This podcast contains comments from the December 11, 2023 College Station city council meeting.

Since September 2021, the city of College Station has a tourism committee that works with the city manager and the city's tourism office.

Board members represent hotels, attractions, and other local tourism businesses.

While many city advisory bodies includes councilmembers and hold meetings that are open to the public, the College Station tourism board does neither.

There was a discussion during December's College Station council meeting about providing more information the tourism board's activity to the council as well as the public.

Councilwoman Linda Harvell brought her past experience of directing four tourism agencies whose boards included council members.

Harvell, Elizabeth Cunha, and Dennis Maloney all supported having a councilmember on the tourism committee.

Maloney later said he could not argue with mayor John Nichols belief that open meetings of the tourism committee would lose their effectiveness because members would not be as candid with their remarks as they would when they meet privately with city staff.

There was a council majority to Nichols suggestion that tourism committee activity would be brought up twice a year during council workshops and a third time during budget deliberations.

College Station's tourism committee was created after the council decided to part ways with a former convention and tourism agency that also included the city of Bryan, Brazos County, and Texas A&M. Last known as Experience Bryan/College Station, that agency did have a board that included elected officials and held public meetings.

Click HERE to read and download presentation materials about the composition of the College Station city council's tourism committee.