Obama signs Travel Promotion Act

[babylonsister]

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/44/2010/03/obama-signs-travel-promotion-a.html?wprss=44

Obama signs Travel Promotion Act

By Michael A. Fletcher


President Obama Thursday enacted legislation to promote international travel to the United States by establishing a national tourism board that would coordinate advertising and other efforts to encourage foreigners to visit the United States.

As a bipartisan group of lawmakers looked on as Obama signed the bill in the Oval Office. The measure is aimed at reversing a decline in foreign visitors to the United States of nearly 10 percent over the past decade.

The board created by the new law would develop advertising and educational campaigns to help potential travelers navigate United States visa requirements and security procedures.

The effort is to be paid for by private sector contributions matched by a $10 fee on foreign visitors from countries who do not need a visa to enter the United States.

Advocates of the law say it would help attract 1.6 million new international visitors, $4 billion in new spending and more than $300 million in tax revenue each year.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (Nev.), who faces a tough re-election battle this year, was a strong backer of the bill in hopes it might aid the ailing economy of his tourism-reliant state.

[MannyGoldstein]

1. Great! A New Tax On Visitors To The US!

Anybody but the Rich are fair game, I guess.

[babylonsister]

3. No, great, because it will provide more people with employment.

Why are you so negative? And I'm sure you really care about visitors to the US. :eyes:

You just care about trashing anything and everything concerning this admin. Your schtick is getting very old, Manny.

[BadgerKid]

4. Some foreigners refuse to be fingerprinted

by default and have no desire to visit the US any time soon.

[IndianaGreen]

2. Yet, this President bans Americans from visiting Cuba, as his predecessors did

Hypocrisy you can believe in!

[ChicagoSuz219]

5. Must be easing up...

...I have two friends who were there a couple months ago.

[lunatica]

7. Hopefully that will end soon

[lunatica]

6. This is actually very good news if it works

We have a beautiful country and some wonderful cities. Places like San Francisco and New York City are places that depend on tourism for a lot of their revenue. I work in UC Berkeley and it has a tourist center with guided tours and it also has a big outreach program that has guided tours for school children. It's great. Especially when kids from the poorer communities come in because it puts the idea of college in their heads.

Great piece of legislation President Obama! This one will make a huge difference because it'll bring money here.

[Gormy Cuss]

8. If it works --- and that's the key.

It seems counter-intuitive to charge a fee to explain our onerous visa and security procedures as a way to promote more travel, but time will tell.

The fee will actually be more than $10 because TSA can charge a handling cost (one estimate that I saw was $2-$3.) On the plus side, frequent visitors will only be assessed fees every two years.

It will also be interesting to see if the countries which now grant U.S. citizens entry without VISA fees will implement tourism fees too.

[Cha]

9. This is really another GREAT turnaround

from the Orwellian nightmare years.