Liaison Committee reports: Tourism, new corridor restaurants, and the Class of 2020’s graduation plight

The Town of Front Royal-Warren County Liaison Committee shared updates on several topics of mutual interest at its meeting of Thursday, July 16. Present for the county government hosting the meeting at the Warren County Government Center caucus room were Board of Supervisors Vice-Chair Cheryl Cullers, filling in for Chairman Walt Mabe, and North River Supervisor Delores Oates. The two county supervisors were accompanied by outgoing County Administrator Doug Stanley, soon-to-be Interim County Administrator Ed Daley and Board Clerk Emily Ciarrocchi as recording clerk.

Representing the Town were Mayor Gene Tewalt and Vice-Mayor Bill Sealock, accompanied by Interim Town Manager Matt Tederick, and for the meeting-opening report on new public meeting video contractor Swagit Productions Systems LLC, IT Director Todd Jones.

The Town-County Liaison Committee gets down to business at 6 p.m. Thursday evening in the WCGC Caucus Room. Royal Examiner Photos/Roger Bianchini – Royal Examiner Video/Mark Williams

Other topics of discussion were the status of: Tourism Promotion as the Town leads the County into private-sector management of the community’s Tourism marketing strategies and operations; Happy Creek Road improvements;

And on the County side: a Development Review Committee report on various projects underway; ongoing tweaks to the Building Inspection Software allowing remote access on applications designed to streamline the process for contractors working in the County; and County projects inside the town limits.

Tourism and Marketing

On the Tourism side, Tederick noted the contracting of the Norfolk-based “Strategic Solutions by Tricia, LLC”, on a short-term, 90-day basis.

“They’re going to be assisting the Town on the business recovery efforts with a primary focus on tourism marketing. The idea was to kind of have them fill the gap before the Front Royal-Warren County Joint Tourism Advisory Committee is really up and running,” Tederick told his County counterparts.

The interim town manager said a second meeting phone conference with the company “to try and give them greater direction” was scheduled Friday, July 17.

“Kerry has some really good ideas that we’d like to see implemented in the next 90 days,” Tederick added of Joint Tourism Advisory Board Vice-Chairman Kerry Barnhart. Vibe Properties partner Barnhart has taken the lead for the Joint Advisory Committee in researching the “metrics” and interactive “synergies” surrounding tourism marketing options and strategies.

Matt Tederick, center right, explains the process of moving forward with Tourism development and marketing.

“We were assuming we were going to be the fiscal agent and have the money run through. If the County doesn’t like that idea, then I don’t think it matters from the town council’s perspective,” Tederick said of his reason for having Tourism on the Liaison Committee agenda. He suggested an MOU (Memorandum of Understanding) between the municipalities “so we know how and when we’re going to disburse funds for tourism”.

Questioned after the meeting about the new tourism management contractor’s impact on Visitors Center staff and operations, Tederick said the Visitors Center would remain open, but at a reduced staffing level he attributed to reduced visitation due to the COVID-19 pandemic emergency response impacts on travel and tourism.

“Last week there was hardly anybody who came to the Visitors Center,” Tederick observed, adding, “So, two part-time people are going to be laid off; we’re keeping two part-time and the Tourism Coordinator, Tim Smith.”

Doug Stanley led the committee through the County side of the agenda and thanked town officials, including the mayor and interim town manager for their support over his years in county government.

In his last weeks on the job after being “involuntarily” separated from the county administrator’s job he has held for two decades, Doug Stanley thanked town officials with whom he has worked over the years who were present for their support in what was likely his last face-to-face meeting with them. And he gave an update on progress on construction of Chipotles and Five Guys restaurants in the North Corridor Riverton Commons Shopping Center, among other projects including the new hospital off Leach Run Parkway and a Harbor Freight moving into the old Big Lots space vacated by the latter’s move into the old Food Lion building.

What about graduation?!?

And speaking of COVID-19 pandemic impacts – we were at the end of the Tourism update – an unscheduled discussion on on-again, off-again plans for a live graduation ceremony for the two high schools’ 2020 graduates broke out near the meeting’s end.

“I have issues, well I’m a parent. So, this is Delores the parent, not Delores the supervisor,” Oates began after Cullers broached the topic. “This is an accomplishment that only happens once in a lifetime. And to minimize it drives me crazy because we had a protest six weeks ago where a thousand people were in the street and went into Bing Crosby Stadium. So, what’s the difference between Bing Crosby Stadium and Skyline’s football stadium,” Oates asked of the potential for a properly social distanced, outdoor graduation event.

Delores Oates, the parent, bemoans Class of 2020 graduates seemingly lost collective experience of that graduation.

“You use your common sense – you do what you need to do, but you let the kids have the experience that they’re only going to have once in their lifetime,” Oates added, noting that she had expressed her unhappiness at the move to cancel graduation activities to the Warren County School Board.

“Many of those children will never graduate from anything else; go off to a trade or whatever. So, it’s a big accomplishment,” Tederick observed of high school graduation’s significance in all people’s lives as they transition from childhood to adulthood.

In a lighter moment, Vice-Mayor Sealock’s videotaped prowess on the dance floor at the joint Warren-Skyline High prom event at Shenandoah Valley Golf Club was also acknowledged.

And Vice-Mayor Sealock, masked man foreground, asserted that he CAN hold his end up on the dance floor!

“Oh, he was getting it,” Oates observed as laughter erupted following Stanley’s description of Sealock patrolling the prom dance floor.

“I can do it,” Sealock asserted of his abilities on the dance floor.

See these discussions, their light and serious moments, and all the Liaison Committee’s Town and County updates in this Royal Examiner video: