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Clay County TDC to tighten event-grant criteria and use Placer AI to measure return as staff prepare revamped guidelines
Summary
Director of Tourism Teddy Meyer said staff will return in August/September with revised grant parameters and reporting requirements intended to increase transparency, prioritize events that produce room nights and use analytics (Placer AI and hotel data) to measure impact.
Teddy Meyer, Clay County director of tourism, told the Tourist Development Council on July 16 that staff will bring a reworked set of event‑grant parameters, categories and deliverables to the board in September (staff offered to move the discussion to late August to align with county budget timelines).
Meyer said the goal is to increase transparency and fiscal accountability by clarifying which events belong in each grant category (sports grants, signature events, product development and sponsorships) and by tightening post‑event deliverables for recipients. "We've gotta just do a better job of tightening this thing up, and more so on the fiscal responsibility," Meyer said.
Staff outlined several analytic and policy tools they plan to use. They will expand use of Placer AI foot‑traffic reports combined with hotel room‑night data to estimate event impacts (origin ZIP codes, dwell time, demographic profiles). Staff demonstrated sample outputs: Orange Park Fall Festival registered roughly 32,000 visits with an average dwell time of about 74 minutes in prior reporting; the county reported the Rodeo at the Ranch sold roughly 2,000 tickets (event max capacity 3,000) and that the Pro Rodeo event reported roughly 8,500 visitors and an average dwell time of about 148 minutes in prior year Placer reporting.
Teddy and staff emphasized that not all events should be evaluated the same way — signature, community and sport events have different goals — but said the board should be able to compare applications against clear buckets of expected outcomes and required deliverables. Staff said previous product development grants (for example, work funded for the Bartram Trail Society) would continue but be subject to clearer milestones and reporting.
Several commissioners and board members suggested building in incentives or tiered payments tied to outcomes (for example, additional grant dollars if documented room nights or external ZIP‑code attendees exceed thresholds). Staff also said they will present strategies for a possible increase to the grant budget and timing to match the county's budget adoption cycle; staff noted the TDC budget for grants in 2025–26 is currently set at $250,000.
Meyer asked the board to expect a structured discussion in August or September and invited members to review sample Placer reports prior to the meeting.
