{"id":37004,"date":"2022-07-20T09:27:11","date_gmt":"2022-07-20T13:27:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/?p=37004"},"modified":"2022-07-20T09:27:13","modified_gmt":"2022-07-20T13:27:13","slug":"commissioners-seek-to-increase-historic-tourism-in-the-county","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/?p=37004","title":{"rendered":"Commissioners seek to increase historic tourism in the county"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-16503\" src=\"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/ChesterCountyLogo.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"303\" height=\"300\" \/>The Chester County Commissioners recently approved a $156,000 contract with Luzerne County-based <a href=\"https:\/\/heritagestrategies.com\/index.htm\">Heritage Strategies<\/a> LLC to bolster historic tourism in the county.<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cOur historic tourism sector of the economy was damaged by the pandemic,\u201d said County Commissioners\u2019 Chair Marian Moskowitz.\u00a0 \u201cThe plan here calls for our consultant to help us rebuild the lost tourism, especially as we lead up to, and prepare for Chester County\u2019s celebration of our nation\u2019s 250<sup>th<\/sup> anniversary in 2026.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Delaware Valley Regional Finance Authority is providing the funding as part of the County\u2019s VISTA2025 economic development strategy, a public-private partnership.\u00a0 The premise of VISTA 2025 is that progress and preservation are complementary elements that support\u00a0economic health\u00a0while maintaining the \u201csense of place\u201d that makes Chester County so attractive to residents and businesses.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cOur Chester County Planning Commission is partnering with the Chester County History Center, the Heritage Task Force, Chester County Conference and Visitors Bureau, and America250PA Chester County Commission to increase capacity and marketing of visitor sites,\u201d noted County Commissioner Josh Maxwell. \u201cHeritage Strategies has demonstrated experience in heritage interpretation and marketing, and we are confident that they can bring these groups together to develop a comprehensive program that provides robust experiences for visitors.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Working with these groups, Heritage Strategies will lead a multi-faceted effort that includes:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Improved interpretation of existing sites of historic and cultural resources of sites of tremendous significance;<\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Creation of new centers for information to tell the county\u2019s full story;<\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Better defined routing to increase connectivity to these resources; and<\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Marketing strategies to target audiences that increases the number of visitors.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">County Commissioner Michelle Kichline, who is leading the county\u2019s America250 semiquincentennial commemoration, said the overarching goal of this project is creation of a comprehensive plan that will continue to support heritage tourism well into the future.<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cThe plan will give us clearer direction for the 250th celebration, and it will also encourage ongoing investment into the maintenance and preservation of historic entities, creating community pride in the unique history and identity of Chester County,\u201d Kichline said.<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Work on the plan will begin immediately. The Chester County Planning Commission estimates it will take about 18 months to complete.<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cThe first year will entail conducting a needs assessment of existing conditions and creating a capacity building plan,\u201d said Brian O\u2019Leary, Executive Director of the Chester County Planning Commission.\u00a0 \u201cThe final six months of the plan\u2019s development will focus on a locational analysis, touring routes, and wayfinding as well as a marketing plan.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Heritage Strategies is a collaboration of three long-time colleagues whose cross-sectoral specialties encompass the fields of planning, landscape architecture, and architecture\u2014all focused on historic preservation and heritage development.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Chester County Commissioners recently approved a $156,000 contract with Luzerne County-based Heritage Strategies LLC to bolster historic tourism in the county. \u201cOur historic tourism sector of the economy was damaged by the pandemic,\u201d said County Commissioners\u2019 Chair Marian Moskowitz.\u00a0 \u201cThe plan here calls for our consultant to help us rebuild the lost tourism, especially [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37003,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[138,6269,13997],"class_list":["post-37004","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-chester-county","tag-featured","tag-historic-tourism"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37004","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=37004"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37004\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":37005,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37004\/revisions\/37005"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/37003"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=37004"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=37004"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=37004"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}