SACRAMENTO, CA – Assemblywoman Sharon Quirk-Silva (D – Orange County) Chair of the Assembly Arts, Entertainment, Sports, Tourism, and Internet Media issued the following statement about the $95 million going towards California Tourism by Governor Newsom.
“For our travel and tourism industry, there was no such thing as work from home,” said Assemblywoman Sharon Quirk-Silva. “As the State continues to work towards reopening, many of our tourism attractions are facing significant deficits. With many of them working on plans for reopening to the public, this one-time stimulus funding will accelerate their return and help get Californians back to work.”
The travel and tourism industry has lost half of an estimated 1.2 million jobs during the pandemic. With travel spending expected to near $98 billion this year and $126 billion in 2022, topping $151 billion in 2024, the trend looks to have a bounce back for many of our tourism industry businesses.
“California’s tourism economy, $145 billion strong in 2019, cratered during the pandemic. Hundreds of thousands of hospitality workers were unemployed and state and local governments took a $6.6 billion hit due to lost taxes. We’ve been working for over a year with CalTravel on a recovery plan to help get hard working Californians safely back to work and the tourism sector reopened in partnership with the California Department of Public Health,” Senator Mike McGuire said. “The Governor’s announcement this morning will be a massive shot in the arm to the Golden State’s economy and help thousands of tourism-based businesses in every corner of California open their doors, rehire tens of thousands of employees and put out the welcome mat to travelers. We look forward to getting this funding proposal across the budget finish line in the coming weeks.”
Governor Newsom’s $95 million proposal would assist California’s tourism economy that has been gravely impacted. This funding will help our tourism industry recover from the devastating loss we saw in 2020. This one-time investment is projected to deliver $35.8 billion in new visitor revenue for California businesses and restore more than 330,000 jobs.
“I have advocated to assist our tourism attractions, such as Disneyland, Universal Studios, and Knott’s Berry Farm to return back to business, as we have seen a significant impact these theme parks have on our surrounding local businesses,” said Assemblywoman Sharon Quirk-Silva. “I am confident that this $95 million will help our California businesses to revitalize the economy and see visitors come back to see California’s iconic tourism attractions.”
The Governor’s support with this allocation of money is appreciated by the entire tourism industry that faced projections of not being able to recover until 2024. This funding will allow them to jumpstart their recovery and allow California to continue to be the number one travel destination.