catlady
Cheer Parent
- Jun 6, 2012
- 2,817
- 6,228
I learned a new word: Tourna-cation
That $9Bil Youth Sports Tourism Industry that is mentioned is a major contributing factor to why cities are requiring the major youth sports/cheer events to do a Stay to Play type program.
Springfield, Illinois has already passed senate bill 508 allowing money from hotel taxes to be used as cash incentives to attract people to their city owned convention centers, but won't allow hotel tax incentives to be used on privately owned convention centers even though they pull in hotel tax revenue, as well. Wait and watch how ugly this gets between government and privately owned convention centers and sport complexes, and then big city versus little towns. Cities are now literally banking on tourism to pay for infrastructure and city development and they're driving comp fees/hotel tax/rental car tax.
You can't build a stable economy off a parenting style....
There's a lot of truth in that statement. The youth sport industry isn't just feeding big dollars into city economy, it is also feeding huge dollars into healthcare. There is a reason I have a huge business crush on Varsity and while they can't control the outside industries and city government, they can (and have) gained much of the control on competitions. There's HUGE benefit in them being able to control the way competitions are done in the future. Unlike most sports, AS doesn't have to be in the same arena to be judged and parents are ready to give up a lot of this traveling. Also, if the AMA, Insurance Corps, or Schools blindside them with something new, they have the legal resources and ability to make immediate changes to the scoresheet and comp rules to literally protect thousands of jobs and businesses. I worked for one of the most cash rich retail corporations in the world, we thought we were pretty untouchable, but Al Gore snuck up on us with the internet <sarcasm> and May was acquired by Federated.
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