we can't get them back to their former wage levels.
FULLER - Maybe I just echo and expand on a couple of those comments.2457 I think businesses have been incredibly resourceful over the past year, as we think about recovery, working with their employees to get them back to work. I would say that we are very well aware of this dynamic that's been created of the 350,000 or so Massachusetts residents that are in the unemployment pool, a significant portion, I think over half drop greater benefits by staying in the pool than returning to work. So we're trying to like the group here has said, trying to figure out ways to incentivize them to2491 go back to work and be part of return to those communities.
I'd also say that housing around the Cape is a hugely important issue for us and I know there's a huge challenge around making sure folks who work in the area can live in the area and be close to those jobs and housing is a huge part of our mission and we are really looking forward to continuing to work, to make that available to folks in the area as well. But a dynamic that we're very well aware of and we're really hoping to have a great sort of recovery season here, I think this date of April 19th where everyone effectively over 16 will be eligible to get the vaccine as supply continues to ramp up to meet demand, I think is going to be a huge part of all of this as well and I'd be remiss not to say thank you. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
thank you, senator, thank you all uh gigs took his hand down. We're coming to the close of the panel before I bring on vice chair Fernandez for the final2559 question for this panel. I would just like to say, I can't yeah, let go more strongly from what I've heard in my district and elsewhere, that these gathering limits. Um, there needs to be planning time unlike a restaurant where you can say next week, we're going to open up some more seats or whatever, there needs to be a lead time. And so I I can't say enough. I think the California plan looking ahead to June 15, there's a date, there's a time, there's a place you know to plan and I've heard that again and again from those venues and um places that need to plan and they are imploring you. So I'd like to leave you undersecretary with that thought that we're looking forward to hearing more on that as our vaccine is in the arm and we're moving ahead. Um And of course the R. T. C. S. We've got to figure out a way to help you market. So thank you. And with our last question of the panel, I'd like to ask Vice chief and Andy's to comment.
REP FERNANDES - Thank you, Madam Chair. Just going back to the peace around the room occupancy and how that has been significantly down but I think on Keiko, maybe your slide, it showed that there was a $10 million dollar transfer from the room occupancy fund of taxes collected by the state to fund tourism, which I think is just an excellent use of those dollars and that's where those dollars should be going because clearly the more people we get staying in the short term rentals, paying for this room occupancy tax, the more money we're going to generate, but we need to get them here. So can you just talk just for my edification, so that is just a one time transfer, is that correct? That's not built in kind of year after year for that transfer?
ORRALL - The 10 million is set in statute and it is allocated outside of the budget into the Tourism Trust Fund. Along with that gaming revenue is also part of the allocation to the regional Tourism councils. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Thank you. Wall, Thank you, sir. Panetti's. Yeah. Okay. Panelists of Panel one can't thank you enough. I know this was like a speed dating episode, but we need to move on to keep to the timing and uh we heard a lot.
FIOLA - We um we uh you were great in giving us um uh concrete direction from the RtC is what we can look to be helpful with. And with that, I have been asked. Yes, our representative Pignatelli is back on technical difficulties represented Pignatelli, Let's end it with you then. Go ahead.
REP PIGNATELLI - Well, I apologize. I've been having all kinds of problems with the Golden West. Um and I apologizing, I bumped off a few times. I missed probably the good chunk of Keiko's presentation. The one area that was particularly interested in me and I want to echo my colleagues, the Tangle wood Jacob's Pillow, the theatre festivals out here in the Berkshires. We need to have some advanced notice about the occupancy. We can't make money at 12%. You know,2754 now, I'm not advocating going to 100% but we need to do far better than 12% occupancy, especially in outdoor venues like tangle2764 wood, it's going be very, very important. We can't afford to lose another season without our creative economy here in the virtues, What I was particularly interested in and I don't want to belabor, Madam Chair, and I appreciate it, let me sneak back in here is the targeted Covid marketing. Who are we targeting and what is the strategy going forward? Because the Berkshires and the2785 Cape are probably very similar, but the Berkshires and the Pioneer Valley are very different. So how is that marketing going to be established and what is going to be some of the criteria?
ORRALL - From the state level, during the pandemic, we pivot to the having our market beach Massachusetts residents and we were encouraging them to stay by any locally and as the vaccinations and everything as things open up more, we will be reaching out, branching out to our neighboring states Connecticut, New York and our drive market but we're waiting to see how things go with the public health data.
SHERIDAN - I'll just add to that if I may, the RTC is also very strategic about who we market to with the limited resources that we have and we do have a concentric circles approach if you will to marketing. You know, obviously during the height of the pandemic, it was Massachusetts, as Keiko mentioned, but now2842 we've expanded to the drive market, particularly since some of the quarantine restrictions have been loosened a bit, so that's been very helpful. Ultimately, we would like to get back to national marketing, but again, it comes down to resources. We are not going to be able to launch a significant national marketing campaign that will compete against other states unless we invest more.
The 10 million that is being referred to is a minuscule percentage of the total occupancy tax collected across the Commonwealth. $514 million collected in good time and only 10 million has been allocated to destination marketing over the past seven years annually. It's not enough, I hate to sound so direct about it, but I come from a state of Rhode island where I worked for dozens of years where they allocate a direct percentage of hotel tax collections into tourism marketing. Its dedicated, it's predictable and it allows for greater planning and greater reach. So thank you.
FULLER - Maybe I could just one last quick thing I've heard from a number of people2965 on this colony also before about this notion and trying to be predictable and as much lead time as possible and that's certainly something we, we will communicate back to the team and it's something more aware of. I think this last change there was effectively a month in between2981 when the Governor announced it in a move to phase four that as2985 we continue to think about moving forward and hopefully it's more predictable, we can build in a little bit more time, that we've heard that from businesses. I also want to just briefly mention, there's been some discussion about the RTC Air Mark and the Economic Development Bill. We just wanted to make a quick comment, we're in the middle of our capital planning process for fy 22.
We typically do that and sort of focus on competitive grant programs and with limited resources, we always try to fund just as much as we can. The one thing I want to flag for the group, though is that capital dollars to have legal limitations on what they can be spent on and it's typically infrastructure, equipment, capital investments. I think we're working with our legal counsel to understand that $4 million dollars can be used on things like marketing. I'm concerned that maybe it's not actually, unfortunately not, we might not have the ability to capital dollars on those types of activities. So what we're working on that, we'll circle back just as quick as we can with this group to clarify once we have some legal help thinking through that one. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Thank you secretary. That's gonna be important to know as we move forward. And I want to comment on mark this point in her presentation slide about an additional this is a once in a pandemic opportunity with funds coming in and uh that is your recommendation of some form of a umbrella investment3068 into marketing and promotion is very, very we listen very carefully to that. Thank you mom. Thank you all of you onward. I'd like to thank you all for being here. Panel one uh you know where to find us and I'm gonna turn it over for panel to to my co chair Senator Kennedy. Thank you. Chair Viola. Panel two is comprised of two executive directors. We have money. I think we lost you. Right, senator, you're muted. Come on. Okay. I'm sorry. Let me start over panel to is comprised of two executive directors. We have Michael Bobbitt who is executive director for the Mass Cultural Council as well as Brian Bowles is executive director for Mass Humanities. I think everybody on3133 this committee had an opportunity to meet with Michael Barber recently, but let's start with him today. Uh Michael bob. Go ahead. Fantastic.
MICHAEL BOBBITT - MASS CULTURAL COUNCIL - Good morning, Chair Kennedy, Chair Fiola and through you to the committee members. It is my pleasure to join you for this moment, this important conversation and I personally think that this is the most important room in the state today. I'm at the end of my 10th week on the job and it's terrific to be in a room with familiar faces now and I am completely in support of the testimony of my colleagues that you heard from in panel one and I promise Chair, I'm going to behave as well as they did. Thank you so much for the opportunity to outline Mass cultural Councils Covid impact data on the cultural sector. For the record, my name is Michael Bobbitt, Executive director of Mass Cultural Council. I am joined today by Beth Ann Steiner, my public affairs director.
As you know, Mass Cultural Council is an independent state agency that promotes excellence, inclusion, education and diversity in the arts, humanities and sciences. We work to elevate the rich cultural life for everyone living, working and3196 visiting in Massachusetts. Yet one year ago, as you know, the COVID-19 pandemic struck Massachusetts. We know that our once booming cultural sector has been economically devastated. Last month on March 8th, the agency announced the data collected from our 5th COVID Economic Impact survey of the cultural sector. Our data shows that 981 nonprofit and municipal cultural organizations have lost an overwhelming $588,334,079 in revenue since March of 2020, while 2951 artists, teaching artists and scientists humanists site $30,403,616 in lost personal income due to the pandemic.
We know those numbers are only from those reporting, the impact is much, much, much larger. The3248 sector is in a state3251 of crisis. Cultural organizations located in every region of the Commonwealth have been financially devastated by the closures and cancellations necessitated by the COVID-19 pandemic. Our colleagues in California are calling their similar situation a cultural depression. On average, Massachusetts Cultural organizations are dealing with the loss of nearly $600,000 each. Difficult decisions have been made to contend with this new reality. 65% of organizations3281 with employees have planned to lay off, furlough or reduce the hours or wages of their employees, and across Massachusetts, 30,000 individual cultural sector employees have seen their jobs impacted by COVID-19 in these ways. Massachusetts Creative professionals are also facing dramatic financial loss from the pandemic.
So these individual artists totaling over nearly 3000 for my survey say that they are reporting uh more than $30 million in loss of personal income and 67,986 canceled gigs and jobs since March 2020. On average, an individual teaching artists or scientists. Humanists in Massachusetts has lost more than 10,000 in personal income and 23 canceled jobs and gigs. The gig workers are already struggling to pull together enough income to survive. Before last March, Public investment in the arts, humanities and sciences through Massachusetts Cultural Council delivered significant economic returns to the3351 commonwealth. Whether you're in greater Boston, Cape3353 Cod or the Berkshires or in between, non profit cultural organizations, drive local economies in every region of the state.
Prior to the Covid 19 pandemic, the cultural nonprofit organization who received grant support from Mass Cultural Council generated $2.3 billion in annual economic activity across the commonwealth, supported more than 71,000 full time equivalent jobs statewide, produced more than 128 million in new revenues for Massachusetts and every dollar awarded was leveraged to raise an additional $157 in private funds. Mass Cultural Council's annual programs and services are major stabilizing force for the cultural sector. We believe our stakeholders and the overall state economy will suffer further3400 economic distress if these state services are diminished in any way. That is why we have launched our power of culture advocacy campaigns, which calls for our partners on Beacon Hill, led by you, our champions to deploy all of the tools in your legislative toolkit to secure robust Fy 22 budget spending, bond authorizations and the passage of key bills to ensure the cultural sector can stabilize, rebuild and benefit from federal Covid relief this year. Internally, we are referring to this campaign as budget bond and bills.
