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PUBLIC TESTIMONY
Testimony by Julie Coker, President and CEO of New York City Tourism and Conventions, on the status of NYC's tourism and hospitality industry
1:55:38
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3 min
Julie Coker, President and CEO of New York City Tourism and Conventions, provided testimony on the current state of New York City's tourism and hospitality industry, highlighting the progress made since the pandemic and the challenges still facing the sector. She emphasized the need for dedicated funding to remain competitive with other major cities and to support various community programs.
- The organization's mission is to maximize inbound travel, build economic prosperity, and promote the image of NYC's five boroughs globally.
- While visitor numbers have improved since the pandemic (64.5 million in 2024), they are still below the pre-pandemic forecast of 76 million for 2024.
- Coker stressed the need for increased funding to maintain NYC's competitiveness, especially in the face of rising competition from other first-tier meeting cities and potential economic challenges.
Julie Coker
1:55:38
Good afternoon, majority leader, Ferris, and members of economic development committee.
1:55:43
I am Julie Coker, and I'm the president and CEO of New York City Tourism and Conventions.
1:55:48
I thank you for this opportunity to share the current status of the city's tourism and hospitality industry and our efforts along with our government and private sector partners to revitalize the industry as we work for a full recovery.
1:56:02
I would like to take a moment to provide a quick background of who we are and what we do as an organization.
1:56:11
And it's the we are New York City Tourism is the official destination marketing organization and convention of visitors bureau for the five boroughs to New York City.
1:56:20
Our mission is threefold, maximizing inbound travel, building economic prosperity, and spreading the dynamic image of five boroughs around the world.
1:56:29
We're a five zero one c six not for profit member organization and represent the interest of 1,400 member businesses and organizations across the five boroughs.
1:56:38
We are governed by a 81 member board and I am gonna skip ahead.
1:56:45
Prior to the pandemic, twenty nineteen was the tenth consecutive year of growth in the number of visitors, importantly, in visitor spend.
1:56:54
The first of the pandemic the first year of the pandemic hit our industry very hard.
1:56:58
The good news is as we sit here in 2025, '5 years later, there are things things are looking much more positive.
1:57:05
What I really highlight today is that in 2019, we forecasted to be at 76,000,000 visitors in 2024.
1:57:15
And while we are grateful and excited about the 64,500,000 visitors that we had last year, as you can see it is well below what we originally forecasted.
1:57:26
And for those reasons, we are extremely concerned and wanna just highlight that we need dedicated funding for this upcoming fiscal year so that we can be may we can remain competitive.
Amanda Farías
1:57:39
Please continue.
1:57:40
Okay.
Julie Coker
1:57:42
What I'd say is as we plan for the next eight months of this year and into 2026, New York City is facing increased competition.
1:57:50
Domestic visitors are traveling internationally again, and businesses are traveling travelers are becoming more cautious as concerns about a recession swirl.
1:57:59
And more importantly, first tier meeting cities such as Dallas and Los Angeles and Vegas have bid funds that are making them also much more competitive for the meetings market.
1:58:11
Where we really need to double down is that we need to take a look at the fact that we just recently adjusted our forecast for international travelers down 3%.
1:58:22
And as we are all watching the conversations around tariffs unfold, there is a concern about our forecast that we just recently did and we're hoping that we can hold those numbers.
1:58:35
What's really important about the funding that we offer is that it supports community programs like New York Restaurant Week and New York Restaurant Week New York outings, I should say, which is a part of Restaurant Week, Hotel Week, and Must and Must Attractions Week.
1:58:53
In fiscal year twenty twenty six, without increased funding, we will cut we will need to cut back on our global presence further and further, and this will reduce community programs and may have other lasting cuts that will essentially make New York City not competitive.