Bellingham Tourism Commission

The Bellingham Tourism Commission met to discuss two major developments that will significantly impact the region's tourism landscape over the next two years. The commission approved January meeting minutes and received comprehensive updates on FIFA World Cup 2026 fan zone preparations and the 2025 tourism grant program progress. The most significant announcement was Bellingham's selection as an official FIFA World Cup fan zone for 2026, with the city taking the lead on coordinating public watch parties for six matches to be played in Seattle. This designation comes as FIFA expects 750,000 visitors to the region, presenting both an unprecedented opportunity and logistical challenges for the community. The city is partnering with Bellingham Whatcom County Tourism and the Port of Bellingham under a memorandum of understanding that establishes three primary committees: marketing and communications, watch party events, and community engagement and activations. The commission also received detailed reports on the 2025 tourism grant recipients, with all initial meetings completed or scheduled. The presentation revealed strong performance across most funded events, with several grantees showing notable innovation in marketing to out-of-town visitors. However, discussions also highlighted emerging challenges, particularly declining Canadian tourism due to current political tensions and broader economic factors affecting the hospitality industry. Staff emphasized the need for immediate hiring of an experienced event coordinator to manage the FIFA fan zone activities, with a Request for Proposals expected to be issued Friday. The waterfront has been selected as the primary venue for watch parties, despite logistical challenges, as it better showcases the community compared to the Civic Complex.

**January Meeting Minutes Approval** - Vote: Passed unanimously - Motion and second recorded, no changes requested **FIFA Fan Zone Event Coordinator Hiring** - Staff authorized to issue RFP for event coordinator or team - Timeline: RFP release targeted for Friday following the meeting - Scope: Initially for developing event plans, then potentially expanded based on budget and capabilities **Waterfront Venue Selection for FIFA Events** - Bellingham waterfront selected over Civic Field for official watch parties - Rationale: Better showcase of community character, despite easier crowd management at Civic Complex

**Tara, on FIFA event scope management:** "The scope of this work has to be kind of established and executed really well, and I want to make sure we've like we're right now. We're building the 3 party ship and make sure we're all on the same page, which hasn't happened quite yet." **Dylan, on FIFA regional impact:** "Seattle. Fifa is expecting 750,000 visitors to our region. They have selected fan zones not necessarily even on the I 5 corridor they're wanting to. They they would like they're trying to bring the the games and the excitement to areas throughout our state." **Tara, on event coordinator hiring:** "We definitely want to be hiring somebody that has the experience we don't have. You know, I was saying, you know, tune up had the like. Okay, this was the 1st year. Let's do a little bit better than next year, and then the next year we have. We don't have that we have." **Craig Jewell, on street closures idea:** "What if we were to do some street closures downtown and make it so that everybody could just be walking around just that like like they're in like Las Vegas like we like how it wasn't Covid, actually, so that like, it's just a very wide open space and and a very welcoming thing." **Sara Holliday, on Canadian tourism impacts:** "We definitely are seeing impact. We are seeing people that are calling us that are telling us exactly why they're canceling. We are seeing a huge percentage of our Canadian guests that we normally have are canceling with us." **John Purdie, on Canadian sentiment:** "I just went to the president training this weekend, which is one of the biggest in the rotary world. The district that we deal with is Alaska, Canada, down into Northern California. So there's like 600 rotary clubs in there. So huge contingent of Canadians in there. And they are hot." **Lindsay, on grant program effectiveness:** "I think I said this last year, and I still hold to it that even with the changes in marketing to operational costs that I that hasn't changed the attitude of the grantees in terms of understanding that they should market out of town." **Marc Blake, on best practices sharing:** "I'm thinking, in terms of best practices, maybe across some of the events and industry. If there was a way to maybe note and share those? Or is that something that is possible? Or or is that like effective strategies or something."