So the Fy budget spending, we are requesting that mass cultural counts will be funded at 20 million in Fy 22. This level of support will make a demonstrable impact to the state economy and among Massachusetts cultural stakeholders. With the funding, the agency will continue to invest in artist, communities, cultural nonprofits and students to provide meaningful core services to help stabilize the sector as it continues to recover, rebuild and renew post Covid. The next point, fy 22 bond authorizations. We have started conversation with the Baker Polito administration to secure a total of 24 million in the Fy 22 capital spending plan. This is made up of a renewal of $10 million dollars in the cultural facilities fund that he has funded for his whole time in office, as well as two new Covid assistant programs authorized by the Legislature in the 2020 Economic Development bond bill.
Three million to create new mediums for artists and cultural organizations to virtually and digitally showcase art exhibits, programming and adventure to the public, and 11 million to help cultural organizations with equipment and infrastructure costs necessary to3512 reopen safely and sustainably while3514 upholding public health and social distancing protocols. Then the key bills, in here, I must pause to thank Chair Kennedy for his innovative thinking and leadership. The legislation SB 2105 and act to rebuild the commonwealth Cultural future is key to the sector's recovery. This proposal3533 takes a minimum of $200 million COVID assistance3537 Massachusetts has received from the federal government and directs Mass Cultural Council to use it to make one time recovery grants to artists, nonprofit and for profit cultural organizations.
I believe this legislation is the most comprehensive Covid relief proposal ever filed in the in Massachusetts. As our grant making decisions must consider racial diversity and equity, geographic diversity and programmatic diversity within the cultural sector, economic need and recipients economic impact in terms of job creation and tourism spending prior to March 2020 is also prioritized. So, thank you Chair Kennedy, I look forward to working with you to secure covert relief for the cultural sector. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Thank you too. For you and your continued support and partnership with Mass Cultural Council. Together, I believe we will continue to advance the power of culture in the commonwealth and I would be happy to discuss and address any questions that you may have before I can turn it over to my friend and colleague, brian boiled of Mass humanities. Thank you. Okay. And we will hold off with questions. Thank you very much. Um um Michael for for your comments. We will hold off on the questions and go to brian boils. Who's who's with us today from Mass. Humanity's brian. Go ahead.
BRIAN BOYLES - MASS HUMANITIES - Thank you. Good morning, Chair Kennedy, Chair Fiola, Vice Chair Cronin and Vice Chair Fernandes, and through all of you to all the members of the Joint Committee. For the record, I am Brian Boyles, executive director of Massachusetts and I'm very appreciative of the opportunity to talk with you all today about our work and impact of the pandemic on the field of the humanities in Massachusetts. Our mission is to create opportunities for the people of Massachusetts to transform their lives and build a more equitable commonwealth through the humanities. For us, the humanities are the cornerstones of our democracy, the tools by which we comprehend the past, forge new ideas and express ourselves as participants in a free society. We serve as the state affiliate of the National Humanities, which is a federal agency that was created in 1965 by legislation in Congress that stated very expressly, the democracy demands wisdom and then each of us has a right to our shared cultural heritage.
The data shared today by Michael and Mass Cultural Council reflects the importance of this very pivotal moment. The road back for the cultural sector will be long but it can begin today with the funding proposals we are discussing. We believe the health of the Humanities institutions and organizations around the commonwealth will determine the course of the recovery as a whole. Fredrick3714 Douglass, who found his freedom in Massachusetts, put it very succinctly, 'we must do with the past only as we can make it work for the present and for the future.' What is at risk today,3729 our public museums or historical society's libraries and community centers, the places where people confront the past in order to build the future, where they gather together to learn from one another and to listen to each other and where they add their voices to the evolving global story of Massachusetts.
More than ever before, we're going to need those places and the resources they share to be accessible to every resident. We have been established since 1974 and we work with the smallest grassroots organizations, your town's historical societies, local museums, public libraries, we also work with community centers, YWCAs, immigrant organizations, higher education and human services providers to bring humanities programs to underserved neighborhoods. We do that in order to meet these places where they are, to meet people where they are because we know that these are the institutions that hold neighborhoods and generations together. Our partnership with Mass Cultural Council provides the funding for our grants program. Through a series of streamlining measures over the last two years, we now turn every dollar received from mass cultural3792 council and the revenue into a direct grant to a nonprofit in Massachusetts.
So in fiscal 21, we received $686,000 through this partnership and will make all of that available in grants this year. The fiscal 22 budget of $20 million, for MCC means that Mass humanities can increase its support and funding available to projects like the teacher workshops at the Song Just Industrial Center in Lowell that reach educators with new tools to teach immigration and voting rights history. The community conversations, Center on Wampanoag history that happened at the Quinta Cultural Center. The groundbreaking exhibitions at the Worcester Historical Museum has done on the Puerto3833 Rican and LGBTQ plus communities. In the town of Norwood's, reading Frederick Douglass together event, which brings people together to read and discuss Douglas's fourth of July speech every year.
We are committed to building equity and inclusion in this recovery, then projects like these are not expendable. Quite the opposite, the humanities make possible the recognition of our common humanity and our unique interconnected stories. For an inclusive future, we must treat the past inclusively. We commend Chair Kennedy sponsorship of the commonwealth Cultural Future Act because it3865 asks us to commit to geographic diversity, which3867 we do in all of our funding, racial equity and the importance of the artists, the scientists and humanists to our economy and our future. In the wake of this devastating polarizing year, we invest in these programs because they3880 preserve and expand priceless common ground3882 available to anyone free of charge and they give the communities the right and their access to acknowledge new voices and additional funding for these efforts will create opportunities for the people of Massachusetts to pick up the pieces following this tragic year.
We are concerned about the ability of the smallest organizations to survive as the future comes into view for all of the reasons Michael discussed, but also because as the pandemic has endured, our field has struggled to transition into the digital realm. Now, many of you have probably attended great zoom events but while that has been a boon for some, many of these small organizations struggle because those events are free and not everyone has the access to that equipment or to the expertise to use them. This week, Mass Humanity's awarded $251,000 to 59 organizations around Massachusetts, specifically for digital capacity. These projects include a virtual exhibition on Mohican history at the Berkshire Museum, virtual field trips at the film of Historical Society and the preservation of Pittsburgh's Historical Society's collection of more than 25,000 photographs.
The need for the additional funding for these programs was clear, we received 140 applications and can only fund 59 projects and the organizations that receive these grants, 75% of them had staffs of five or less. This support for digital capacity at the local level was only possible because the Legislature support of Mass Cultural3965 Council. The need to preserve our histories, to give our children access to our shared past, spark, inclusive dialogue, those needs are exasperated, we feel3973 and more urgent than ever, due to the events of the last year. It's for those reasons that we fully support Mass Cultural Council and our friends at Mass Creative in their call for $3 million in funding in the fiscal 22 capital spending3986 plan to support technology capacity for artists in the cultural sector.
These digital upgrades are not only needed to stay afloat during the pandemic, they are an investment and access educational opportunities and the preservation of our globally significant history. Since March 2020, Mass Humanities has awarded 290 for grants totaling $1.2 million Massachusetts nonprofits that nearly tripled the grand making that we have done in4013 the previous 12 months. We prioritize geographic diversity in these awards to make sure that those resources reach places where few other funding possibilities are open but these numbers reflect the ongoing struggles of this sector. Massachusetts is home to hundreds of community based organizations that have turned the humanities into combat for this crisis.
We will need those grassroots organizations more than ever before as we emerge into a post Covid recovery as we seek new paths for racial justice and as we combat the forces of misinformation and polarization that threaten the American experiment that began right here in Massachusetts. I'm so appreciative of the opportunity to provide testimony4050 today on the impact of the pandemic on our field and4054 I would be happy along with Michael to take your questions. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Thank you very much4058 brian. Um, thank you for your comments and for being here today. So at this4063 point we'll open it up to the committee for questions to either Michael Barbaro to uh, brian other many questions I would uh, just bring to your attention that we are falling. We're slipping a little bit behind schedule, but we're still,4076 we're still okay. So are there any questions from the committee
and Representative blace? Mm Thank you so much. Sen Kennedy. 1st, Brian. It's good to see you virtually rather than in North Hampton. And I just want to say what a great job mass humanities has done in supporting the humanities across the entire Commonwealth.
REP BLAIS - Michael, I was wondering if you've had any conversations with the administration about why he has proposed to cut Mass Cultural Council's budget by 10.4%. The legislature has consistently supported your efforts and this decrease seems like an untenable recommendation during this time of economic crisis, particularly given the important role your efforts play in economic development.
BOBBITT - I agree with you about your observation of his recommendation. We met with him, we didn't talk with4139 about his cut, we had other asks specifically the capital spending asks that would help us a lot. His recommendation is pretty consistent with what he's been recommending before and it is untenable but the main thing is I think it would undo what the legislature has done in the last two years. We've been funded at $18.2 million dollars for the last two years and I think good starting place but we really need to up it. In general, my thoughts about this is that we know the arts and culture and tourism and humanities generate a lot of revenue. So in my mind this is a basic business practice of double downing. If we want to bounce back, we need to double down and support these organizations even more. If you look at places like New Orleans when they doubled down in support of the Jazz Festival, they were able to come back after Katrina much faster, had they not done that, they could4208 still be suffering from that. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Thanks. That's really helpful. Thank you. Okay, thank4213 you. Are there any other questions?
Uh, Senator Moran, thank you Mr Chair.
MORAN - I really want to echo Rep Blais intent in her question and I certainly appreciate the answer. But the other quick point I want to make is that, you know, the economic development aspect of tourism is huge, it's undeniable. But at this point in time coming out of Covid, when we have really a generation of students who have been put on ice for a year, I appreciated both Mr. Boyles and Michael's presentations and I'm looking at the beautiful woman behind you on your zoom and the thing is, we are in in cultural experiences are a way of communicating and when you look at the racial divide we have right now, you know, kids learn in different ways and you know, some are concrete learners, some have to see, I've been through town meetings where folks say, you know, I don't understand it, I don't think there is racism, I don't4283 think it exists, then of course the rest of the community is of course. My point is that there are any number of reasons, both economic and the dollar, but also for humanism and to learn from history and I think there's that element just can't be understated and I really appreciated that aspect of your testimony.
BOBBITT - If I can add, I also believe that the more investments, behalf of the arts one, the more money will bring back into the state, but two, specifically on the arts education component, that's our next generation of artists, but also arts patrons. The other thing too, is that the more we can sort of brainwash4323 kids into this love of the arts, the more competitive our workforce becomes because there will be more innovative and creative, we want to keep Massachusetts as competitive as possible. I think I said at one point too, we know a lot of artists are moving out4338 of the state because they can't afford to live here and there's no work, we can't let that happen. That will have a huge devastating effect on the quality of the work that we have here. So again, I'm suggesting to you, we really doubled down and in many ways over correct what the devastation that we've lost from Covid. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Okay, thank you, Michael and thank you Senator Moran. Are there any other questions?
