Visitor Toolkit

Community Tourism Foundations® Program

Information for Dawson Creek and Pouce Coupe

Dawson Creek and Pouce Coupe have been accepted into the Community Tourism Foundations® Program. This program provides professional facilitation services to assist communities with their tourism planning and to develop a tourism plan. The program is customized based on the needs of the community and offers a range of tools, proven resources and customized destination development assistance. Because it takes a step-by-step approach, the program can accommodate the needs of communities at different stages of the tourism development process. A number of factors are determined in the initial assessment phase of the Program: how well the community understands the value of tourism, its specific development needs, and how and where program resources can best be applied. In the planning phase, development activities might include developing long-term strategies by participating in tourism research projects, conducting SWOT analyses (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats), or examining community tourism organizational structures. The implementation phase can include such things as assistance with partnership development, designing visitor service programs or whatever the needs are for that particular community.

Program Process:

The program steps include an initial meeting to understand the challenges and opportunities facing the community. A working group commits to working with the Tourism BC facilitator to supply information, review draft reports and be ambassadors for the tourism planning process. The facilitator will produce, with the community’s assistance, an initial report, situation analysis and a tourism plan. The community commits to providing a completed inventory using Tourism BC templates; hosting of the facilitator accommodation for subsequent meetings in the community; venue, refreshments and promotion of working group meetings, the planning session meeting and plan presentation. After the situation analysis initial draft is complete a 5-hour tourism planning session will be held to review the report determine next steps. The workshop will have participants contribute to the direction of the tourism plan and set priorities for the next three to five years.

Activities to Date:

On November 06, 2008 an exploratory meeting was held in Dawson Creek with a broad cross-section of tourism stakeholders from both Dawson Creek and Pouce Coupe to understand the current challenges and opportunities facing the communities for tourism development.

Next Steps

A working group of tourism stakeholders will be formed to work with the Tourism BC Facilitator. The working group will complete the inventory for the community. The Tourism BC facilitator will complete a draft work plan and initial report.

A first draft situation analysis is anticipated for completion by early April in preparation for review by a broader stakeholder group to participate in a planning session estimated for mid-April. Outcomes from this session will be included in the final draft of the Situation Analysis as well as set the direction for the Tourism Plan.

Program Information

Memorandum of Understanding
Program Process and Work Plan

Contacts:

Dawson Creek
Tourism Dawson Creek
Dustin Bodnaryk, Tourism Development Coordinator
10201-10th Street
Dawson Creek, BC, V1G 3T5
Ph: 250-782-4714 Cell: 250-219-5608
Fax: 250-782-2371 Toll Free: 1-866-645-3022
Email: dustin@tourismdawsoncreek.com
www.tourismdawsoncreek.com

Pouce Coupe
Village of Pouce Coupe
Peter Thomas, Chief Administrative Officer
PO Box 190
Pouce Coupe, BC V0C 2C0
Ph: 250-786-5794
Fax: 250-786-5257
Email: cao@poucecoupe.ca

Tourism BC Representatives:
Tourism BC Facilitator:
Simone Carlysle-Smith
(604) 885-5924
Toll free 1-888-306-6611
simonecs@telus.net

April Moi
Northern BC Tourism
250-561-0432 ext 206
april@nbctourism.com

Caterina Papadakos
Tourism BC
(604) 660-3754
Caterina.Papadakos@tourismbc.com