# Bellingham Tourism Commission Charts Course for FIFA Fan Zone and Reviews Grant Program Success The Bellingham Tourism Commission convened on February 25, 2025, with members gathering both in person and online to tackle two significant agenda items: planning for the city's designation as a FIFA World Cup Fan Zone and reviewing the performance of tourism grant recipients. The meeting revealed both exciting opportunities and emerging challenges as the commission navigates international events, changing visitor patterns, and evolving grant programs. ## Meeting Overview The commission meeting took place with a full quorum present, including staff from both the City of Bellingham and Bellingham Whatcom County Tourism. The session was structured around two primary topics: an update on Bellingham's selection as a FIFA Fan Zone for the 2026 World Cup and a comprehensive review of the 2025 tourism grant recipients' initial meetings and progress reports. What made this meeting particularly notable was the depth of operational detail shared about both the FIFA planning process and the maturation of the grant program's oversight structure. The commission heard about concrete next steps for World Cup planning while also grappling with broader questions about Canadian visitor impacts and the effectiveness of tourism investments. ## FIFA World Cup Fan Zone Planning The commission received its first detailed briefing on Bellingham's selection as one of eight Washington State fan zones for the 2026 FIFA World Cup. Tara, representing the city's planning efforts, outlined the scope and significance of this designation. "Seattle FIFA is expecting 750,000 visitors to our region," Tara explained. "They have selected fan zones not necessarily even on the I-5 corridor — they're wanting to bring the games and the excitement to areas throughout our state." The fan zone designation means Bellingham will host watch parties for the six World Cup matches scheduled to be played in Seattle. The other Washington fan zones are Bremerton, Everett, Olympia, Tri-Cities, Spokane, Tacoma, and Vancouver. Bellingham's position as the northernmost fan zone, combined with its proximity to the Canadian border, creates unique opportunities and challenges. "This is going to be our opportunity to invite people from across the globe to be welcoming and to invite them into our community," Tara said. "We want to have that summer be — which is already a busy time, which we know from the hotel data — we know there's probably going to be some displacement that happens, but invite people that may have never come to this part of the world." The organizational structure for the fan zone is taking shape as a partnership between the City of Bellingham, Bellingham Whatcom County Tourism, and the Port of Bellingham. Three primary committees are being established: marketing and communications, watch party events, and community engagement and activations. The watch parties are planned for the Bellingham waterfront, rather than Civic Field, based on input from partners and the mayor's preference for showcasing a different aspect of the community. This decision builds on lessons learned from the 2024 test run during the Olympic Games that went "really well" according to Tara. One immediate need is hiring an event coordinator through a Request for Proposals process. "We definitely want to be hiring somebody that has the experience we don't have," Tara explained. The RFP structure will be unusual for the city, allowing the selected team to provide cost estimates for developing the plan rather than a fixed-price contract. Dylan from tourism added context about the preparation work already underway: "We've already developed a landing page, bellingham.org slash FIFA. So it's got some information right now, particularly on the dates for when the group stage games are in Vancouver and in Seattle." The tourism bureau is focusing on providing advance travel information, particularly for international visitors who will need to navigate different visa requirements for Canada and the U.S. Infrastructure challenges are already emerging, with potential construction projects at border crossings and the airport during summer 2026. Commission members immediately began brainstorming community engagement opportunities. Craig Jewell suggested street closures downtown, proposing to "make it so that everybody could just be walking around just like they're in Las Vegas... closing down Railroad and Holly, I think, would be a pretty brilliant thing to do." This led to a brief exchange about the practical implications of street closures, with John Purdie noting that closing both Holly and Railroad would "cripple the city, and no one can get anywhere." Marc Blake suggested the road in front of Depot Market Square as "pretty amenable to closures." The discussion revealed both the enthusiasm and the need for careful planning around community activations. Parking emerged as another concern, with Sarah Holiday calling attention to the challenge: "If we've got our hotels full on the North end, where the hell is everybody gonna park down there on the waterfront? Is there a possibility for a shuttle that goes from one end of town to the other?" Budget concerns surfaced as well, with Tara noting that "it doesn't appear to me that there is budget coming from