Eye on the future: Tampa Bay

Eye on the future:

Tampa Bay was tested but not broken in 2020 and promising signs abound

Due to its privileged location in the Gulf of Mexico, with clear blue waters and barrier islands – not to mention its proximity to the three largest cruise ports in the world – the Tampa Bay region’s tourism sector has long been one of its strongest GDP generators. In 2019, tourism in Hillsborough County alone brought in $6.9 billion from 24.5 million visitors, according to a study by Tourism Economics. Pre-pandemic the sector supported over 54,000 jobs and generated $2.5 billion in wages. Around $840 per household was saved in taxes due to the sector.

While the full impact of the pandemic on tourism, arts and culture remains uncertain, it is clear that these were the main casualties of the 2020 COVID-19 crisis. Preliminary figures show that Pinellas County took a $2 billion economic hit in 2020 as the tourism industry was disrupted, with Visit Tampa Bay’s tourism tax dropping by more than 40% year on year in October. Florida’s tourist numbers declined over 10% year over year in the first quarter of 2020, with air travel down 10.3% and hotel occupancy dipping over 15%.

Nevertheless, the tourism sector in Tampa Bay has displayed resilience and is already well on its way to recovery. And there are plenty of reasons to remain optimistic, with the region having pulled off a successful Super Bowl at the beginning of February and several more high-profile events for the year including the Sunset Music Festival in May and Tampa Bay Comic Con in July.

Landscape The biggest learning curve in 2020 for Florida’s hospitality and tourism industry was when the shelter in place order was issued by the governor in March. Having been poised for a banner 2020, with a slew of high-profile events that included WrestleMania, March Madness and SuperBowl LV, the industry was left reeling from the prospect of months without any form of income. Job losses were unavoidable as airlines were grounded and faced disruption in services for over a year. At the beginning of 2021, both American Airlines and Southwest Airlines had lost about 35,000 employees and United notified about 14,000 employees of impending furlough plans.

Tourism-exposed businesses were luckily able to mitigate some of the losses through government assistance programs, including small business loans, the PPP loan program and the Main Street Lending program. A long-awaited second stimulus totaling ( )