LETTER TO THE EDITOR
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I note with interest the comments of Nick Beale which generally refer to a decision by the City of Ballarat to reorganise the manner in which it will, in the future, attend to the commercial matters of tourism promotion within the municipality.
Clearly Ballarat needs to be professional and above all entrepreneurial in everything it does, including tourism promotion. However in doing so, the city must be mindful of the totality of the tasks before it, and budget accordingly.
I also note the comment "Ballarat misses out on Lost Trades Fair".
I am not sure of the correlation between Mr Beale's concerns about Visit Ballarat and the venue for the next Lost Trades Fair event but he follows on with the comment "this is a fine example of small country poor thinking and decision making" - frankly I am not sure how any of those issues co-relate.
There can be no doubt the lost Trades Fair is a fantastic event and any town or city would be honoured to host it, but how Mr Beale believes the alteration to the manner in which the City of Ballarat manages its tourism operation has any bearing on the venue for next season's Lost Trades Fair is beyond me.
Ballarat was in the running but COB never had a mortgage on the event nor did COB ever have that capacity to make the final decision of where the event would go - that full commercial decision rested with the promoters of the event.
No question COB made a bid, but the promoters believed that of the venues on offer, the Bendigo Race Track, provided the best option. This had nothing to do with Visit Ballarat or what is going on with tourism management in Ballarat.
Of all people, I believe Nick Beale knows that well.
The fact is COB believes the promotion of Ballarat can be attended to in a better manner and at a more acceptable price than was being done by Visit Ballarat, a purely commercial decision.
As an entity, Visit Ballarat members might choose to continue promoting the businesses of their membership as does Commerce Ballarat, the Committee for Ballarat, the Committee for Miners Rest, the Save our Station Group and all the others which co-exist in our city, all of which are fully independently operational.
Grant Tillett, Mount Rowan.