GLYNN: Mayor excited about Obama tourism initiative

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January 25, 2012

By Don Glynn Niagara Gazette The Niagara Gazette Wed Jan 25, 2012, 09:51 PM EST

Column by Don Glynn — President Obama takes a lot of heat, especially in an election year, but in one area even his most vocal critics must agree he is right on the money.

That’s evident from the new tourism initiative that is part of the president’s “We Can’t Wait Program.”

Mayor Paul A. Dyster, who recently returned from the U.S. Conference of Mayors in Washington, D.C., noted that one topic of particular interest at the annual meeting focused on tourism as an export industry.

“Obama is using the powers of his office to move the federal bureaucracy to help create jobs in the vital tourism sector,” Dyster said, adding the impact of the president’s program could be felt as early as the 2012 season.

Tourism is definitely big business on the local front but Dyster says, “We can do better.”

Based on recent industry projections, more than one million American jobs could be created over the next decade if we increase the U.S. share of the international market, Dyster says, “The president gets it. He’s taking action to create jobs now, when we need them the most.”

Obama’s initiative includes: making sharp improvements in visa processing; providing more assistance to travelers in understanding visa requirements; promoting and marketing visits to our national treasures (e.g. Niagara Falls and Yellowstone National Park); directing the Department of State and Homeland Security to increase the non-immigrant processing capacity in China and Brazil by 40 percent in 2012; and to develop a National Travel & Tourism Strategy to promote domestic and international throughout the U.S.

•••

CARROT & STICK: The Washington Post has praised Gov. Andrew Cuomo for insisting that school districts reform their teacher evaluation systems by 2013. If they fail in that effort, the governor warned, they will risk losing a share of the 4 percent statewide increase in education funding.

“No evaluation, no money, period,” Cuomo said in unveiling his annual budget message last week.

In an editorial, the Post noted that Cuomo, a Democrat, was willing to challenge the lawmakers and unions to overhaul how teachers are evaluated. He singled out the state Assembly for engineering teacher evaluation legislation in 2010 that was destined to fail and “protected the teacher union at the expense of the students,” the editorial stated.

Cuomo has enjoyed such strong popular support for his first year in office that his name sometimes surfaces on the list of future presidential candidates.

•••

ON THE MOVE: Nick Mattera, a former Niagara Gazette reporter who most recently was the communications manager for the Niagara Tourism and Convention Corp., is off to Las Vegas to work in the marketing department for several MGM hotel and casino properties.

A graduate of Buffalo State College, Mattera was named by the Associated Press as “The Best Young Journalist in New York State” for 2009-10.

We wish Nick all the best in his new challenge.

•••

REST OF STORY: Retired financial adviser Domenick Iannuzzi called the other day after my column item about President Eisenhower snubbing Niagara Falls native Sal (“The Barber”) Maglie after the 1956 World Series. Apparently that wasn’t the case.

Playing with the Brooklyn Dodgers at the time, Maglie pitched splendidly in a losing cause as Don Larsen of the Yankees had a perfect game.

When the series ended, however, Ike wrote a letter consoling the Dodgers’ Don Newcombe, the losing pitcher in the seventh game of that same series. In the new Eisenhower biography — that I quoted — there was no reference to Maglie’s stellar performance.

“The fact is, Ike did write to Maglie,” says Iannuzzi who found a copy of the White House letter in his attic. (Iannuzzi’s father, a close friend of Maglie’s, had kept the letter over the years.

•••

QUOTE OF THE DAY: “Making gambling more convenient to residents is not the answer to New York state’s budget or unemployment woes. Lawmakers are sworn to protect residents, not make it easier for them to lose money” — Paul Davies, a journalist and fellow at the Institute for American Values, commenting on Gov. Cuomo’s call to legalize casino gambling in the Empire State.

•••

GROWING OLD: Overheard in McDonald’s Restaurant in the City Market: “It’s nice to be here. In fact, at my age, it’s nice to be anywhere,” a customer slipping into a booth with his younger 80-year-old friends.

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