the State of Washington." This reality will require the three partner organizations to develop realistic budgets and seek sponsorship opportunities. Katie and Eric from the tourism office will handle sponsorship development. The commission agreed to put FIFA planning on a future agenda for more detailed brainstorming once the organizational structure is more firmly established. ## Tourism Grant Program Review Lindsay provided a comprehensive update on the 2025 tourism grant recipients, marking a significant evolution in the program's oversight and support structure. All 100% of grantee meetings have been either completed or scheduled, representing a smoother process than previous years. The support structure now includes initial meetings focused on hotel partnerships and marketing details, midway check-ins timed around the next application cycle, and final meetings scheduled within a month of event completion. This tighter timeline addresses previous concerns about outdated information in the application process. "I'm excited about that. I think it will really streamline the timeline," Lindsay said about the new final meeting structure. "So we'll be able to go through all that information before they submit their reports." The grant portfolio includes both returning recipients and several new organizations. Notable among the newcomers are American Theater Northwest, which is expanding to Seattle venues, and Backcountry Medical Guides, described by Lindsay as "one of the most impressive groups to me." Backcountry Medical Guides offers wilderness and maritime first aid programs that Lindsay noted are unique: "They're the only group in the country that offers the trainings that they do. So that is a big draw for bringing people here to take those trainings." The organization recently acquired a boat called the Swiftshire for mobile classroom programs and plans to host a conference around their maritime medical programs. Cascade Mountains continues their focus on female-only mountaineering courses that "sell out really quickly." Their goal is expanding beyond introductory courses to address the lack of advanced programming for women in mountaineering. Several established grantees showed strong performance indicators. The Bellingham Bay Marathon organizer stated his goal to make it "the best marathon," while the Chugging 50K filled 471 of 600 spots in just 37 minutes, demonstrating no registration concerns. Lindsay highlighted interesting marketing tactics emerging from the grantees. Wild Buffalo is "announcing some of their shows in Canada before even announcing locally to drive Canadian tickets," a strategy that continues to work effectively for them despite some social media setbacks. Craig Jewell elaborated on those challenges: "I had my marketing manager click on one of those links that I'm sure all of you received from somebody that says in order to keep your Facebook events alive or well, you need to respond to this message from this Siberian Prince type of thing, and it dismantled all of our social media for about 3 and a half months." The rebuild process was extensive, with Craig spending "3 weeks like working on it day in and day out," but the organization successfully recovered and maintained their grant performance. The Pickford Film Center emerged as a surprise success story in visitor attraction. "When we're looking at October last year, they are tracking at 39% of their attendees are visitors," Lindsay reported. "They are bringing in handfuls of people from New York, East Coast areas that I wasn't seeing in other reports." Marc Blake identified an opportunity for cross-pollination of successful strategies among grantees: "I'm thinking in terms of best practices, maybe across some of the events... is that something that is possible? Or effective strategies or something." Craig Jewell expressed willingness to share Wild Buffalo's targeting strategies: "I'm beyond happy to do that and hold any kind of seminar, because that just brings more people out and brings more Canadians down here." ## Canadian Visitor Concerns A significant portion of the discussion centered on changing patterns with Canadian visitors, reflecting broader political and economic uncertainties. The impacts are already being felt across multiple sectors. Sarah Holiday reported direct impacts on lodging: "We definitely are seeing impact. We are seeing people that are calling us that are telling us exactly why they're canceling. We are seeing a huge percentage of our Canadian guests that we normally have are canceling with us." Airport data confirms the trend. "We had a meeting a couple of weeks ago with Rob fixed, and we asked him that point blank conversation about if he's seeing a decline in the Canadian travelers through the airport, and he said absolutely. He's seeing a pretty massive decline." The impacts extend beyond tourism into other sectors. John Purdie attended a regional Rotary training that covers clubs from Alaska to Northern California: "There's like 600 rotary clubs in there. So huge contingent of Canadians in there. And they are hot. They are hot." Dylan provided context from the tourism bureau's perspective: "We don't have any quantifiable data to show that the uncertainties around any of the economic factors that could be upcoming are currently affecting what we're seeing. But