DATE: Tuesday, June 24, 1997                TAG: 9706240309

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B1   EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA 

SOURCE: BY CATHERINE KOZAK, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: MANTEO                            LENGTH:  104 lines

RETIRING TOURISM CHIEF CALLS FOR CHANGES HE SAYS THE DARE COUNTY AGENCY LACKS VISION.

Disagreement over how to market Dare County's biggest business may have prompted the executive director of the county's tourist bureau to retire a little early.

But Alvah Ward is not leaving quietly when he retires July 1. Ward said after 18 months as chief he is disappointed in the leadership and lack of vision of the agency.

``I just think there's some basic flaws in management and structure that need to be corrected,'' the 66-year-old Dare County native said in an interview. ``I really believe that we are marketing the same old furrows, the same old way as the days since (famed photographer and tourism pioneer) Aycock Brown.''

Promotional strategies should be expanded, especially to encourage more year-round visits from the Research Triangle, he said. Joint advertising and merchandising efforts should be established with surrounding counties, long-range planning should be stepped up and measures should be implemented to determine the effectiveness of the marketing strategies.

But Renee Cahoon, chairman of the Dare County Tourism Board, said some of things that Ward suggested are already being incorporated in future tourism plans. For instance, she said, the bureau will be conducting a study next year that will show if marketing efforts are working.

``I think we are moving on,'' Cahoon said. ``We've got a better handle on where we want to target. . . . We've been going through growing pains.''

The tourist bureau is currently advertising for Ward's replacement on the Internet and in professional travel publications. Tourism officials expect the $65,000 post to be filled by the fall.

``We're sorry to lose Alvah, and he's done a great job in his tenure,'' Cahoon said. Responding to Ward's criticism of the tourism board, she said, ``I think everybody has a right to their opinion. . . . No one person gets to do everything they want to do.''

Since Ward's involvement with the first tourist bureau in 1958, tourism has blossomed from a minor money-maker for county businesses to a full-blown multimillion-dollar enterprise.

When Ward chaired the original bureau 40 years ago, photographer Brown worked with Sara Owens, the wife of politician Bobby Owens Sr., sending out articles and photographs of the Outer Banks.

``Of course, they had no money. It was kind of a two-person band. They published the beginning of the original vacation guide - it was less than 12 pages,'' Ward recalled. ``But really, it worked because Aycock was smart and agile enough, and he had such a good relationship with the press. . . . He was really the daddy of tourism on the Outer Banks.''

Ward, born in Wanchese, said that despite its modest beginnings, the tourist bureau broke ground as one of the first of its kind in the state and the first to be funded by one-half of ABC profits. Eventually, as the county grew, the bureau began to be staffed with professionals - and the serious work of tourism promotion got more complicated.

Although Ward spent much of the 1980s - the tourism boom years - in Raleigh as the director of business and industrial development for the state Department of Commerce, he said he learned a good deal about promotion that could be applied to Dare County.

``There's very little difference in attracting business and attracting tourists,'' he said.

Tourism was nonexistent in Ward's early years, when his merchant seaman father started an ice plant in Wanchese. ``People don't realize: This was a very poor county - one of the poorest in the state.''

But tourism changed that, becoming the lifeblood of the Outer Banks economy. Markets should be pursued aggressively, Ward said. Care should be taken to promote Outer Banks assets: the upcoming 100th anniversary of the Wright brothers' flight; the new bridges and roadways on Highway 64; the movement of the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse; Blackbeard and pirate lore; and Manteo's most famous native son, state Sen. Marc Basnight, the president pro tempore of the Senate.

Ward said he also sees the ``rebirth'' of the Lost Colony and the building of the new Roanoke Island Festival Park, slated to open in 1998, as strong tourism attractions that should be promoted. But more importantly, he said, people have to know that the Outer Banks is here and what it has to offer.

``One of the things we see in North Carolina is that people have no idea where the Outer Banks is,'' Ward said. ``We need to do a better job of identifying where we are'' to North Carolina residents.

But a spokeswoman for the state Division of Travel and Tourism said the problem extends beyond the barrier islands.

``What we have found - whether it's pfisteria(a toxic algae blamed for fish kills in 1995) or hurricanes or whatever, our citizens do not have a handle on geography,'' said Susan Moran. She has even found, she added, that people from overseas think that North Carolina is somewhere in New England. And she gets calls all the time from folks within the state asking where the Neuse River is located. ``What's important here is that people don't know their geography.''

But she said the Outer Banks is one of the most visited and well-recognized places in North Carolina. ``There's so many great features . . . There's a lot of history,'' she said.

Exactly the point, Ward said. And once you get people to the barrier islands, you must help them find the attractions. He said the tourist bureau's new map last year helped, and the improvements at the Aycock Brown visitors center - which include new displays and exhibits - will give tourists a visual guide to the area. The $300,000 renovation will be completed by next summer. But visitors need more.

``We found that they have no idea of what this county is about. So as a result, they miss about a half of the attractions.''

Ward said he believes if the word got out to the right people, at the right time, year-round visitation would increase. And it would take not just better marketing, but a willingness on the part of businesses to adjust to a year-round work schedule.

``The mystique of the Outer Banks - that will sell whether it's November or July,'' Ward said. ``This is a very unique area. We just haven't told our story.''

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