When people are struggling to pay bills, when government is expected to feed and house children, when private industry is relying increasingly more on government grants to pad the bottom line; one must ask why tourism is still considered to hold high potential for generating wealth. Granted, some places have mystique or notoriety that will inspire people to eat dry rice and live in the dark to save up for a trip. With gas prices at $4.00 a gallon and up, people are likely to say of Western North Carolina, “Been there, done that.”

Yet tourism is like incantations and awareness. One can make money off doing nothing if they pitch it correctly. That government has overextended sufficiently to be enticed by opportunities for taxation without representation is sorry. In the town of Canton, however, leadership does not want to pay staff to operate the visitor center serving drivers on I-40. Staffing the center didn’t make the 86% cutline when Canton was paring down its budget. Customer attendance has been down drastically. People are spending less on tourism, and they’re using GPS systems so they don’t have to ask for directions. The TDA is of a different opinion. Some of the problem may have been due to a rock slide. It could be argued that some more of it pertained to the TDA not having enough money to brand Canton and engage in a countrywide advertising campaign.