Attendees of the Regional Office of Sustainable Tourism’s Spring Social on Saturday, April 29 mingle in the gallery of the Lake Placid Center for the Arts. (News photo — Andy Flynn)

LAKE PLACID — About 120 people packed the Lake Placid Center for the Arts gallery Saturday evening, April 29, to mingle, network and catch up with the movers and shakers of this community at the Regional Office of Sustainable Tourism’s Spring Social.

The social — an annual ROOST tradition — had been paused for three years due to the COVID pandemic. Speeches were given by ROOST CEO Jim McKenna and Chief Operating Officer Mary Jane “MJ” Lawrence.

“One of the things that we, Jim and I, are most proud of … since we’ve all seen you is the ROOST staff,” Lawrence told the crowd. “They’re hard working. They’re dynamic. They push the limits. They’re always thinking outside the box.”

With drinks and finger food available, the crowd consisted of ROOST staff and board members, business owners, politicians and other residents active in the region’s communities.

Based in Lake Placid, ROOST is the destination marketing and management organization for Hamilton and Essex counties and the villages of Lake Placid, Tupper Lake and Saranac Lake.

Regional Office of Sustainable Tourism CEO Jim McKenna points to ROOST Board President Nick Politi during his Spring Social speech on Saturday, April 29 in the gallery of the Lake Placid Center for the Arts. (News photo — Andy Flynn)

Lawrence thanked LPCA Executive Director James Lemons and Managing Director Jon Donk for hosting the event, which was held just before a presentation of “Animal” by Cirque Alfonse.

“I called Jon about, oh, 27 times, and he answered every time, so that was well appreciated,” Lawrence said.

“What MJ didn’t tell you,” Lemons added in his speech, “is that she called Jon 27 times since 2 o’clock today.”

Spring Social attendees were surrounded by artwork. On display were creations from the Annual High School Juried Art Show, which features art from 147 students at six high schools around the region.

“We’re so thrilled to really highlight and celebrate the art that is happening in our high schools,” Lemons said, “and many of these students go on to study art in college and have professional careers or at least really good hobbies.”

In the lobby next to the auditorium were high school student photographs from the Lake Placid Institute’s contest, “24 Hours: A Photographic Interpretation of Life in the Adirondacks.”

In his speech, McKenna explained the new direction ROOST has taken in the past few years. During a staff retreat in January 2020, ROOST updated its strategic plan. The organization originally began as a tourism “marketing” organization but now includes tourism “management” in its mission.

“We’ve recognized clearly that successful tourism is first based on successful communities,” McKenna said. “And our organizations worldwide are called DMOs, destination marketing organizations. We’ve changed that, as some others too have around the world, to DMMO, destination marketing and management organizations.”

The pandemic accelerated ROOST’s new direction.

“Because we had to act more in different ways,” McKenna said, “not only as an information source for our region but also visitors potentially coming here had to really understand what was going on.”

Beginning in 2021, ROOST led the creation of a destination management plan for the village of Lake Placid and town of North Elba. It was designed to be “a strategic road map” for the next five to 10 years. In May 2022, ROOST announced that the plan was complete.

“That really lays out pillars on what must be accomplished to be successful long term to really make communities a better place to live and also a sustainable place to visit,” McKenna said, “because as time goes on, that’s going to be harder and harder to accomplish. Getting on top of it now we feel is very important.”

One recent accomplishment, McKenna said, was a 2% occupancy tax (added to the existing 3%) on visitors’ lodging, which was approved in June 2020 by the Essex County Board of Supervisors. The funds collected from the extra tax dollars go into two funds: the Community Tourism Enhancement Fund — a countywide program — and the North Elba Local Enhancement and Advancement Fund (LEAF), just for the town of North Elba.

“That’s getting direct dollars from visitors — 2% — and getting it back into the hands of the communities to enhance their communities, not used for marketing purposes,” McKenna said. “To date, over $3 million has been distributed around Essex County through those programs.”

The Adirondack Park has been a vacation destination since the early 1800s, but COVID sent tourism demand into overdrive, as many escaped the cities and came here. The region is within a day’s drive from the main population centers in the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec and U.S. states such as New York, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

“As climate change and everything else happens, this region is going to be a go-to place,” McKenna said. “That’s why the destination marketing and management plan is key to our future.”

In the future, ROOST staff will be working on solutions to the many challenges facing Adirondack residents, including housing, health care, community amenities and services.

“A viable destination must be a good community first for its residents,” McKenna said. “So we’ll be focusing not only on getting people here but making sure that our communities can sustain themselves over time.”

ROOST is also partnering with the village of Lake Placid and town of North Elba to create an economic development position.

“The purpose of that is to start really looking at diversifying the economy a little bit so we don’t always feel the ups and downs of tourism,” McKenna said. “We have other industries that will have real positive jobs to help round out the economies.”

ROOST’s marketing initiatives will continue, but they’ll be “more fine tuned,” according to McKenna.

ROOST will be using the Zartico Destination Operating System software to track cellphones and credit card purchases in the Adirondacks to help with that fine tuning. Zartico mainly tracks geolocation, spending and event data to find out where visitors are coming from, where are they going and how tourism marketing organizations such as ROOST can influence them. It allows clients to see visitor movement in near real time.

“We can see how people can move around the region,” McKenna said. “The end result of that, you can determine who are your best customers and concentrate on those as we move forward.”

ROOST will be increasing its focus on the arts, culinary destinations and agritourism — not just sports and the outdoors — and expanding its messaging for the Love Your ADK program, which asks visitors to take a pledge to become environmental stewards of the Adirondacks during their stays.

ROOST also recently launched a marketing campaign to attract visitors to the Adirondack Park to watch the total solar eclipse on April 8, 2024.

Learn more about ROOST at www.roostadk.com.