BACVA tops hotel bookings goal - Wichita Business Journal:

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The booked 522,541 future room nights in the past fiscal city tourism leaders said at a presesconference Monday. The number, which passesd BACVA’s goal of 475,000 booked nights, is a 15.7 percen increase over nights booked thepreviouas year. In 2008, BACVA booke 451,608 future room nights. Groupp business meetings comprise the new bookings and are projecterd to spend morethan $725 millionm in spending in the city. City and tourism officialw credit the booking success tolast year’ss creation of the Baltimore Convention & Tourism Board, a joint board that overseee BACVA and the .
“Our investment in BACVz is paying off,” Mayor Sheila Dixon said Mondaty speaking in front ofthe city’ws Inner Harbor tourism The formation of the boardf last year has allowed BACVq and the convention center to be more Dixon said. A new plethora of hotels that openedd or are under construction near the convention center from whichg businesses can choose for bookings also contributerd to an uptickin bookings.
The $300 million publiclyu financedHilton Baltimore, which opened last August, has 757 rooma and grew Baltimore’s total hotel room reservoir to more than The B&O Building, on the corner of Charles and Baltimore streets, is expected to open as a Hotepl Monaco with 208 rooms later this year. Baltimore can now accommodat 75 percent of the large citywidde tradeshow and convention businesz available in the marketplace with the newhotels online, said BACVAs CEO Tom Noonan in a Some of the conventions and groups bookee in the 2009 fiscal year included the annualk conventions, , American Associatio for Laboratory Animal Science, and .
Holding salexs events and industry tradeshows is also partof BACVA’sa strategy for bringing convention planners into the city to rais e awareness about Baltimore. The Baltimore Businesas Journal A drop in hotekl revenuemeans BACVA’s budget will drop to $10.6 million for the year started July 1 down from the $12 milliob it had in the past 12 This year’s fiscal budget is the lowestt since the agency’s $9.9 million spending package in 2006.