The Band is Together Again, local tourism is benefitting

During the first four months of 2013 the Peoria Area Convention and Visitors Bureau has already book 56 events into the region that will bring an estimated $5.2 million to the local economy.

And there are a whole lot more possibilities that could be booked soon.

It's no wonder Don Welch and his staff at the Convention and Visitors Bureau say they have "got the band back together" and in a celebratory mood.

Don Welch, back row center, CEO of the Peoria Area Convention and Visitors Bureau, and his staff pose behind the cardboard cutout of a police cruiser similar to the one used in The Blue Brothers film. Using the them "The Band is Back Together," the staff told of growing successes in the past year druing hte bureau's annual meeitng on Thursday. The bureau's 2013 annual meeting was Thursday at the Gateway Building and the hundred or so in attendance may have felt they were walking onto the set of a new Blues Brothers movie. Welch was in a black suit, black hat and sunglasses, trying to look his best Jake Blues; his staff was dressed in similar fashion.

In one corner was a cardboard cutout of a black-and-white police cruiser, purported to be like the one Jake and Elwood drove in the 1980 film that remains a hit today.

Why the movie rip-off? Welch explained that shortly after he took the job as CEO of the Convention and Visitors Bureau, when trying to put his team together, he got a telephone call from a friend asking what he was doing.

Without thinking he replied with one of the movie's most classic lines, "I'm putting the band together and we're on a mission from God."

The staff, Welch said, "took that and ran with it. We've been working very hard to get things moving and we're getting some wins. And I am here to tell you the band is back together," Welch said to the applause of the audience.

Sue Atherton, vice president of the bureau and Welch's first hire as CEO, said the staff has already sent out 110 leads to events and conventioneers in 2013 and if just those came to fruition it would be worth more than 48,000 room nights and $16.1 million in revenues to the area economy.

Of those leads, 56 are now booked, generating 15,166 room nights, 37 days at the Peoria Civic Center and an estimated economic impact of $5.2 million.

"Most people don't realize the economic impact tourism has on the area," Atherton said. She then explained the "circle of tourism" and how travel and meeting promotion bring increased visits, additional visitor spending, new jobs and revenues, and then more money to do more travel and meeting promotions.

"Tourism saves the average Illinois family $1,100 each year in taxes. That's taxes you don't have to pay because of revenues generated by tourism," she said.

Atherton talked about some of the innovative and fun ways the staff approached event planners at various trade shows, including dressing as Dorothy and the two witches from "The Wizard of Oz" to capture their attention.

"These work to break the ice, which is really important when you only get six minutes to make a pitch," she said.

Leloni Luft, director of marketing, talked about the various advertisements that the bureau places in out-of-town and out-of-state publications — advertisements Peorians don't see but that are effective.

Adam Gierhart told of redesigning the Official Visitors Guide to make it more user-friendly. It is working; website visits are up more than 35 percent from this time a year ago, he said.

Other staff made presentations as well to give attendees a look at what has been going on at the bureau.

The Convention and Visitors Bureau presented its annual awards on Thursday, as well.

The Steve Kouri Award, named for the Peoria judge who led the charge to bring March Madness to Peoria nearly 20 years, is presented to a person who makes extraordinary contributions to the area economy as well as assistance to the bureau. The award this year was presented to Jim Wetherington, general manager of the Civic Center.

The Member of the Year Award was presented to Bobbie Rice, marketing manager for the Wheels O' Time Museum in Peoria, "for her tireless dedication to the bureau."

The Friend of Tourism Award was presented to Caterpillar Inc. for its efforts in building the Cat Visitors Center and helping to promote it as well as the entire area.

Balloon launch to commemorate birth mothers

The skies throughout central Illinois will be filled with balloons beginning at 11 a.m. Saturday when the Center for Youth and Family Solutions commemorates the sacrifices of birthmothers who placed children in adoption.

The inaugural Birthmother's Day Balloon Launch will occur simultaneously in seven towns in central Illinois. The Center plans for the launch to become an annual event.

"For many mothers, Mother's Day is a time of celebration with their children and families, spent enjoying each other's company and gift-giving. For birthmothers, however, this day is often marked with remembering the loss of the child they placed in adoption," said a news release from the Center for Youth and Family Solutions.