Um Seeing none, I'll turn it back over to my co chair to introduce panel three. Thank you. Senator brian Michael, thank you so much. You uh keep screaming at us. It's critical. It's vital and we appreciate your uh focus your laser focus on helping us understand how what we can do. Uh Thank you very much. Uh the time actually, can I report Senator Kennedy did outstanding job because we're actually a few minutes ahead of schedule. So thank you Senator. That's your wise experience, I guess, keeping things on track. I just would like to also introduce another House member that has joined us. Uh and that is the ranking minority member. Representative Matthew March are uh welcome representative uh to the to the to the hearing. Uh you bet a third panel is here today. And you know how interesting we've heard arts, culture, we've heard tourism uh today we've got uh you arrive, you sleep, you arrive, you sleep and you eat and uh we have with us right now I'll let them uh you know, figure out who wants to go first. But from mass restaurant association we have bob loves the president and Ceo and steve Clark the VP of Government affairs we have from mass lodging we have uh president and ceo paul psycho and who also sits on the mass convention center Authority board. And from Mass sport we have lisa uh Wieland I hope I'm not pronouncing that correctly. Weiland Wieland, ceo. Welcome Panelist three. Please share your your4464 testimony with us. Welcome. Sure, well
BOB LUZ - MASS RESTAURANT ASSOCIATION - Thank you. This bob was and I appreciate the time and I'll speak a little bit then Steve Clark will probably clean it up and make a couple points here at the end. Certainly, I appreciate the time from this group, both Chairs as well and all the electives here and committee members. Let me just start by saying, you know, no industry has been spared in this by any matter, stretching and imagination. Sadly, restaurants sort of find themselves at the top of the list they don't want to be at just because of the amount of businesses that we have across Massachusetts, the amount of employees we employ, the amount of main streets were on and I do want4514 to acknowledge that the big building on Beacon Hill at all levels has been very understanding and helpful in trying to get us through this crisis and we certainly appreciate it.
Restaurants, hotels, tourist attractions are an ecosystem that is unquestionably linked. I believe some restaurant4532 tours probably didn't understand just how much of their revenues across the state are linked to tourism. Sometimes you think you're just a local place and you don't think like that, but no question, we found that out this year. Let me stop like quickly giving you a state of the industry talk about a few things and then maybe be a little bit forward thinking. So here's the state of the industry, some of which you might be aware of, some of which do not but this sort of sets the ground. On March 1st of last year, there were just over 16,000 restaurants across Massachusetts. We employed just at 300,000 people within those four walls. It does not include all the businesses that sell us goods and services.
If you brought those numbers in, it would dramatically increase. On March 18th, when we closed, we furloughed 255,000 of the 300,000 workers. Again, at the time we thought it was going to be for three weeks, and as we know, it ended up being much further. When we were able to reopen and we were able to reopen only outdoors and we found out about that two days in advance, we had 3400 restaurants that never reopened again, so that's a 23% rate of loss of restaurants that have never recovered, never reopened. As the business started to come in, we were able to bring some workers back, when we opened outdoors, we were able to bring some more workers back, when we opened two weeks later indoors, but we never recalled 98,000 of our workers, those workers were never recalled to sales lost from restaurants that closed, but more importantly for the say 12,500 that survived4651 their revenues were down significantly.
In fact, we now know in 2019, the restaurant industry had sales of $19 billion in Massachusetts, that's a billion with a B and we lost $7 billion March to March, so obviously a significant impact. We did have a lot of recovery through the summer and fall. Some people managed to start to figure out how to look at that new sales model, how to figure it out, and again, it went from being 92% indoors in my dining room, if you are a full service restaurant, having a good portion of it outside, a good4690 portion of it to go and, and delivery and some inside and that's a real different business model. But as we came into the late fall, actually, early winter, we4705 had a number of factors that came upon us, including the second surge, including the Governor putting an overnight curfew, which was really pretty devastating to the industry and then ultimately a rollback to 25% capacity for all businesses.
We had 5 to 750 somewhere in their restaurants decided to hibernate for the winter, meaning they had been open for the summer and the fall, but they decided their only way to survive would be to close for the winter. The good news is we expect all of those most, or all of those to reopen now, some have already started to, some are in the midst of it. I will tell you this sense of optimism for the first time, since last March 1st, we've always said that we thought the other side was going to be around April 1st of 15th and we do believe that, you know, restaurant tourists can now see that and sense that, and you know, what happens is we've got a lot of vaccinations. I mean, first of all our people started getting vaccinated, which was critical. You know, our employees were the only industry out there dealing with an unmasked public.
Secondly, the general public is getting vaccinated. I can report to you that in the last month, restaurant tours across the state are saying they've seen more people inside than at any point since last March. That's optimism, that's encouraging, and now we're going to start to get weather today, like we have today, it's going to open up outdoor dining pretty quickly. Outdoor dining was pretty significant for us last year, and I'll talk about that in a second but as we kind of look at this recovery and what happened as well, the recovery has been disproportionate in the high tourism areas, especially in Greater Boston and right out of4826 the gate for the restaurant industry and the broader hospitality industry and tourist industry, we always said that Boston was going to be the significant problem and certainly that played out.
PPP programs worked for a lot of people, actually, they didn't work at first, we worked with the government to get it to work a little bit differently for restaurants, for closed industries if you would, but it certainly didn't work4882 for every operator and for every operation, especially again, those operations that are in tourist areas, you know, think about a restaurant next to the Orpheum theater, they can't reopen right now because there's no traffic driver there for them to be able to do it. Or you know, hotels like the Bear Wolf Lodge out in Pittsburgh where they have the indoor water park, you can't open those things in a pandemic, so it didn't work for certain operations, we still have a significant portion of our industry that's closed. You know, thank God, we're getting events back, we've got back the March 22nd, they're starting to come online. Brides, grooms are getting married4928 for the first time in a year, so that's significant.
But we still have a good deal closed bars, nightclubs and breweries and we had a whole tourism industry built around breweries, quite honestly, that was really starting to come alive prior to this whole thing. The silver lining for restaurants was, and is outdoor dining. You know, it was something we found out about on two days notice, so restaurants really had to be flexible and adaptable and try and figure out how to make it work and they sort4965 of haphazardly slapped it together and tried to open up areas with their municipalities to make it work for everybody. I will say largely the cities and towns were incredible in helping making that happen. It became a real change that cities and towns embrace, our employees embrace ,our guests embraced, and operators embraced it. I think going forward, that's something that we can hopefully build around and we can promote it.
4994 I4994 think it allows that local tourism type of mentality to happen, it really brings our streets alive.5001 You see what happens in moody street in Waltham or on the North end on Handover Street and that happened all across cities and towns across the year. So, being able to plan for it makes it that much better, we will do it better this year than we did last year, but figuring out how we can kind of look at that on a more permanent basis, I think is an opportunity for us. In fact, I know before he left for a job in DC, Mayor Walsh wanted to make it year round, he was trying to figure out how we make this year round in Boston. Obviously, Boston does have challenges because of snow removal and sidewalks etcetera. A lot of the same lines, I think one of the things the legislation helped us with alcohol to go. With the sales mix change forever, that to go sales used to be, I think I said this earlier, maybe eight or 10% and there was no delivery in the full service restaurant industry.
Today, in the middle of the summer, it will probably be at least 25%. Over the winter, it was as high as 40-50%. We had some5076 restaurants at 60% of weekly sales being to go and delivery and so being able to5080 have that alcohol to go, beer, wine, etcetera, I think is a real opportunity for us. Before I turn over Steve, one thing I do want to bring up that's very topical because it just came out this week in the UI bill that was signed by the Governor that froze the rates for unemployment insurance, that was the good news. Sadly, in the fine print, we have a major issue upon us which is the solvency rate went from, Steve, you will correct me, I think it was 0.58% to 9.3% roughly and this is a huge increase for restaurant, well for any small business, but certainly the restaurant industry and it appears that we're taking a big bite, or we are taking the biggest bite of the apple, almost 100% of it back in one year because they were already in the projection.
It shows that the solvency rate dropping to 1.8% next year and then like .75% the third year. So instead of spreading this over three years, maybe four years, we're using some cares act money, we took a huge bite of the apple on trying to get it back all at once here and it's going to be very, very troublesome, it's caused our5210 phones to ring nonstop. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
So with that I'll stop steve will correct me on anything I screwed up on uh and then Stephen talked a couple minutes for about labor issues bob. Could we move ahead to mass lodging for a minute because you were very thorough and we are trying to keep our timing. Is that okay or do you have just a very brief minute or so? Given the one minute I can speaking, I can speak in less than a minute.
STEVE CLARK - MASSACHUSETTS RESTAURANTS ASSOCIATION - Biggest issue facing the industry going forward is returning to the labor work force. Currently, right now, there are 62% of UI claimants that make more money while earning UI than they did when they5250 were working. This has become a huge issue as restaurants try to rehire for this season. A number of people have put out restaurant ads, they're getting people to respond to the ad, but then they're saying call me in September when my unemployment runs out and I'll be happy to5265 come back. So it is definitely presented itself as an issue. As a whole, the industry is having some hiring challenges in general, and I think this will apply to other tourism based. Some people have left the industry, the Covid situation has caused them to rethink how they earn their living and they're pursuing other avenues and other industries but then also we're running into this5285 this unemployment issue as well, so probably the biggest challenge to coming back.5289
In addition to growing consumer confidence, growing people getting out is actually getting people to working people in in the in the restaurants. And it's a real crisis on the Cape. The Cape is going to be a very concerning this summer with with labor issues. Everything I read is the Cape is booked up this summer that you can't get a rental, so there's going to be a lot of people flocking to the Cape but we don't have the employees to service those customers. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
You hear your every business. This is my uh uh
welcome
mass lodging.
You hear yourself please? Palm muted.
I said thanks baba muted. Um
PAUL SACCO - MASS LODGING ASSOCIATION - Good morning, everyone. Thank you. First of all, thank you, Senator Kennedy and Representative Fiola and the rest of the group on this call. As I mentioned to Rep Fiola recently, welcome to arts, culture and travel and tourism and this is quite refreshing by the way and many years being involved, not only through Art and hotels, et cetera, as I recall is the first time I've experienced something of this nature and I think it's wonderful. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
That said um I had a a deck that would be presented
who was supposed?
Mhm Thailand is you have two arrows?
Yeah, he should be able to share his screen.
Yeah,
5406 it's5406 okay.
Okay. Yeah. Yeah.
Well I'll go without it. Yeah, basically. Um if you'd like to share my screen, go ahead.
Yeah.
There you go. Uh
SACCO - As you can see the mission of the MLA is to promote the business environment and image of the lodging industry in Massachusetts through legislative and communication initiatives, networking and educational opportunities and member focus programs and services. Our members of properties of all sizes and from geographical regions throughout the state of Massachusetts as well as the businesses that provide services and products to the lodging industry. And as you know, many of our hotels have maybe one or two restaurants. There are 900 lodging establishments in Massachusetts representing over 80,000 rooms. We have another hotel coming on board at the Seaport, The Omni with a 1000 I believe and 35 rooms. So we are seeing some uptick interest in expanding on properties.
A few of the5506 numbers, pre Covid, the Massachusetts lodging industry accounted for over 40,562 hotel jobs with thousands more supported by the lodging industry. It is estimated that over 50% of these jobs in Massachusetts have been either furloughed or eliminated completely. Statewide lodging market ended 220 with a 35.8 occupancy down from 68.1 in 19. Revenue per available room, our key monitor room decline from 129,76 in 19 to 4863 in 20. As you well know, the state impact on tax revenue generated by the lodging industry is estimated to be 306 million loss in Massachusetts. This does not include the up to 6.5 for local option taxes and all of the municipalities, Boston being 6.5. I moved on to the right, there are concerns and feedback.
