Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1507211
36 B M & T ••• September/October 2023 ••• www.blackmeetingsandtourism.com These are excellent recommendations for ALL travel- ers and NON travelers. In Black Meetings & Tourism's July/August '23 Publishers' message, entitled Lighting a Candle to The Darkness in Florida - https://digital.cop- comm.com/i/1503289-july-august-2023/4? - BM&T offers additional considerations particularly for African- Americans as they travel anywhere, to make their travel dollars COUNT and to economically empower communi- ties of color, front line Travel Industry workers and Black-owned businesses that rely on the travel industry for their livelihood. These include: • Whenever possible, stay at a Black owned hotel or a bed-and-breakfast • Utilize the services of an African-American travel agent or travel specialist • Visit an African-American attraction, historic site or venue • Dine at ethnic eateries • Seek out the services of Black owned businesses through the local African American and/or Black Chamber of Commerce. Groups, meetings, conferences and conventions stand to leverage their travel SPEND even more in their plan- ning and negotiations with destination marketing compa- nies and hotels by essentially becoming advocates for African-Americans in the Travel Industry. During the years that Robert Johns was Executive Director of the National Dental Association he made a point to incorpo- rate the questions below, which we urge all planners to adopt, as a part of their standard RFP process: • How many African Americans are there in manage- rial positions at your company? • Does your company's promotional marketing cam- paign include ads regularly placed in Black OWNED media? • Do you provide advancement and opportunities for entry level employees? • Does your company engage in supportive and enriching activities and programs that benefit the African-American community? Going back to our initial question regarding whether or not travelers should visit Florida, prompts another question: if you don't go to Florida, where should you travel…Alabama? While the spotlight is focused so intensely on Florida, it is not the only state that has enact- ed these types of regressive legislation. To date, over 43 states have introduced bills or taken other steps that restrict teaching critical race theory or in some way limit how teachers can discuss racism and sexism. Currently 18 states have imposed, bands, or restrictions on education, through legislation, or by other means Inhibiting the FREEDOM of TRAVEL for which African-Americans have fought long and hard to achieve and which, is a privilege that many in this country consid- er to be one of those inalienable rights, as precious as "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness," does not appear to offer a solution to the problems that are inher- ent in the situation that exists in Florida and other states. Most of you know that over the years, many attempts have been made to hide, bury or distort the history of African-Americans and Native Americans. This is not the Travel Industry's "first rodeo" of having to address these issues front and center. See BM&T's article "BLACK AMERICA 250 – Telling Your Stories of the Nation, in the May/June 2023 issue of Black Meetings &Tourism magazine - https://digital.copcomm.com/i/-1498279-may- june-2023/44?. Moving the needle forward this time to any significant degree may require the power of people's discontent, com- mitment and outrage, expressed in a way we witnessed when during the height of a global pandemic, day after day, people of every nationality, age group, sexual preference and reli- gious persuasion across the nation and around the world, BANDED together to demand CHANGE. Perhaps more than ever, everyone's VOICE, VOTE and DOLLARS are need- ed. The passionate words of the late U.S, congressman and civil rights icon, John Lewis, "when you see something wrong…SAY some- thing, DO something," are as rele- vant TODAY as they were in the 1960's when he first spoke them. YOUR efforts and ours will make the DIFFERENCE. JOHN LEWIS