CVB SHOULD LOOK AT VOLUNTEER APPROACH AGAIN

Cape Girardeau's Convention and Visitors Bureau board is taking a closer look at its pay schedule for employees who used to be volunteers. It is an examination that is well overdue.

The Paddlewheelers, which is what the CVB workers are called, have been around for many years, greeting visitors, docking riverboats, but convention attendees. In recent years, the CVB has begun to pay them. Today, Paddlewheeler pay accounts for $129,000 -- more than half of the CBV's annual budget. These tax dollars could be better used to promote the city outside of the region.

The CVB should rethink the notion of volunteers to help the city. After all, many other organizations -- such as both local hospitals -- mobilize a virtual army of volunteers for many different vital services. CBV board members and staff might want to learn the secret of these group's success in recruiting and keeping volunteers.

A proposed expansion of the city's hotel-motel-restaurant tax will be placed on the ballot in April. The city wants to better define restaurants in the tax.

But before people vote on the tax, it would behoove the city to explain exactly how these tax dollars are going to be spent -- including the use of these dollars to pay CVB workers.