I have to let you know that actually yesterday I was on a call with my counterparts throughout the US and we're not alone on a lot of this, some of them are ahead of us and some of them are behind us. I have a bullet there, I also went out by the way5598 to across the state asking questions of people, you know, what would they like covered and they're included in this. As you see, we've heard in the past increasing meeting room capacities. As you know, Boston is at 60, the state at 100 inside and I heard recently that Plymouth, I don't know if they straightened it out, but they were looking at 60. We have a fundraising event in Plymouth at 130, so that throws that up in question.
We submitted a bill offering real estate tax relief to hotels, it's amongst the up to,5637 I think at this 0.7000 bills that have been entered in this session, but we are tracking it and hopefully we'll have some development in that area.5646 We want to encourage, as you've heard, you know from Bob and others unemployed workers to return5654 to work as business increases and we see that is a key focus. I can tell you my counterparts across the US are having that same issue of people returning to work, so we need to get in there and figure out5674 what to do in that regard. Eliminating the need for food service when serving cartels was one that was developed came in from some of the properties. But that's a quick overview. The hospitality and the lodging industry, which is part of the hospitality industry was devastated over the last year.
We're starting to see a bit of light at the end of the tunnel, but it's not in our key markets segments, you'll hear from Executive Director Gibbons, from the MCCA on what they're experiencing there. We know that the international market is not returning certainly within the next year or so. We know corporate is reconsidering how they'll operate. What what we do see is light at the end of the tunnel, is that key feeder markets as they open up, there's an ability to capture these feeder markets. Primarily, I see the New England States, New York, New Jersey, all the dried markets are an opportunity certainly through June through September. I hear what people are saying about the Cape and I've talked to our members on the Cape. Yes, if you're on the ocean, if you're on a lake, you're in good shape, it appears if you're a short term rental, you seem to be doing well.
However, that's not the case with all the properties on the Cape like Route 28 Namath. I I don't want people to feel that the Capes in good shape, that's really not the case. You know, the TDMD Bill that was passed, that's going to take a while to ramp up and I agree with the regional tourism councils that there has to be a need for funding. I differ in regard, I want them to have funding, but along with that, I am a very strong proponent of MOTT getting additional funding and that can be a one time or a two time. They have to get onto a program because MOTT should be promoting the state to key feeder markets and I've even talked to Keiko with about some plans that I thought might be useful in that regard but the fact remains that unless we do something as you heard from the RTCs, we're going to have a missed opportunity June through September to capture some of this business.
It's not just the, the Cape and the islands, Boston is in dire need, the Berkshires, North Shore, all over the commonwealth needs help. So the Mass lodging association is out there to assist, help our members, educate our members, we're trying to think of ways of developing job fairs to get people interested or incentivizing for people to come back to work. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
But
I'll take questions if at this point, if there are any thank you paul, you can hang on, we will move on to the mass sport and uh and then we'll bring you all for questions if that's okay. Um Thank you paul, lisa.
LISA WIELAND - MASSPORT - Good morning, and thank you, Chair Fiola and Chair Kennedy for having me here today. Nice to meet all of you. Also, thank you5893 to all members5895 of the the committee. I do have some slides5899 to share, so let me see if I can share my screen. So what I thought I would do today during my testimony is provide an overview of each of our three business lines, aviation, maritime and real estate. Talk about their contributions to the travel and tourism industry and the commonwealth prior to the pandemic, give you a sense of the impacts of Covid 19 and then also our prospects for recovery and rebound. Mass Port's assets facilitate economic activity, generating more than $22 billion in annual economic impact and supporting more than 100,000 jobs. If we start with aviation, prior to the pandemic, Logan airport was experiencing unprecedented growth.
We handled 42.5 million passengers in 2019 and we were on track to serve 45 million passengers in 2020. Much of5970 that growth was driven by the addition of new nonstop international service, which connected Massachusetts, travel intensive industries like healthcare, higher Ed and tech to global economic centers, but not just in Europe, also in Asia and the Middle East. But then of course, Covid hit and Logan's flight activity and passenger volume fell off a cliff. Last March in April at the trough, we were down 98%. We have seen improvements from last spring, but today Logan passenger volume is still down nearly 70%. To provide a little context on that for you, on a typical day in 2019, we have about 1200 inbound and outbound flight today.
6016 Right6016 now, we're averaging around 500 - 550. On a typical day, we'd see 60-65,000 passengers pass through our TSA checkpoints as they departed. Right now we're seeing about 20,000. You'll hear the TSA reporting increases nationally on passengers going through checkpoints, the recovery has been quite uneven. Airports across the US are still down on average about 50%, although some primarily in leisure intensive markets like Florida are faring much better. But airports that are dependent upon business travel and international travel are facing a much slower recovery. Those airports include Boston International, as well as airports like JFK, LaGuardia and SAN Francisco. So where do we go from here? So we estimate that we'll finish this fiscal year with about 10.5 million passengers. Logan really hasn't seen that low of an activity since the mid 1970s.
So because of where we are today and because of our dependence on business and international travel, which will6075 be much slower to6077 recover as well as some structural changes taking place in the airline sector, we are expecting that it's going to take us about 3 to 5 years to get back to our 2019 levels or 45 million passengers. But as we look ahead to the summer season, there are lots of reasons to be optimistic. The economy is recovering, passengers going through TSA checkpoints are rising, vaccinations are increasing so people are feeling much more confident about booking their trips further out, Airlines are adding back flights at Logan and they're adding new destinations mostly focused on the leisure traveler and primarily here in the US but there are also a few new international destinations on the horizon.
We think the recent guidance from the CDC indicating it's safe for vaccinated people to travel will unleash some of that pent up demand and Logan is ready. We are ready for when people are ready to travel again. We've been prepared throughout this crisis by implementing rigorous cleaning and sanitizing protocols, enforcing mask requirements and encouraging social distancing. We were actually the first airport in the country to receive these ACI coveted health accreditation. We've continued to invest in strategic projects at the airport like the Terminal B to C Connector, which will link6154 Logan's two busiest terminals with their post security connection and we've also accelerated runway projects to take advantage of this period of low activity.
In addition, we've been reimagining the customer journey to incorporate new technologies that reduce touchpoints, preserve safety and health and make travelling more convenient. We now offer6171 contact less payment at many concessions, mobile food delivery service right at your gate and voice activated information centers. In the future will also be rolling out a new Logan app, an online parking reservation system and a host of other new products and services. If we switched side of the harbor and take a look at our cruise business, Flint Cruise Port Boston plays a vital role in our visitor economy and hosts more than 20 different cruise lines offering voyages to Bermuda, the Caribbean and Canada, New England. In 2019, we had a record 402,000 passengers and we were on track in 2020 to break that record with 440,000 passengers on more than 150 ships but due to the pandemic, we had no cruise ships called the port last year. Frankly, we don't expect any to call this year.
Our cruise season typically runs April through early November and the CDC currently has in place a no sale order that's in effect until November. While the cruise lines have been pushing to change that and today we heard that the state of Florida6268 is suing the CDC over that no sale order, there's still a lot that needs to happen before ships can sail into Boston harbor again. Even if the CDC were to amend that no sale order, the Canadian government is prohibiting cruise ships from coming6280 until February of 2022 and that's a big part of our business, especially in the fall. That said, there's a lot of pent up demand for cruising, cruise lines reports strong bookings for next year and each of armed three major cruise partners, Norwegian Royal Caribbean and Haul in America have announced that they're adding new ships or new itineraries at Lupton Cruise Port Boston for the 2022 seasons.
If we look at our commercial real estate portfolio, we have a number of hotels on our property in East Boston and South Boston, all of which were doing quite well pre pandemic with occupancy rates north of 80%. Of course, those felt6315 pretty substantially last year and some of them had to close for6318 a period of time. But from a long term perspective, we believe it's a good sign that a couple of hotels on our6325 property, some of them mentioned previously completed construction and opened last year,6328 that's the Hyatt Place Hotel you see there on the left, which opened in September and of course the Omni Hotel is wrapping up construction and slated to open this summer, which will be an important asset for the convention center. So in conclusion, while6343 this has been a challenging year, we are optimistic about the future and we think we're positioned well for the recovery and rebound. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Mhm. Thank you, lisa. Uh Well, there is certainly a little bright spark in that presentation. Uh and I think we can feel it from everyone, the pent up demand to try to move around and travel and uh anyway, thank you, lisa, I'd like to begin opening up with questions and Representative Vitolo has had his hand up patiently and uh you're on thank you charity. I confess it's6379 a bit easier to be patient in the comfort of my own home. Um
REP VITOLO - I have a question and a comment, the question probably is best for Mr. Luz, but I'm happy to hear from anyone and it relates to booze to go, right? So in addition to sort of beer and wine, there was this idea of put mixed drinks in a goldfish bag or something and send people home with them and we did it and we tried it. I remain dubious that, a, there were an awful lot of sales there that it was driving a whole lot of sales, and b, I kind of feel like it's probably a little more attempting to have a step on the way home in your car, which is absolutely a no go. So my question is, you know, like while being allowed to do as much as you can and selling anyways, you can as always best if you're a business in6429 the spectrum of all the things that you want to keep or that you like to change, is holding onto the ability to sell mixed drinks like made on site and sent home in a to go box or bag. Is that something that's particularly important, do you think to restaurants, or is that the kind of thing that is not the end all be all?
LUZ - Yes, so, great question, I appreciate it. First of all, I would tell you anything to go, has to be sealed, so whether it's beer, wine or mixed drink, it does have to be sealed. There's been some really innovative packaging that's come up with that, that, you know, quite frankly, we'll tell you if it's been opened or not before it goes right, so before it gets to the house. That being said, what has happened in the industry as a transformation, the restaurant quality dining experience is moving from our dining room to your dining rooms, and the opportunity for us has to be able to maximize what we can do when it goes that way, because it's a limited sale. So you and I are not going to order a Tito's and soda to go, right? I mean, that doesn't make sense.
We can make that at home, but you can't6502 make a Michael slough margarita at home, right? It's those specialty drinks and that's really where we're seeing the innovation and the opportunity to say, a6510 bartender who's a mixologist can make a drink better than6512 we can at our house for us to enjoy, you know, at home. Just the same way that, you know, a chef at Davios or some other restaurant is going to make a meal better than you and I can cook. So we think that's the opportunity there and where it's such a large percentage of sales now, where it was very negligible before, having the opportunity to be able to augment that a little bit is key to being able to assist us to get moving forward. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Thank you, and I appreciate that that's helpful to me. You know, it wasn't my thing, and I'm just trying to get my head around,6568 you know,
VITOLO - All of the different aspects in the restaurant industry, how important this piece is because I know that there were quite a6576 few legislators who were a little uncomfortable with the prospect. You know, we said, well, let's give it a shot, it's a pandemic and now there's going to be a question, is this something to keep or not? I think there will be a more robust conversation about it. The second thing I want to do is make a comment, I appreciate that the Cape and in other places businesses are having a hard time attracting employees, and it's true. Folks who used to work for a living and then got laid off are not getting rich on unemployment, but they are able to pay their bills.
