Two newly elected members were sworn into the Marianas Visitors Authority board, while four current board members were also sworn for another term during the MVA\u2019s board meeting in San Jose last Aug. 5.<\/p>\n
Board members Marian Aldan-Pierce will remain as chairwoman, Gloria Cavanagh will remain as vice chairwoman, Agida Quitugua will remain as secretary, while re-elected director Chris Nelson will take over as treasurer. Masato Tezuka, Japanese Society of Northern Marianas president who is also on the Governor\u2019s Council of Economic Advisers, and Ivan Quichocho, TanHoldings executive, are the newly elected board members.<\/p>\n
Aldan-Pierce said the board also needs to create a finance committee and a personnel committee, and to focus on destination enhancement. According to her, this will be a big part of their objective for this and next year.<\/p>\n
As of right now, there are currently no marketing promotion. \u201cThere\u2019s no market but it\u2019s actually very key that we have that discussion with offshore and the current situation that we are in,\u201d said Warren Villagomez, who is another board member.<\/p>\n
Since Villagomez heads the Governor\u2019s COVID-19 Task Force, he was nominated to participate in marketing, as well to give suggestions given \u201cthe new norm of COVID-19.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI know we\u2019ve all kind of wonder what tourism is going to look like here in the near and far future and everyone I talked to is always brainstorming on what we could possibly do in the near- and long-term,\u201d said Nelson.<\/p>\n
Nelson suggested during the public comments portion of the board meeting if the task force is comfortable with the idea of having small universities ship some students to the islands as part of a \u201cin-person school\u201d where they could study marine biology and more per semester.<\/p>\n
Aldan-Pierce said this is something for the Governor\u2019s Council of Economic Advisers to look into since they\u2019re looking for a new business ideas for the CNMI. Additionally, since the islands have about 2,200 hotel rooms to fill, Nelson said it would take 5,000 kids to fill up every hotel room. He added that the students will have to quarantine, if the \u201cin-person school\u201d were to happen.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe students could come in quarantine at the hotel and a two-week quarantine isn\u2019t so bad if you\u2019re staying for months in a place,\u201d said Nelson. \u201cThat\u2019s something we could talk about as a community if that\u2019s something that the task force could be comfortable with.\u201d<\/p>\n
Although this is just a thought, bringing this idea to the economic council will help it look for \u201cdifferent businesses.\u201d \u201cThe governor\u2019s advisory board, basically has a committee…and they\u2019re looking to different businesses for the CNMI, and that is a start,\u201d said Cavanagh.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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