The Birthmother's Day celebration honors and remembers first mothers, whose children have been placed in adoption. Everyone in the community is welcome to attend the balloon launch, which will include a short ceremony.

Mary Kay Collins, assistant director of adoption at CYFS, explains, "Our Crisis Pregnancy and Adoption Counselors carefully considered how to not only give a voice to the birthmother's loss, but also a way to honor and respect their sacrifice. A balloon launch symbolized raising the motherhood experience for birthmothers. As a society, we need to help birthmothers step out of the shadows and be acknowledged as first mothers to the children they placed for adoption."

Since 1990 the Saturday before Mother's Day has been set aside to honor and remember the motherhood experience of birthmothers who placed their children in adoption.

Founded in Seattle, the day purposefully falls on the day before Mother's Day to symbolize the reality that a birthmother's decision makes the adoptive mother's motherhood possible.

"Historically, birthmothers are often the invisible members of the adoption process. The loss of their child was only intensified when told to 'forget' or 'move on'. Many birthmothers become a shadow in the lives of the adoptee and the adoptive family they helped create," the Center said.

As adoptions began to move toward more openness, birthmothers began to step out of the shadows and into a role that is uniquely theirs, it added.

"It is extremely important to me to be remembered by my children as well as their adoptive parents. Adopting out my children was the hardest decision I have ever made. It was not a decision to be taken lightly. It was an extremely selfless act and took a lot of courage," said Jessica, a CYFS birth mother.

"Knowing about Birthmother's Day helps me know my children and their adoptive parents have a chance to remember how much I love my children and how much pain I struggled with to give them the life they now have with their adoptive families," she said.

The locations for the balloon launches are

• In Peoria, at the Center for Youth and Family Solutions office at 2610 W. Richwoods Boulevard.
• In Bloomington, at the Center for Youth and Family Solutions office at 502 S. Morris Ave.
• In Macomb, at Chandler Park, north of the Square.
• In Springfield, at the Center for Youth and Family Solutions office at 614 N 6th St.
• In LaSalle, at Grace United Methodist Church at 1345 Chartres St.
• In Rock Island, at Heritage Church at 4801 44th St.
• In Champaign, at the Center for Youth and Family Solutions office at 315 A Curt Drive.

The balloons will be a variety of colors "to allow people to pick the color they feel is most appropriate and best represents their experience with their birth mother," said Meg Murphy, director of marketing and communications for the Center for Youth and Family Solutions. She said the number released at each location will vary, but added there will be at least two dozen at each site.

The Center for Youth & Family Solutions is a not-for-profit social service agency providing strength-based, family-centered social services to youth and families in need throughout Central Illinois.

Services include foster care, child abuse prevention, crisis response for runaways and their families, adoption, intervention and education with at-risk youth, counseling for individuals and families, mental health crisis response and community advocacy programs.

For more information, visit www.cyfsolutions.org.

A more secure Race for the Cure

The sea of pink wrought by the 10,000-plus participants in the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure this Saturday won't be surprising; it's common on the day before Mother's Day.

What will seem different this year will be the presence of security as the Race kicks off for the 28th consecutive year from the Metro Centre in the heart of the city.

"There will be a visible difference with the amount of security we will have this year. And yes, it certainly is in reaction to what occurred in Boston," said Gina Morss-Fischer, development director for the Susan G. Komen For the Cure Memorial Affiliate in Peoria.

She was referring to the bombs that exploded near the finish line of the Boston Marathon on April 15, killing three and injuring many others. One of the two men accused of placing the bombs reportedly told police the plan was to place the bombs in an area where there was a large concentration of people.

Since then many events across the country have beefed up security.

Morss-Fischer said Phil Lockwood, race director of the Race for the Cure, was on the telephone that very afternoon talking with the race's security partners. "We'll have the most security for this year's race than we've ever had," she said.

"It's really too bad we and other events have to resort to that, but it's a sign of our times, I guess. But we are doing everything we can to make sure our participants still feel that the Race is all about celebrating and creating a celebration atmosphere," Morss-Fischer said.

Saturday's activities begin when the Kid's Corner opens at 7 a.m. Aerobic warm-up exercises begin at 7:10 a.m. and at 7:20 a.m. survivors will gather for a procession and photograph.

