Board Meeting: Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
The NTA Board of Directors met Nov. 14 in Pittsburgh prior to the NTA Convention. Here is a recap of the meeting.
- The board held final discussions and approved the association's budget for 2009. Board members also reviewed the proposed format for the Convention again, which would take effect in 2009. They had limited discussions on the Convention, noting that at this point, they were most interested in getting broad member feedback, which would be shared with the 2009 Meetings and Events Committee in order to finalize the planning.
- Building on NTA's strategic agreements with industry organizations, the board approved a formal agreement with the American Tourism Society. For nearly 20 years, ATS has focused on providing education, cultural understanding and business opportunities in transformational nations such as Russia, the Baltic States, central and eastern Europe, the Middle East and Africa.
- The NTA-ATS agreement will include cooperative educational programming and opportunities for promotion and business development among the two organizations and their members. Just prior to the Convention, NTA finished joint work with ATS where members could attend the 2008 ATS conference and then participate in an NTA Product Development Trip in Egypt.
- Due to the change in domestic services by NTA corporate partner DHL, the board approved a new corporate partnership with FedEx. The program will be available to U.S. members and FedEx hopes to launch a Canadian program within the next several months. Also, NTA will continue to work with FedEx to push for the need of this service for its international members. More information on the discounts available to members will be shared as the details are finalized.
- Recognizing that arts organizations such as symphonies, operas, ballets, museums and dance companies often cannot join the association due to budget constraints, the board also approved a new membership category by which these types of entities could join as an arts consortia. This change does require a bylaw vote, so more information will be shared with tour operators before the vote takes place.