The woman in charge of marketing Baltimore as a tourist destination is taking the reins of the Maryland Office of Tourism, the state said yesterday.
Margot Amelia, who will step into the executive director role Monday, spent three years at the Baltimore Area Convention and Visitors Association. Before that, while at a local advertising agency, she coordinated the marketing for a hotel chain. A Baltimore native, Amelia said she has enjoyed the opportunity to sell the city and is looking forward to widening her reach.
She's making the move to state government at a time when the tourism office faces potential budget cuts, "which is always what you want to hear when you take a new job," Amelia said wryly.
She said she wants to focus what funding she gets on "the highest-value prospects" for increasing visits to Maryland.
"Tourism is an incredibly important industry to the state," said Amelia, 49, a Roland Park resident who will earn $101,000 in her new job. "It's the fourth-largest."
The office's budget was $12.5 million in the fiscal year that ended last month.
Hannah L. Byron, the state's assistant secretary for tourism, film and the arts, said she has not been told how much money will be set aside for tourism this year.
Tourism leaders have long complained that Maryland is outspent by nearby states in the battle to attract visitors.
Amelia, who said the tourism office is redesigning its Web site and starting a new round of strategic planning, envisions an effort to reach not only out-of-state residents but also people inside Maryland.
Susan Jones, executive director of the Ocean City Hotel-Motel-Restaurant Association, hopes Amelia can persuade state officials not to slash tourism spending. Local merchants, meeting with Gov. Martin O'Malley last month, told him that visitor numbers have leveled off and begged him to increase marketing.
Jones said yesterday that the beach resort is struggling to overcome the perception that it's overpriced. Affordable Ocean City businesses don't have the budget to market themselves far and wide, she said.
"Tourism is economic development," said Jones, whose trade group has more than 350 members, including businesses that supply hotels, motels and restaurants. "In Ocean City, it's the only economic development we have."
The leisure and hospitality sector employs 240,000 in Maryland, from seasonal businesses to hotels across the state that operate year-round.
The industry is adding jobs at an annual rate of 2.7 percent, faster than any other sector - Ocean City's worries notwithstanding. That's an average of more than 500 new jobs a month.
Amelia said such growth underscores a need for the state to do more than simply market itself to tourists. It also needs to help expand the pool of available workers, she said. Large new projects are in the works, from Baltimore's convention center hotel to the Gaylord National Resort Hotel and Convention Center in Prince George's County.
"It's a big, big issue," Amelia said. "There's great need for new work force."
Michael Haynie, managing director of the Tremont Suite Hotels in downtown Baltimore, helped select Amelia for the job because he sits on the Maryland Tourism Development Board.
He calls her a "very smart marketer." While vice president of marketing for the Baltimore Area Convention and Visitors Association, Amelia stayed on task throughout the leadership upheaval at the quasi-city agency, he said.
"I thought she was absolutely the best candidate that we interviewed," Haynie said. "She's very much a big-picture person."
jamie.smith.hopkins@baltsun.com