The 5K Competitive/Timed Run will begin at 8 a.m. followed by the 5K Family Run/Walk at 8:05 a.m. and the one-mile Family Run/Walk at 8:15 a.m.

"We expect more than 10,000 participants this year," Morss-Fischer said. "That is down a little from last year (about 11,000 in 2012) but when we look at events across the country right now most of them are down a little. Compared with some others we're doing really well."

Other events that surround the Race for the Cure include the Pray for the Cure event,, which was Thursday night at Salem Lutheran Church in Peoria. Other fundraising events with proceeds going to Susan G. Komen For The Cure have been ongoing all year.

A new sponsor this year is Lazy Boy and one of the participants in the Race will be going home with a new, pink recliner.

Kitchen Cooked Potato Chips of Farmington is donating 10 cents from every pink bag of chips sold to the Komen organization.

Other sponsors include Kroger, which will serve breakfast to the participants on Saturday; Caterpillar Inc., Komatsu Ltd., Par-A-Dice Hotel/Casino, RLI Corp., dex, CityLink, the Metro Centre and Illinois Valley Striders and many more.

"We couldn't do this without our sponsors, of course, and we can't thank them enough," Morss-Fischer said.

Riverfront Museum restructures operations

A restructuring of operations at the Peoria Riverfront Museum that took effect last week was done so the facility and its staff can best serve their clients, the public, museum CEO Jim Richerson said Tuesday.

The restructuring, which included the elimination of some positions — four gone, two created for a net change of two fewer positions — and the merging of two departments, will improve effectiveness and efficiency while bringing expenses more into line with income, he said.

While acknowledging there are naysayers about the museum and its operations, including its communications with the Peoria County Board, Richerson said the changes were the result of an internal analysis after the Riverfront Museum's first six months in operation as well as surveys from museum guests about their experiences and wishes for the facility.

"Like any business that is six months into operations we looked closely at the time and resources from that period and made what we believe were the appropriate changes. Any problems were looked at and things were realigned to address those and we think the structure we have now will help us better serve the public," Richerson said.

The analysis identified a need to allocate resources differently and more equitable and to rebuild teams so they are more effective and efficient. The changes that resulted are expected to improve efficiency, improve communications and workflow and improve productivity, Richerson told the museum's board.

Among the changes:

Positions that were eliminated were vice president of communications and marketing, visitor services manager, exhibitions technician and curatorial assistant.

New positions are marketing manager, which will report to the vice president of development and marketing, and visitors service senior lead.

The Development and Marketing department have been merged into one department to be overseen by Nikki Cole, vice president of development and marketing.

There also were changes made to the reporting structure; i.e., who reports to whom.

"We are being proactive in other ways, as well, to respond to some of the surveys. For example, we are going to be looking at different pricing structures for the theater, depending on times," Richerson said.

On an overall basis, he said, he is pleased with the museum's first six months of operations. "I will admit I can't wait for Washington Street to be finished. We worked so hard to have the museum fronting Washington Street we want people to be able to use that entrance and to see it. And, of course, the flood didn't help our causes the last few weeks. I just hope the locusts aren't next," he said.

He did praise the city and volunteers who helped keep flood waters at bay and credited the museum designers for making sure it was built high enough that the flood waters didn't reach the building.

"I just wish the naysayers would come down and see what we're doing and talk to our guests. Attendance can always be better, but we're getting there. We're right there with the Caterpillar Visitors Center in attendance to date. People just need to be patient," Richerson said.

One area in which the Riverfront Museum is performing well is in education, he said. He cited a report given him on Tuesday by the museum's education department that showed 25 schools have visited through field trips that never visited Lakeview Museum. "We're seeing schools we're never seen before, some we've never even heard of. They are seeking us out from all over, even from Iowa. Also, we are doing a lot better job of serving the demographics of the community," he said.

Richerson said he believes communications problems with the Peoria County Board are improving. "We are ready to sit with the county and discuss our audit, which was more time consuming than was expected, and discuss our attendance. The meeting we had scheduled for today (Tuesday) was postponed by the county. I hope we can get it rescheduled soon," he said.