Alamogordo seeks tourism director to capture economic boost from White Sands visitation
The City of Alamogordo is seeking a tourism director, it hopes will help the city capture economic gain from the increased visitation to nearby White Sands National Park.
"The duties were always combined with other positions. The tourism duties were broken out, and a position was reclassified to tourism specialist. Having this position dedicated to tourism, is key to promoting our city," Stephanie Hernandez, assistant city manager said.
Hernandez said the position has a starting hourly rate of $20.21, though the qualifications of any candidate may mean an adjustment of that rate. According to a release from the city of Alamogordo, the position falls under the City's Community Services Department.
"We are putting more effort into our local businesses and boosting our special events," said Hernandez. "The City of Alamogordo is unique and beautiful that is has so much to offer visitors. We want to put 'feet on the streets' of Alamogordo."
Among the job's primary goals is to help implement a new strategy that remakes Alamogordo into "the base of White Sands National Park," the nation's newest national park which saw increasing number of visitors over the last several years and pumped over $46 million into nearby communities.
White Sands National Monument became White Sands National Park in an act by Congress on Dec. 20, 2019. According to the National Parks Service (NPS) website, between 2005 and 2015, the national monument saw as many as 497,506 visitors and as little as 428,924.
In 2017 White Sands National Park had 612,468 visitors, the most since 1997 when White Sands National Monument had 629,507 visitors.
Before COVID-19 was declared a pandemic in January 2020, White Sands National Park was visited by 608,785 people in 2019, the most visitors ever recorded to the site.
"White Sands National Park has experienced an increase in visibility and in visitation. However, park visitation is conflated with the increase in visitation during the height of the pandemic and may be difficult to parse," Marie Sauter, superintendent and public information officer for White Sands National Park, said.
In 2020, White Sands National Park only had 415,383 visitors, a 34% decrease from the prior year.
On March 22, 2020, the park closed due to COVID-19, but opened trails and roads July 2020 to the public.
In 2021 visitation spiked to 782,469, a record number for White Sands National Park.
"The traditional highest months of visitation for the monument and park have been March and the summer months. During the COVID pandemic, visitation followed the typical trends," Sauter said.
White Sands National Park officials predicted an increase in visitors throughout the 2023 spring and summer tourism season.
In its 2022 season, tourism to the park benefited the local economy with the creation of 630 support jobs and a $55 million injection into Alamogordo's local economy.
"We expect that visitation will continue to follow the trends and is on a slight uptick. White Sands (National Park) continues to be the most visited park in New Mexico," Sauter said.
Juan Corral can be reached at JCorral@gannett.com or on twitter at @Juan36Corr.
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This article originally appeared on Alamogordo Daily News: Alamogordo seeks tourism director to capture