I would respectfully point out that restaurant minimum wage, tipped minimum wage in Massachusetts 5.55 an hour. On the three states in the West Coast, it's $13.69 and 11.25. So one way to6617 attract employees, if you're expecting your business to be full is to pay them a little bit more and I would encourage you to just think about that and see how it pencils out. You know, restaurants on the west6632 coast, they charge the same amount as restaurants on the East coast and they're paying their employees under six bucks an hour. I wonder if maybe there's some opportunity to pay our lowest wage cheap employees a little bit more to help attract them. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Thank you. So representative
CLARK - Representative, just to address that point because I think that's important. So one thing you said was that the tip minimum wage is 5.55, but the tip minimum wage is 13.50 because all tipped employees in Massachusetts are required to make the minimum wage. Also the tipped employees in Massachusetts on average make a dollar more than California tipped employees, according to the Bureau of Labor statistics and four years ago, they made $3 an hour more than their California counterparts. Massachusetts tipped employees are amongst the highest compensated in the country and so some of that data is a little bit incorrect.
VITOLO - I'm going to push back on that. Actually, I've worked in restaurants and I will tell6685 you there are plenty of waiters and waitresses, particularly waitresses who if they go in and they ask for their legally mandated 13.15 hour up paid because they didn't get tipped enough, they're told, yes, sure and then they can't get ours anymore. We see that in restaurants all over the place. I'm not saying any particular restaurant, I know there are good restaurant tours but6703 they aren't all good restaurant tours and it's true they're getting 13.50 but a chunk of that's coming from the customers, not from their employer. The employer is paying 5.55 an hour, that is correct. That is the 2021 minimum wage payment from the employer.
If they don't get enough tips, the employer is supposed to up that back up to the 13.50, sometimes they do, sometimes they don't but the employer is paying out 5.55 when the season is busy. When we're down in the Cape and all those restaurants are full. I promise you are making enough in tips to get them up to 13.50. So my point is simply if you're having trouble,6739 you could. This is true in every line of work, if you're having trouble getting employees, one thing you can do is pay them a little bit more and that can6746 help get some employees in.
CLARK - The number one constituency that we hear from on these proposals is tipped employees themselves, they reach out to us countlessly and say, please don't mess with our tips system, we make so much money making tips, please do not change this, we are not asking for this, we don't need to be saved. We hear from restaurant employees all the time, every time this issue pops up and they say, please leave us out of this conversation, we are not minimum wage earners, we're making $25, $30, $35 an hour, please6774 don't mess with that system. So we're not going to solve this problem today, in this discussion but you know I think we're pretty diametrically opposed on this position. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Thank you, thank you rep digs, thank you madam chair. Um You know I'm curious I think because I live on the cake um I think we're6791 gonna need more of our youth, our young young adults to really um get on the fan that wagon of being coming6802 to restaurants because you know, I don't think we're going to get that in the uh, international flavor like we normally get because of the covid and all that stuff. So I mean, yeah, I, I6816 guess we gotta tell our Children to kind of go out there and go get those jobs like we used to when we were younger and I think that, you know, these restaurants are really going to have to change a little bit understand, hey, maybe we need to go this route instead of going, you know, well, you know, everyone's going to have to kind of work with each other on that and make sure that, you know, our youth are going to be able to uh, take advantage of this situation on this. We could not agree more representative. We would mean we6849 would love for parents to encourage their kids uh to come into the workforce. It's been a challenge for us for a while.
LUZ - The great news is restaurants have incredible training programs uh and you can take people Statham as a dishwasher, They end up, you know, moving into management, moving into chef positions, moving into ownership positions, it's a great career opportunity. One out of three jobs, first jobs is in a6875 restaurant, one out of two adults who work in a restaurant in their lifetime, we couldn't agree more. We want to train America's workforce and frankly, that's what we're going to have to do. We lost a lot of people to different parts of the economy when we furloughed and we're ready willing and able to train folks and bring them back and we're excited about that opportunity. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Yes paul Sacco here,
SACCO - I know the segued into restaurants, but basically when I spoke about rehiring people and getting people back to work, to begin with from someone who worked and lived on the Cape for many years, this has always been an issue every year about getting staff and they had some success. We used to bust people in from other areas of the state to work. We've tried everything. In addition to that, there's issues with the J1 process, the H2B process right now. So it's sort of a triple hit when we talk about getting people back to work, I'm talking about people,6937 housekeepers, desk clerks, you name it, hotels need help and we have to find a way. The Cape is compounded by the fact that it should have a pretty good season for most hotels, but they need to have staff, so if they were getting, you know, 10 people from Jamaica, that's not happening this year. So I just want to clarify this. I agree with what you're saying, I think from a hotel point of view, Chatham bars inn, you know, quadruples its employment for the summer and they're having a lot of difficulty right now. We cross it, a lot of them having difficulty, but we'll figure something out. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Um, Steve did you want to add something?
CLARK - Just one minor point that that that is out there that we might be able to consider is that I believe Massachusetts has the latest starting youth summer hours. I don't believe our youth summer hours start until July, so even if we could tweak that a little bit and have youth employment regulations go into effect slightly earlier, I think we are the second last state in the country for youth employment hours to start.7020 So if we could move that a little bit, I think that would alleviate some of the restrictions in June. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
thanks steve, I didn't know that. Um and I bet nobody else did here. I know that representative. I think it's the last question for this panel. Representatives Polly bouvier, thank you so much, madam Chair. And um I can see the smile on Mr lets his face because he knows exactly where I'm going.
REP FARLEY-BOUVIER - We have worked I'll say together on on the one fair wage issue for for many years and um I'm really appreciative of my colleague, Tommy Vitolo um bringing up this issue and pushing back on on it. Um I will tell you that. I thought the grand bargain7076 when we when we worked on the grand bargain on minimum wage and the compromise that we made to um to make to true up the minimum wage by shift as opposed to buy pay period was a good step in the right direction. And I um this is when this proposal was made several years ago madam Chair, I have to tell you that I was wrong. Um and the reason I was wrong is is just what what Representative Vitolo was talking about in that it has been determined that truing up the minimum wage um by shift is completely unenforceable.
That's7117 not a determination made by me, it's been a determination made by the U. S. Labor Department and that wage theft in the restaurant industry is one of the worst and it's not usually because it's purposeful, it's usually because it's really hard to do it. And so7139 many restaurants are family owned restaurants, they don't have the big software companies working with them to make sure this all goes well. Um one fair wage,7152 which happens in other states as Representative Vitolo talked about um uh happens in states with thriving restaurants restaurant industry. It doesn't as a matter of fact, the restaurants think about California, Do you think of California as like somehow decimating their restaurant industry? Because they have one fair wage. We do not. We think of California is having a thriving industry uh in in those states, um with one fair wage sexual harassment of work staff plummets.
And I have to tell you madam Chair. And this is so disturbing that the reports coming out in the last year during covid of the sexual harassment um has there has so much increase, please take down your mass so I can see you smile. And I'm going to determine how, so I can determine how much to tip you. So first of all that is sexual harassment, secondly, you're actually asking that
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representative, I hate to interrupt you. I just want7224 to keep our our timing is for recovery and this is an important topic that I will7229 wrap up. I will wrap up. I promise.
FARLEY-BOUVIER - I just want to say that as we talk about recovery and recovery in restaurants, which I agree which were the hardest hit in in in in in massachusetts. It's very important to have workers centered in this. We've heard that the reason we want to help restaurant is because they employ so many people. We need to hear from the workers and Madam Chair when we do hear from the workers, it's important that they be the workers not at the high end restaurants, right? But that the workers in our gateway cities, our workers and our rural restaurants, we want to hear from them as we talk about recovery. Thank you madam Chair.
FIOLA - Um Thank you Representative and I think it is important I know like you I spend an awful lot of time in our district talking, watching our restaurants coming back and and fighting back and you know there's you know there's a lot of issues, there's a lot of issues for them and uh thank you for your you point and for sharing that. Um Thank you to this panel panel three.7302 you know there was a glimmer of of excitement on travel but we know the business travel is what's going to add to the rooms as well is going to add to some of those restaurants in some certain sections of our Commonwealth.
Um You know what I heard paul say as part of this was something I heard ma to stay in the first panel, and I've heard a couple of times now, while each of you have unique needs and nuances to your industries in the recovery, there seems to be a unified voice of give us this is the time $4 million dollars is not enough to bring back business to massachusetts, whether it's our own, you know, in state visitors or domestically, and of course internationally. Later down the road, we have a one time opportunity7361 for tremendous pandemic dollars coming from7364 our federal government, and this is a chance for us to figure out how7370 to help all of you in this umbrella. So thank you all, I know we'll be hearing from you and more on this, and we appreciate the time we took today.
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So with that, I'll turn it back to my coach here to introduce channels. Fourth, thank you, Thank you,
Jeff Viola in the 4th of7391 five panels today is also comprised of um two people we've got from Mass Creative Emily, who's executive director for Mass Creative7399 and also from Tom Whelan, who is the president of the Mass Live Events Coalition. So,7409 um let's start with Emily.
EMILY RUDDOCK - MASSCREATIVE - Good morning, Chair Kennedy, Chair Fiola and members of the Tourism Arts and Cultural Development Committee. I really appreciate your time today and I know it's already been a long zoom day, so I will try to keep our comments brief. For the record, I'm Emily, executive director of Mass Creative. Mass Creative Works to advance grassroots advocacy learning and cross sector alliances towards a commonwealth where art, culture and creativity are unexpected, publicly funded and valued part of everyday life. On behalf of our members, which includes over 400 arts and cultural organizations, as well as countless artists, creative workers and cultural workers and supporters. I thank you for the opportunity to testify today.
You already heard earlier today from the Mass Cultural Council about the impact COVID-19 has had on the creative industry as7464 a whole, and I want to offer some context around7467 their research as well as the everyday situation faced7471 by our members. One study estimates that came out in January estimates that it will take over two7477 years for arts nonprofit jobs to return to pre pandemic levels, and what's not included in that simple statistic is that are the real people affected as well as the people around them. Each job in the arts and cultural sector with an ancillary effect of sustaining 3.75 other jobs, meaning that every stagehand or docent or artists and resident, affects the employment of almost four other people in our state.
To pull that out a bit more, Arts Boston, in which serves the Greater Boston area, reported in 2018 that more than 21 million people attended arts and cultural events in the Greater Boston area, that's more than four times all major boston sporting events combined. The US Bureau of Economic Analysis reported7521 that arts and Cultural production for both for profit and nonprofit business firms accounts for 25.5 billion in total value added to the commonwealth, representing 4.3 of total gross state product in 2019. This is a significant impact to our economic recovery. Add to this, the difficulty of reopening some of our cultural institutions with restrictions necessary due to COVID-19. While some destinations have been able to reopen at restricted capacity, it simply is not possible for most organizations.
