The Sedona City Council approved a new contract with the Sedona Chamber of Commerce for operation of the Uptown Visitor Center on March 11, as well as authorizing city staff to spend $115,000 installing three information kiosks.

Visitor Center

City Communications Manager Lauren Browne said that the city’s Tourism Advisory Board had recommended that the physical Visitor Center be maintained permanently on the basis of the existing 80-20 funding model split between the city and the chamber, respectively, as well as suggesting the introduction of other elements such as “a curated trail map to assist with visitor management” and “an artificial intelligence chatbot.”

“To me it’s very impersonal,” Mayor Scott Jablow said of the chatbot concept. “I hate the AI.”

Browne also said that city staff were in the process of having the Visitor Center wrapped with the city’s branding information, for which the city is paying.

The Visitor Center’s bed tax funded expenses budget for FY25 was $426,535, of which the city’s share was $341,228, while the proposed FY26 contract put the center’s budget at $439,300 with a city contribution of $351,440. The contract also gave the city the option to renew for FY27 for $358,892.

The city’s FY25 tourism and economic initiatives budget was $2,097,730.

Chamber president David Key attributed the budget’s growth to factors including building maintenance, an expected increase in utility costs due to Arizona Water Company’s proposed 48% rate increase and salary increases. “We’ve got good people, we’re going to keep them and we’re going to keep them happy,” Key said.

Key said that the Visitor Center saw 156,713 walk-in visitors in fiscal year 2024 against a goal of 150,000, with volunteers providing a total of 7,076 hours to operate the center for 57 hours per week. For FY25 so far, the center has seen 75,051 visitors, or 50% of its goal, compared to 43% of the goal at the same time last year.

“We moved from a mortgage interest reimbursement style to a rent, and that rent of $25,500 for a year for a prop erty of that size in Uptown is really a great rate, to say the least,” Key said. “We moved from two full-time staff to one part-time director, eight part-time people” as well as about 30 volunteers. Citing information provided by Sedona Historical Museum Executive Director Nate Meyers, Key noted that the museum saw an estimated $22,000 in revenue from admissions and gift shop sales in 2024 attributed to Visitor Center referrals.

Key added that part of the center’s community value would derive from its promotion of visitation that was “eco-conscious, conscious of the residents here.”

Tourism Manager Andrew Grossman connected the role of the Visitor Center to city efforts to control visitors.

“We want to be able to control the narrative about how we want you experience the expectations that we set around responsible and respectful use,” Grossman said. “That’s really what our marketing campaigns are designed to be.”

“The challenge is that it’s a lot of decentralized actors that are the ones that are sharing information to visitors,” Grossman continued. “How we present information to get you to come to Sedona should reflect the similar type of information you get when you arrive, and allows us to really kind of control to make sure that the presentation is what we want. We’ll continue to lean into this idea of reputation management.”

“How can the [Sedona] Lodging Council, and vis-a-vis the private sector industry here, the tourism businesses, share that communication?” Grossman asked, discussing city staff’s initiatives to get hotels to share city messaging. “It becomes the role of the private sector to communicate after the bookings.”

‘Giant Cellphones’

Grossman presented the council with a proposal to install two or three digital information kiosks — which Councilman Brian Fultz described as “giant cellphones” — in “priority visitor locations” in Uptown to promote city messaging and steer tourists to certain locations.

“Some folks were engaging with it, but then they would come up to the counter to validate what they were getting from the kiosk, so it didn’t really save time,” former chamber President Michelle Kostecki told council in April 2024 when discussing possible kiosks.

“If we can create a more informed visitor that understands our expectations of them, understands our recommendations for how we would curate this place, ideally they’ll move faster or with less friction,” Grossman said. “A digital kiosk strategy helps us not only communicate that we have additional touch points but gives us a way to report on the actual engagements.”

Grossman said digital kiosks displaying trail maps would allow city staff to determine which trails are displayed on those maps.

“We can essentially curate our own custom maps within AllTrails, so we can define which trails show up on the map,” Grossman said. “We know that the social trails are on AllTrails. I met with them this month, and I understand that there’s a way that we can help getting a vendor on board to go into Open Street Maps to recategorize the presentation of social trails or non-system trails, and that essentially deprioritizes them on this.”

“Hypothetically, I can toggle on and off trails throughout the day,” Grossman said. “We can control the narrative around what we want you to hike, and we can share that with everybody, and we can change it in real time.” Grossman also said that he was negotiating with map providers to remove social trails from their systems entirely and suggested the idea of including a large photo of Devil’s Bridge with each kiosk for tourists to take photos with instead of hiking to the formation.

Social trails are regularly used shortcuts or detours off designated trails.

Comments

“None of us could imagine having visitor services in Sedona without a physical Visitor Center,” TAB member and Keep Sedona Beautiful President Craig Swanson said.

“Visitors will benefit from quick access to information through these tools while still having the ability to talk with a friendly, knowledge able volunteer and staff at the Visitor Center,” Lodging Council President Cheryl Barron said.

Chamber Visitor Services Director Victoria Latunski said international visitors especially appreciate a face to-face experience with Visitor Center volunteers.

“Personally, I’m resistant, as I do not love technology,” Dyanna Nichols said. “Even though I am opposed, I feel that it’s a great move for our city.”

Fultz said he felt compelled to respect the TAB’s recommendations and would support both proposals.

“Mayor, the kiosks are not for you, Mr. I-don’t-like AI-chatbots,” Fultz said. “I think it’s pretty cool.”

“I will not complain about $30,000 giant cellphones now,” Fultz added.

“I have never been a fan of the Visitor Center in Uptown,” Councilwoman Melissa Dunn said. “I’m willing to fund it for another year because I would love to get more information about what people are actually doing in the Visitor Center.”

“Recently I was overseas and they’re everywhere, kiosks,” Vice Mayor Holli Ploog said. “I support the one-year extension … and the technology now.”

Councilman Derek Pfaff said that after thinking cutting the Visitor Center could save money, “I am definitely in favor of funding it for another year. I think it’s great for people to have the one-on-one.”

“The kiosks I feel differently about,” Pfaff added. “The technology already exists right on our phones. I think we could accomplish the same thing with signs advertising our website.”

Councilman Pete Furman said he was “uncomfortable” with the Visitor Center giving business or restaurant recommendations instead of encouraging visitors to stay longer or directing them, but would support the contract renewal as well as the kiosks.

“I think this is the way of the future,” Councilwoman Kathy Kinsella said of the kiosks. “This actually might entice people to go to the Visitor Center.”

“In Uptown I think the kiosk is important,” Jablow said.

Council approved the chamber contract by a 7-0 vote and the kiosk purchase by a 6-1 vote, with Pfaff opposed to the latter.