Through the Discover America Partnership and the U.S. Travel Association’s Ready for Takeoff Report, the Mayors agreed with report recommendations to tackle the following key barriers:
- A highly inefficient and unpredictable visa application approval process.
- Lack of personnel to process and interview visa applicants and lack of access to a U.S. consular facility.
- Poor planning and communication to applicants.
- Attract 98 million more legitimate visitors.
- Create an additional 1.3 million U.S. jobs by 2020 compared with 2010.
- Inject $859 billion into the U.S. economy.
- A 2008 survey of air travelers found that 28% of travelers avoided at least one trip because of air travel hassles, which translates into a $26.5 billion dollar loss to the U.S. economy, including $4.2 billion in federal, state and local tax revenue.
- In a 2010 survey conducted by Consensus Research Group, American travelers would take an additional 2 to 3 flights per year if the hassles in security screening system were eliminated, and these additional flights would add nearly $85 billion in consumer spending and 900,000 jobs to the American economy.
Support of the President’s High Speed Rail Initiative
High speed rail will put thousands of Americans to work, save hundreds of thousands of hours for American travelers every year, and boost U.S. manufacturing by investing hundreds of millions of dollars in next-generation, American-made locomotives and rail cars.
- Send a letter to your mayor supporting these initiatives. Find out how your organization can help. No matter the size of your event services company, every letter, email, and phone call helps.
- Lobby your U.S. Congressman and Senator. If you are going to Washington D.C. sometime in the next year, contact your legislators for a meeting. Find out what action they are taking on these resolutions and ask how you can help make them a reality.
- Work with the U.S. Travel Association to spread the word to other industry partners.