State visitor restrictions don't allow for enough financial stability for some and others7561 simply cannot7563 modify historic sites or existing facilities to meet the state's guidelines. Finally, for some, it isn't a matter of opening the doors, it's the booking, the musicals or theatrical acts, for example, that require many months notice and the likelihood of financial solvency. So organizations and individuals have worked hard to adapt in the crisis, from virtual tours, concerts and seminars to offering physical space to educational facilities, to online training and classes for the public but this isn't sustainable and it's not an appropriate long term plan. The arts and cultural sector needs a significant and meaningful public support now to ensure its survival in the future.
So I want to take a moment and I really want to thank Chair Kennedy for his leadership in sponsoring SB 2105, an act to rebuild the commonwealth's cultural future. This bill uses 200 million of the aid from the American Rescue Plan Act to create the Covid 19 Cultural Economy Recovery Fund. The Commonwealth Cultural Future Act is a bold envision and comprehensive in scope. The Grand Fund would be available to individual artists, nonprofit cultural organizations and for profit businesses that have all been impacted by COVID-19 and allow uses include pay for staff and an artist rent or mortgage payments and other fixed costs. Nearly 200 individuals and organizations from across the Commonwealth have already endorsed this bill and it will offer significant support and recovery to cultural institutions and the individuals that make up the sector who are eager to get back to sharing their expertise and passion with their communities.
It will also help7687 bolster organizations that are in imminent danger of permanent closure. I need to also take a beat here and recognize that in addition to the COVID-19 pandemic, the events over the last year have forced many of us to confront the legacy of our nation's systemic and violent racism that has marginalized black, indigenous and communities of color. This is true within the arts and cultural sector where bipoc lead and culturally specific arts and cultural organizations that have been impacted by the pandemic also face specific funding and capacity challenges. That is why it is especially important that the commonwealth Cultural Features Act directs the distribution of grants to consider racial diversity and equity, as well as geographic diversity and programmatic diversity. Finally, I just Mass Creative urges the committee to fully support this bill and move it quickly through the process.
Finally, looking beyond relief dollars, Mass Creative also supports technology capacity funding to ensure arts and cultural businesses can deliver high quality virtual programming to residents across the commonwealth and in that we join, the Mass Cultural Council in advocating that Governor Baker include the three million authorized in last session's Economic Development bond bill for artists and cultural organizations, technology infrastructure costs in Governor Baker's fiscal year 22 capital spending plan. Additionally, I would urge the committee to look at policies that scale up successful creative workforce programs across the commonwealth, like the recently launched trust transfer project in Springfield.
Finally, as the commonwealth approaches will reopening in the next year, we really need funding for programs that get people back into our cultural spaces, restaurants, and lodging establishments, and we encourage the committee to consider legislation that will support these efforts. Mass Creative, myself, our members and supporters look forward to working with the committee in on any of these items in support of a vibrant, inclusive and sustainable arts and cultural sector. Thank7821 you for your time and consideration today and I'm happy to answer any questions you may have. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Thank you very much Emily. We'll hold off on questions until we hear from um from Tom Whelan at mass Live Events Coalition Time. Go ahead. Yeah,
good after.
THOMAS WHELAN - MASS LIVE EVENT COALITION - Good afternoon, Chair Kennedy, Chair Fiola and members of the Joint Committee on Tourism Arts and Cultural Development. Thank7842 you for providing the Massachusetts live Events Coalition the opportunity to testify on the issues and recovering needs of our live events industry in Massachusetts. My name is Thomas Whalen and I am the president of the Massachusetts Live Events Coalition, a state chapter of the National Live Events Coalition. Our coalition advocates for representation, support and financial resources for the live events industry and our workforce who have been impacted by the extensive shutdown of the events industry due the COVID-19 pandemic. Our Massachusetts Coalition is a network of over 2000 workers and business owners. This network has become reliant on each other for assistance, information and support while navigating this unprecedented7905 time in our commonwealth.
I would like to take a moment to familiarize you with our industry, an industry that touches and impacts every single resident of the commonwealth. In addition to live events and performance venues, most of our businesses and workers are behind the scenes professionals. We are planners, trades store managers, usher's caterers, entertainers, professionals who work in audiovisual lighting rentals, tents floral to core staging, ticketing, security, valet and so much more. The industry before COVID-19 employed roughly 12 million Americans, including an estimated 300,000 Massachusetts residents. Unlike restaurants, gyms or personal service providers, our industry is not able to turn on the lights and go back to business as normal once restrictions are lifted. It will take months and for some years before live events related businesses will break even or even reach a profitable level.
Events must be planned and produced tickets sold, booth spaces, booked advertisements run, invitation sent and so forth. One of the biggest roadblocks we face as we look to recovery is time, future safety checklists and guidelines must include benchmarks for future planning. Establishing benchmarks for further allowances, incapacity and operations are essential in stopping the hemorrhaging of our industry. Benchmarks are essential to getting our workforce back into the careers they have dedicated time and training to. Currently, our commonwealth performance venues are unable to plan for the future. John Peters of the8005 Worcester palladium explains it best. The thing with concert venues is, it's all or nothing.
The cost of producing our events requires an attendance of 90% to be beneficial. Currently, we have a great fall lineup, however, everything we book now is all subject to state regulations later.8021 Our venues and planners need a better timeline for a better future. California's tiered blueprint is a notable example of the kind of benchmarks we need here in Massachusetts. The California blueprint for a safer economy, outlines a framework for a safe progression of opening more businesses and activities considering the pandemic. Should the commonwealth adopt a system like that of California, booking agents will be able to include our state theaters and entertainment venues and national tours. Erika Schwarz, general manager of the Emerson Colonial Theater and Ambassador Theatre Group Venue recently explained the need for opening blueprints in Massachusetts and stating that as venues working throughout the commonwealth, we need a 4 to 6 month ramp up window for when we will be able to operate at 100% capacity.
We need this time to book and produce the shows that we will be having in our spaces. We8071 are not like other industries in this sector that only need a few days to operate. Booking agents and managers are booking the fall 2021 and into 2022 now, the window of opportunity is closing quickly, and if we do not have some sense of timing of when we can operate at 100% indoors in the coming month, we'll have to kick the can further down the road. What would be most prudent is to have monthly check ins and road maps so we can evaluate when will we be able to open meaningfully. Without that, we are operating blind and we'll lose the opportunity to plan for shows and be left out of the routing. As you'll see in written testimony submitted to the joint committee in response to this hearing, the guidelines lack of depth of understanding and how the events industry operates in the commonwealth.
No better example of this is the forbidden of live singers on stage during events. If musicians and industry experts were included in the reopening planning solutions to safe live performances would have been offered. Natalie and town owner of Seoul City Entertainment performs with her husband in a wedding band in Massachusetts. They played an integral part in the wedding day of so many couples. When asked about these guidelines, Natalie states, all musicians would be willing to take additional precautionary measures8147 for indoor performances including remaining mask while singing as we need and8152 want to return to work as soon as8155 possible. We are barely surviving, our industry, our business, our musicians, our livelihood, our families, everyone is affected by8163 this minor difference that does not allow us to do our jobs. Thousands of artists are without any income.
Future planning of how to return safely to our work has led to stress, anxiety and confusion and what the future holds. As we begin to get guidance plans from the Governor's reopening committee, it has become evident that our craft knowledge and expertise is not being utilized. Cara Pratt,8187 vice president of business development and partner of CSE destination and event management explains, a big challenge is a lack8195 of standard protocols or resources to get those protocols confirmed. Live events inside ballrooms or meeting venues are still completely unclear as to what the requirements will be and how to keep attendees feeling safe enough to show up and attend or engage in those meetings.
Our clients and their audiences must feel fully confident that a gathering of any size will be safe. In a survey conducted by the live events coalition, over 57% of our businesses report that they will fail by summer 2021, even8223 after the latest round of PPP. These business owners who have depleted their life savings, lost their family homes, vehicles and taking on massive debts to try and stay afloat. Our workforce, despite a recorded8235 average of 20 years, professional working experience have gone from 5:00 AM work calls to standing in food lines due to food insecurity. The fiscal impact of the pandemic is single handedly crippling our industry. In March 2020, our events industry have the single most catastrophic week one we hope to never experience again. Becky Gray of Bent Productions and Clinton Mass reported a loss of $300,000 between March 11th and March 13th of 2020.
After 11 years of hard work developing a small specialty manufacturing business in central Massachusetts, it was gone. I would like to take a moment to acknowledge and thank the committee members who voted for the appropriation of sector specific grants through the Mass Growth capital Corporation via the commonwealth operating budget for fiscal year 21 the cares act of 2020. These grants have become a lifeline to those in our industry. They provided a temporary respite for so many endangered businesses. This allocation of funds by the Massachusetts legislation was the first time that someone had heard the cries of our industry. These grants of up to $75,000 benefited live events, support companies, such as photography studios, florists, limo services and event planning companies. Event rentals, performers, conventions and trade show organization, they have kept the lights on an entertainment, established restaurants, bars and food trucks. Programs like the sector specific relief grants are a lifeline to some, but many are still in the dark. Unfortunately, we need more.
As we return to business, the cost associated with providing safe events that mitigate risk and create a comfortable atmosphere for attendees are expensive. Personal protective equipment barriers and reworking outdoor spaces are costs that a business in the negative cannot budget. Therefore, the Massachusetts live events Coalition urges this committee to pass further legislation to assist our events industry and specifically the arts and cultural sector for our industry. Senator Kennedy's sponsored bill, an act to rebuild the commonwealth cultural future will provide much sought after relief for the artists, cultural organizations and businesses in the commonwealth to provide a major economic engine for related industries such as travel and tourism, hospitality, food and beverage, transportation and specialized manufacturing.
The Massachusetts Live Events Coalition is proud to be included in the 200 endorsers of this much needed relief. The Massachusetts Live events Coalition also asked for the consideration of further8387 economic recovery drivers for our industry. We hope that this committee will consider the Shutter Business Recovery Grant program, which would help to provide a financial bridge until our businesses and workers can reopen and normalize operation. This recovery grant should include the following; grant eligibility tied to a defined Q2 through Q4 2020 revenue loss threshold to assist the entities that are hardest hit by Covid 19 closures. Grant amount should be tied to a percentage of the entities past revenues from 2019 and Massachusetts smallest businesses and sole proprietors should have the first opportunity to receive funding followed by larger entities.
The Massachusetts live Events Coalition thanks you for your time8428 and consideration of these issues facing our industry, needed recovery. On behalf of our coalition and its members, I will leave you with this, we were the first industry too close and we will be the last to reopen. Our industry is comprised of trained and experienced professionals who should be included in conversations8446 about both recovery and the ongoing creation of guidelines, benchmarks and checklist. Thank you for the opportunity to have our voices heard. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Thank you very much. Thank you very much time in Emily. And now I'd8460 open it up to questions. Does anybody have a question? Mhm.
