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New tourism boss rides wave of success

Lee County's beach champion will run the show in Pinellas.

By STEVE HUETTEL
Published April 3, 2007

Pinellas officials looked south to another Florida beach destination to tap the county's new tourism boss.

Dana Troy "D.T." Minich, executive director of Lee County's tourism marketing agency, was named Monday to take over the top job, effective April 30, at the St. Petersburg/Clearwater Area Convention & Visitors Bureau.

Minich, 43, worked to develop Lee's eco-tourism, expand airline service and re-brand the destination from the vanilla "Lee Island Coast" to "The Beaches of Sanibel and Fort Myers," wrote Pinellas County Administrator Stephen Spratt in a memo Monday.

"He has the ideal mix of experience and skills for our tourism market," Spratt said. "He can hit the ground with minimal transition training."

Minich will replace Carole Ketterhagen, who is retiring after 15 years running the local tourism bureau. He started as a public relations intern for the Lee County tourism bureau 15 years ago and worked up through sales and management jobs to the executive director post in 2000.

Minich led marketing campaigns to bring tourists back after Hurricane Charley in 2004 and Hurricane Wilma in 2005 whipped through the county.

Minich didn't originally apply for the Pinellas job. But after 48 candidates were winnowed down to three finalists, Spratt asked county officials to reach out to Florida tourism directors.

He then cut the list to Minich, Tim Hemphill, executive director of the Kissimmee-St. Cloud Convention & Visitors Bureau, and Lee Daniel, Ketterhagen's No. 2 at the Pinellas agency.

In the end, Spratt wanted someone with experience running a tourism bureau for a Florida beach destination - "a little bit of a specialized niche," he said.

Minich will earn $155,000 a year. Ketterhagen, who will work on special projects until her retirement in August, makes $135,000.

"I need to be a big sponge for the first couple months, get to know everything and everybody," Minich said.

He had to search on Google with the local agency's address to find where his new office is located.

Once Minich gets his feet wet, Spratt said, he wants him to look for the reasons behind recent declines in European tourists and review how the county is marketing itself as a destination.

Steve Huettel can be reached at huettel@sptimes.com or (813) 226-3384.

[Last modified April 2, 2007, 22:50:19]