remember, our data is aggregate, and we look at it so a few months from now we may be able to determine if that is one of the factors." Exchange rates remain a key factor to monitor. "Once we hit a certain point on the exchange rate, that's when historically... many of you have been through this for decades, right, with our symbiotic relationship with British Columbia," Dylan noted. The tourism bureau's response emphasizes continuity: "For us, it's continuing to stress we are a warm and welcoming community to our Canadian neighbors... we have a strong relationship with British Columbia and have for many, many years as a county and as a city." ## Grant Program Effectiveness and Future Planning The commission engaged in substantive discussion about the effectiveness of their grant investments, with generally positive assessments of both new and returning recipients. Lindsay expressed satisfaction with the program's evolution: "I can't think of any concerns that pop to mind with anything... even with the changes in marketing to operational costs, that hasn't changed the attitude of the grantees in terms of understanding that they should market out of town." The integration between grantees and tourism bureau staff has deepened. "I think our whole staff is more in touch with all of these people," Lindsay noted, crediting the decision to require meetings as beneficial for both sides. Nick Kelly emphasized the value of detailed reporting for future decision-making: "It's so hard to go into the scoring without context of what's working or what hasn't worked because everyone has different metrics and different ways to measure." This led to discussion of timing for comprehensive program review. The commission agreed to consider quarterly reviews of final reports and a September presentation summarizing 2024 performance before the next application cycle begins. Tara emphasized the importance of this feedback loop: "I'd like to make sure that we I'll read those and then have a discussion about it, because it's precious feedback that we need." The relationship between grantees and tourism staff has evolved beyond mere oversight to active collaboration. "This connection has been really good, having the grantees work with the agency that is here to help them market their stuff and has marketing expertise that the city staff doesn't have," Tara observed. ## Routine Business and Legislative Updates The commission approved January meeting minutes without changes and received brief legislative updates from Dylan on World Cup-related tax proposals and state tourism funding initiatives. A proposed 2% additional statewide lodging tax during World Cup events has been declared "dead" after failing to pass committee, despite provisions that would have returned 25% to cities. Sarah Holiday noted the implementation challenges: "That would have been the absolute hardest thing to implement... It takes us the longest time to change our taxes." State tourism funding discussions continue around a self-assessment model, with legislation creating a task force currently advancing through committees. The commission also discussed House Bill 1515, which would ease restrictions on alcohol service at nonprofit events, though prospects for passage appear limited due to Senate opposition. ## Public Comment and Film Location Development The meeting included brief public comment about waterfront development opportunities and recreational activities, followed by discussion of film location scouting initiatives. The tourism bureau is developing relationships with Washington Film Works and building a permit database for filming inquiries. Lindsay noted increasing interest: "I've been getting increased inquiries of people wanting to film like episodes, or like one off things." Sarah Holiday revealed more filming activity than might be apparent: "I have in the last maybe 6 months had 4 HGTV crews that have stayed with us because they're filming consistently... we get quite a bit of it through here." Craig Jewell offered to connect the commission with Kate Becker from the Seattle Office of Film Music, who has expertise in developing film-friendly communities throughout Washington State. ## Looking Ahead The commission meeting concluded with a sense of momentum on multiple fronts. FIFA World Cup planning will require intensive coordination over the coming months, with community engagement opportunities balanced against practical constraints of budget and logistics. The tourism grant program continues maturing with stronger oversight and support systems, though Canadian visitor patterns warrant ongoing monitoring. The integration between city planning, tourism bureau expertise, and community partnerships appears to be strengthening across all initiatives. As Nick Kelly noted in closing, the detailed presentations and discussions provide essential context for future decision-making, particularly as the commission prepares for the next grant cycle and navigates the opportunities and challenges of hosting international events in an increasingly complex tourism landscape. The February 25th meeting demonstrated a tourism commission grappling seriously with both immediate operational needs and longer-term strategic questions about Bellingham's role as a destination for regional, national, and international visitors.