We've got plenty of time for questions because we're a little a little we're running ahead of schedule at this point, so, um
Mhm. All right. Um
Representative Dylan Fernandez,
thank you. Mr Chairman. I'll chime in. Um so thanks Emily and tom and loud and clear that uh the guidance from the state has been slow, arbitrary,8498
inconsistent, and we as legislators very much share that sentiment and feeling as well, because when that happens, we then hear from our constituents who complain about it. And then we have to go through and try to go through the weeds on the guidance and try8525 to interpret it ourselves or reach out to the administration, because even even for us, it can be really hard to interpret just how complex and um and really kind of inconsistent, some of what they've put out is. So, I just want to share that. We empathize with you on that and are pushing for similar um you know, consistent guidance from the state. And
FERNANDES - I suppose the question would be, can you fill us in on what your conversations with the command center and the administration have looked like around trying to get that guidance set up in a way that helps this industry grow and move forward, especially as we hopefully look towards a summer and future where people8579 are vaccinated at a high enough rate that we can really start to8586 grow this industry.8587 So insight there would be would be welcome. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Thank you. Okay, thank you Emily,
you're on mute, Emily, it's okay,
RUDDOCK - Thank you for the question, Vice Chair Fernandes. I think the answer is it's been really, hard. Many of our members will reach out to what is considered the appropriate channels to ask questions and don't get answers or get routed to someone else. Then I think this is also a place where we're also seeing inconsistencies. So depending on the capacity for an organization to make this a focal point and push and lobby really hard. Sometimes we're seeing exemptions, but it's then very confusing for other organizations that don't have the ability to do that kind of lobbying and it's causing a lot of frustrations. If I might also add, there's an extension here into our schools as well where parents are completely flummoxed as to why cheerleading is happening, but their students can't sing or play wind instruments with the same distance requirements that cheerleading, which I think is one of the best sort of corollary examples is being allowed to happen. So the answer is the conversations are bleak, vague and confusing. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
um, thomas, I'm sure you also have a perspective on this. So, sorry, chair, a moderate for you. It's okay time do you want to jump in here?
WHELAN - Yes, absolutely, thank you and thank you for the question. Our organization, the Massachusetts Live Events Coalition has reached out to both the Governor's office and the reopening committee numerous times. In October of 2020, we actually staged an empty wedding during the full shutdown of Mass gatherings in Massachusetts, we8697 staged an empty wedding and brought in industry experts to show how seating can be done, we brought in vendors and again, professionals who are so aware of everything that happens. You know, an event planner is similar to a Chef, they know all of the health and safety regulations in their craft that are required to keep all of the attendees safe. The same for live performance venues.
You know, we've had amazing conversations with different small venues who are thinking craftily on how they can do singing. I've heard stories of singing and dressing rooms while the band is on stage, you know, using that ingenuity that only a trained professional in a craft would know. These are trade workers, we are freelancers, gig workers, they have seen it all. If you have a question on how to do something, even for, like a home gathering, they will give you insight that you will never have known about. We've also joined task forces, including unease task force that shared with the Governor's office in the reopening committee, as well as a number of the members of the Massachusetts house edited guidelines of inclusionary terms and references, so, people know what things mean.
You know, I think one of the things8771 we really want to stress is the inclusion of having our Massachusetts professionals in the events industry during these discussions, or at least an opportunity to be8780 heard because the insights that they will have after years of doing what they do are invaluable. They have always kept in mind the health and safety of our attendees, if not that's the first priority and so we just want to make sure that we're being heard and that when we ask for moments to review things that you know, hopefully someone will accept it one day. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Okay, thank you represented Fernandez, did you have your hand up again or was that from the previous time?
I'll lower it. Thanks. Okay, um All right. Are there any other questions?
If not, I want to thank both of the panelists and I'll turn it over to cheer Feola to introduce the 5th panel.
FIOLA - Thank you, Senator. I just want to add before I introduce the fifth channel, uh, Vice Chair Fernandes the topic of these gatherings for live event use live events has been really, probably my most um frustrating moment in the last several months. And for the last many months, uh, the guidance, the lack of that has been the one area that8857 the industry has really struggled the most. As you we've been hearing today, um, a venue for a wedding that8866 can be safe that can be socially distant and Has the space to do much more to be limited to that now. 100 when their facility is so much larger. I think there needs to be different guidelines. I think it has to be reviewed.
We've been urging that. You've all been urging that in this, in this arena, my wedding venue locations have been urging8895 and fighting along with the musicians. Um, and I think, um the administration will hear that today again, and with the increased vaccinations around the corner open to everyone, I am really hoping we can as soon as tomorrow get some guidance because the planning for this industry that is involved, those musicians will not automatically have a gig tomorrow because a facility can now accommodate them. It's going to take time and8944 that time could we could miss out on a very valuable second season that we're missing out on.
And so I agree with you. I think that's a huge, huge issue and something that we8955 implore um the administration to work on as soon as possible. They've heard it from me, they've heard it from you. I know they they understand it. We just need to see some action we hope taken very soon. So, um, I just want to add my voice to that. Um Piano five. I mean we had five panels. So many incredible presenters today outlining their where they where they've been with the pandemic and where they need to be going forward with recovery. We could have been here like I said at the beginning another week with all the nuances and the regional organizations.
SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
We tried to cover the senator and I as we planned this with the massachusetts umbrella um and touching upon all of the industries with these organizations are last panel has the new England Museum Association. Uh we can't forget9009 how um devastated they have been as well. And we have Dan Yager, the executive director joining us as well as our mass convention center authority. Executive Director. David Gibbons. Welcome. And uh to our last panel
secret, you want one of us to go first. Yeah,
I'll let you pick, Dan was first on the agenda, so maybe we'll let him go. Well, thank you appreciate it. Hello, David, how are you? Good to see you on the, on the panel with you. Um so well,
DAN YAEGER - NEW ENGLAND MUSEUM ASSOCIATION - Good afternoon and thank you for inviting me to testify today in support of museums, Arts and culture. My name is Dan Yaeger and I represent the New England Museum Association as its executive director. My organization, which is9068 based in Arlington Massachusetts, represents almost 3000 members across the region, more than half of which are in Massachusetts. Our membership includes museums A-Z as we like to say, art museums to zoos and include larger museums such as the MFA in the Museum of Science as well as many smaller organizations. About half of our membership represents history, museums or local historical societies, about 25% art museums and the rest includes science museums, children's museums and so on.
Now, one fun fact you may not know is9103 that New England is home to the highest per capita number of museums in the United States, double the national average, about 12 museums per 100,000 population, compared to six museums per 100,000 nationally. But I'm sure all of you representing this committee have made at least one or two road trips in Massachusetts, so you know the truth in this statistic. Virtually every town in the commonwealth features a local museum or historic site and many of these contain world class treasures and stories. More than 40% of tourists count museums, historic sites, art galleries and parks as their top visitor activities, according to the Mass office of travel and tourism. All of them have a tremendous impact on their communities in terms of the local economy, support of local education and quality of9150 life.
Prior to the pandemic, museums generated an estimated $1.2 billion annually to state economy supporting 16,500 jobs and returning9163 about $80 million dollars in state and local taxes. But these figures capture only a fraction of what museums mean to their cities and towns. What would the Berkshires be like without Mass MOCA or the Norman Rockwell museum or Springfield without the Dr Seuss museum? Look what the Museum of Russian icons has contributed to the town of Clinton, or the Boot mills in Lowell or battleship cove to fall river or museums on the green defilement. Each of these places and all their colleagues across the commonwealth are the glue of their communities, drawing together local citizens with community events, family activities, educational programs, veterans services and a sense of pride in where they live.
That's why the pandemic and economic collapse have had such a magnified effect on museums in their communities. Attendance at Massachusetts Museums declined 73% last year. Almost every museum shut its doors completely between mid March and through July and 13% of museums reporting to our organization have still not reopened. The American Alliance of Museums estimates that nationwide more than 50% of museum workers have been furloughed or laid off and expects9232 that almost 30% of museums will not reopen at all. These layoffs disproportionately affect women, since females make up about 80% of the museum field workforce here in New England. The sudden and dramatic decline in visitation has caused great economic pain. This is especially true of institutions dependent on tourism, which we know will not rebound fully until at least 2024-25.
On revenues from facility9258 rentals, such as weddings and other events that you were just talking about and these were eliminated, of course, due to the pandemic. In a national survey, museums reported average losses of9268 $850,000 this past year. Fortunately, private philanthropy has held steady or increased, donors have stepped in to keep museum operations running, and some museums have continued to embark on capital campaigns indicating their supporters have faith in the future. Public funding likewise has helped museums whether the financial storm, almost every eligible museum in Massachusetts receive federal paycheck protection Program funds, which helped keep museum workers employed at least9297 for the short term.
Many museums received emergency grants in 2020 from any day and any age dispersed, both directly from the federal agencies and through the Mass Cultural Council and Mass Humanity's. We're hopeful for even more robust funding in 2021 do the federal American Rescue Plant Act, which includes a 135 million each9316 for any and any age and 200 million for the Institute of Museum and Library services. These grants notably are focused largely on providing operating funds to museums and other non profits rather than being restricted to projects and consultants as they have in the past, allowing for much greater flexibility and impact as cultural entities struggle for survival. Very shortly after museums closed a year ago, they realized that they would need to develop new ways of engaging with their audiences and serving their communities. Many institutions stepped up with donations of personal protective equipment from their collections, care departments to area9353 hospitals and first responders during the crucial early days of PPE shortages.
The Fitchburg Art Museum launched a program to provide food, art supplies and educational support for central Massachusetts families as they struggled to adapt to the pandemic. Some museums served as Covid testing sites and many museums opened up their outdoor spaces to the public so they could enjoy fresh air activities during the lockdown. Many museums became proficient with using remote technology to keep their community connections alive. Within two months, 33% of New England Museums had begun offering programming online, 24% had created online educational resources, 25% had expanded online accessibility to their collections and 88% had experienced9399 an increase in social media interaction according to a survey that we conducted in May of 2020. Over the next year, museums continue to refine their online engagement tools, offering things such as virtual field trips, exhibition tours, curator talks, concerts and guest lectures.
A survey of 25 museums reported to Neema that their online programming generated more than 500,000 participants between March and December, that was just 25 museums that we had surveyed. While these programs did not necessarily replace in person engagement, they served to keep existing museum audiences involved and in some cases allowed museums to expand their exposure to international audiences. Most museum leaders agree that virtual engagement is here to stay and at least in some form. After all these months of quarantine, society has become accustomed to the convenience of online programming and is likely to continue its participation in these events moving forward. The challenge for museums, however, is to find ways to generate revenues from online programs.
While museums were able to charge for at least some of their online offerings, they were able to generate only a fraction of the income they would expect for an in person event. So what do museums need right now? Well, first we need funding, of course, which is why we're very grateful for SB 2105 and are hardly supporting the legislation. Public funding is crucial for9483 our sector at this moment in time to stabilize museums and allow them breathing room to develop strategies for recovery. Public funding also helps leverage private philanthropy because it demonstrates a commitment for long term investment. However, please remember that science museums, nature centers and children's museums are often less able to qualify for grants that go through arts and culture focused funding streams and they've been some of the hardest hit this past year.
So please make sure that they're eligible for funding to. We also urge that these funds and all funds distributed through the Mass Cultural Council and Mass Humanities allow museums the flexibility to apply them to operational needs. As I mentioned earlier, the fact that MCC and Mass Humanity shifted gears by allowing existing grants and emergency funding to be used for operations, including staff salaries rather than just for consultants and programs, has been a lifesaver for many institutions. We hope this unrestricted flexibility continues. We also appreciate the Legislature's continued funding of the big yellow school bus grant fund, administered by the MCC, which has been vital to connecting museums and local schoolchildren through field trips. We9550 would encourage you to provide even more funding for the program and make it available to museums to offer reverse field trips by9556 bringing education staff into classrooms and to support virtual field trips as we emerge from the pandemic.
We also support robust funding of the Cultural facilities fund. This past year, many museums deferred maintenance and construction projects while they focused on Covid related emergencies, which means there will be an increased demand for capital funding in the coming months. Museums also need funding for internal technology infrastructure improvements, including broadband access, hardware and software to build their capacity for delivering those virtual programs, field trips, digitizing collections, live streaming and so on as these offerings will continue to be important even after in person attendance resumes. Thank you again for giving me the chance to update you on how museums are faring in this difficult time. I know I speak for my museum colleagues across the commonwealth in thanking you for your leadership and your support for our field and by extension, the communities and citizens we serve. Thank you. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Thanks dan David.
DAVID GIBBONS - MASSACHUSETTS CONVENTION CENTER AUTHORITY - Good afternoon, Senator Kennedy, Rep Fiola. Thank you very much for inviting me to speak today and having a form for myself and all of my fellow colleagues in the arts, hospitality tourism. We're all interlinked as you've heard today. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
I have a presentation. If I can take the screen,
see if I do this. Right. Mhm. Can you see the presentation?
Not yet. Not yet, David.
Yeah.
Tyler, can you share it on your screen by chance? I can see it on my screen, but if you can't I'm going to talk to it. Tyler, can you share it by chance? I can Give Me one Moment. Okay. Yes. Okay. Mhm. Might be a matter of band with Tyler. You have it? I do. Okay.
Yeah. I'm going to give you9689 back the screen.
Yeah. Okay.
Is everyone able to see it? Yes. And if you could just go to the first slide please. Tyler. Thank you.
GIBBONS - So again, good afternoon and just a quick place setting, the MCCA, we have the BCEC in South Boston, the Hynes Convention Center in the Backbay and Mass Mutual Center in Springfield. In 2019 was, was a banner year, our economic impact was $870,785,000 attendees, 650,000 room nights and 5000 jobs that was supported by our activities. When people talk to me about where we're going and what we need, we need herd confidence, we have the widest common denominator of needs to stand up a major convention, people have to have the desire to travel and spend, flying an airplane, stay in a hotel, gather in a large crowd and attended event. In Springfield actually, we'll probably see a little bit of rebound earlier because it's9770 a drive to market and its smaller, people maybe feel more9774 comfortable going to a small regional meeting than they will for an international meeting.
When business returns, we have a very strong calendar, we book on average the Hynes 4 to 5 years in advance and the BCEC seven years in advance, Springfield's a shorter trigger, usually about 12 to 24 months. We've been working closely with the state in putting together our protocols for when the door does open. The team that's working on, that is the same team that had a certified by Homeland Security where the only convention center in the country to be certified by Homeland Security. So that team is the same team that's working on the9821 protocols for sanitation. One thing is social distancing is about size and we are the biggest building in9828 New England, it's basically the size of the Empire State building laid down.
When it comes to having a meeting, we can stagger entrances, we have the IT infrastructure to work with clients so you can have staggered multiple arrival points. When it comes to space, you may know that we were approved for a volleyball tournament, that tournament only gets us up to 9% of our capacity, so we were under the 12% available capacity. Last summer, we were a hospital9862 for Boston hope. Each of our X holes has a few million square feet a cubic feet of air and we worked with the partners on how we circulated that air and how we filter that air. Um So I think we have some experience9881 of dealing with um complex sanitation for events.
So, the thing about vaccine distribution, all sectors are waiting on that to see when this herd immunity triggers the optimism and confidence of people. Right now, the trends are friendly, but I say right now tentatively because things change so quickly. What does the iteration, next generation events look like? I think what you have to realize a lot of industries have been battered, so we may be able to stand up to show for your particular industry only9954 to be told that we can't do it this year. We're still licking at our wounds and recovering and we really can't cobbled together a show. Other shows will take place, but there will be smaller. I believe some show operators or associations will merge, so we'll see some changes there.
People talk about the convention industry recovery maybe at four years and that's nationally, but Boston, some of our previous strengths or what are hurting us right now, we're very, very successful and international attendance for our events. If you have a major convention, particularly one that's high finance or high medical pharma, if you book that convention10000 in Boston or10002 San Francisco, you'll have 20-30% international attendance. If you book it somewhere in the Heartland, that might be 10%. The other thing about Boston is it's a business hub and so10015 business travel, I think it's going to10018 hybridize international travel10019 will be slow, so the Boston recovery could be five10024 years. Business travel itself maybe it's just permanently changed,10027 we'll see how that goes.10030
This gives you some perspective of what we're looking at for this coming fiscal year, starting10036 July 1st.10037 So at 377,000 attendees, that's 39% less10038 than last10042 year10042 and 55% less than 19. Number10044 of events you can10046 see compared to 19, we're going to be down10050 47%.10051 In revenues compared to 19, we're going to be down 43%. This is one of the key slide, I mentioned about international travel, its light blue, the recovery. When you get10066 up to 2020 for this and this tour tourism10069 economics was10071 and I think by Oxford econometrics and many of the different speakers today, we all get a lot of the same data and this one is troublesome10090 because you can see that that international success is a little bit elusive force to domestic market will10096 come back sooner.10098
We at the MCCA,10099 one of our ads a few years ago was we bragged about how10103 many direct nonstop10104 international flights would bring you into Boston, so we kind10109 of are synergize our marketing with10111 Mass Port's success. So when10113 you saw Lisa speak earlier some of her problems are our problems. I10119 think business travelers for the one off deal can do that and soon people will come back to meetings because we're gregarious by nature but it will be in a new mix. For our hotel sector that our first wave of support the10137 first concentric circle if10138 somebody used that10139 phrase earlier, that business travelers the high10142 octane room rate.10143 So the hotel community has10145 a different calculus going forward and how they how they10149 build their10151 model. It's an expensive market10152 to operate a hotel in.
We see a lot of demand for leisure but usually10158 leisure rates10159 tend to be10160 softer than short term business rates. The other10164 thing about an10165 international traveler, if you were attending a convention in Boston, a conference in10169 Boston and you're coming up from New York for a day and a half10175 but if you're coming from Rome, you probably stay a week, so you are better spending longer10182 staying and so this slide is an important one. Again, I think that when the economists put these together,10189 they have a rational outlook of the future based upon rear view, mere data. I like to think that we're rational and once10197 we become exuberant as an economy, some of these vectors might10199 move up faster. This slide kind of speaks to that, you can see all10205 of the economists usually show a high, medium and low.
The medium10210 projection is probably10212 where we're at. The dire projection,10215 I think we've missed that bullet. Some people talked about a10220 V10221 shaped recovery, some sectors have seen10223 that. The stimulus10225 money is really going to ramp up some people very10229 quickly but as you've heard,10231 the10232 events industry, whether it's a wedding, a convention, a rock and roll10238 concert, we have a long lead time anywhere, 90 days to nine months depending how big your event is of having to have a predictable planning runway into that10252 event. So I think we're10254 headed for this middle red line maybe a little bit better. I referred to hotels because they're our biggest metric of what10262 we do. We10264 drive hotel nights, we10266 drive restaurant covers and limo rides and airplane rides.
10270 This10270 is across the country and this shows that10273 in 2024, the rev par10275 index will be back to 101% of what it was in 19, that's for the whole country. What I said about the business10283 and the international traveler, Boston10285 might10286 be hurt a little more but this10288 same group, CBRE and10290 along10290 with their sub10294 Calibri10294 labs, if you look at this in October, this is a year better than what they were publishing in October So again, I think human nature and10304 the exuberance of our economy might make this10308 maybe six months from10309 now, this will10311 look a little10313 better. I think that's my last slide and any questions,10318 I am happy to answer. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
I'm Tyler, thank you for10322 go into the deck.
Thank you, David. And uh thank10325 you both, jay and David. But so the museum's, does anybody have10331 a question here for either10333 of the panelists?10334
Uh I don't see any right now,10338 David. Uh you know what, it's10340 gonna take a little time. I think that's10342 what you're saying, it's just not gonna happen overnight for you for your business and uh and um you know, dan same,10352 same situation. I mean, as you said, this umbrella that we've been working under, trying to10356 get our hands around has so many unique um pieces, although it's intertwined, it's just everybody's got10366 a different path to this recovery. And10369 I think that what I've noticed is uh does10372 anybody have any questions just raise your hand? But what I've10379 noticed is it's big funds, big10382 flexibility, big messaging, and um obviously there's gonna be a lot of10385 innovation needed, so uh you know, today has10387 been for me uh most enlightening and we have10390 all10391 of your presentations so we can dig into the data and and learn more about how10396 we can help with10397 this recovery, uh any other10398 questions before I turn it back10402 to my co chair for his good10406 bye remarks. Um anybody going once going twice, I just want to know that we're a few minutes ahead of schedule, so I'm very proud of all these panelists were uh being true to their10419 uh plan,10420 but uh10421 I'll speak for my side10422 of the House and the committee members10425 that uh10426 we're here to continue to taken10466 and absorb everything you want to share with10469 us over10470 the next couple of months, a few months and and10473 beyond. Um This, I think it was pointed out a little bit earlier10477 that SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
uh,10478 it's been pointed out again and again that Overall this industry10482 was the first to close and many segments of it will be10486 the last to feel the recovery as we've seen today. 2024. It's a little ways away. So we've got a lot to do between them now and then. So I want to thank you all and um, I look forward to working with each and every one of10500 you as we move forward as I know my committee members10502 do. And I want10503 to thank all of my house members as well for being here today. Thank you. Senator Kennedy.
Thank you. Chief Viola. I just10511 want to thank you. I want to thank all the members10514 of the committee and I also want to thank all the presenters today.10518 I thought that this10519 uh this10520 hearing was provided a great overview of um the state that the that we find tourism, arts and culture,10530 hospitality and restaurants in today. We have a long way to10534 go. And I think that you know,10536 for for members of this committee we have uh if we have two responsibilities and I think one of those is just to continue to10545 remind the baker administration10547 and10548 the fellow legislators and the general public about how important these sectors10553 are to the overall massachusetts economy. And I think secondly,10557 we also have a responsibility to do whatever we can to try to smooth the10562 path way to recovery,10563 which10564 might be shorter for some, some sectors and longer for others. But um, but it's important that we get it all back and back on track. And10574 I think it's aside from the economy,10576 I think that you can't say enough about how important it10580 is just to everybody's,10581 um, psyche and the quality10585 of life that we have. And I think everybody10587 wants to10588 return as soon as we10589 can. So, um, so I think this was a10592 great start. We have a10593 lot of work to do. And once10595 again, just thank10596 you to everybody that participated10597 today.
Thank you all. And I want to10601 thank our staffs for helping us pull this10603 together as well in10604 L I. S. And, uh, thank you,10606 Vice chair for an Andes and everyone so reach out and we'll be following up. Thank you and10612 enjoy this beautiful, beautiful day here in massachusetts. I know10617 it isn't everybody. Thanks.
Yeah.
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