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CAPE MAY - Temple University will help market the city's new convention facility.

Mayor Ed Mahaney, a graduate who has earned three degrees at Temple, made the announcement this week.

Temple's School of Tourism and Hospitality Management, which is affiliated with the university's Fox School of Business, will spend 19 months helping get the $10.5 million facility going.

"There will be Temple students working here as part-time students and doing internships," Mahaney said.

The facility is not built yet, but the city is close to garnering a state Coastal Area Facility Review Act permit and hopes to demolish the old hall and begin building the new one this fall. The facility is slated to open for the 2011 tourism season.

Mahaney said Temple students helped market the harbor area in Baltimore and other tourist sites. The deal will cost the city $53,000, while Temple will provide $30,000 over the course of the partnership.

Mahaney released a list of things the school will help out with - and one of the goals is to help the city reverse a trend that has shrunk the tourism economy from 10.5 months per year just a few years ago to about seven or eight months per year now. He said the longer economy gives businesses a better chance to stay here and pay taxes. It also gives the residents who own those businesses a better chance to live here and pay taxes.

"Temple has the experience to complete a business plan and a management plan for our new multi-purpose convention hall," Mahaney said.

Students and professors will work with the city Department of Civic Affairs and Recreation staff who ran the old convention facility, which is closed due to structural problems.

The mayor said one goal is to make the new facility as economically self-sustaining as possible. The public, he noted, does not want it to be a drain on city coffers. One goal for Temple students is find ways to fill the hall with events as often as possible.

Mahaney said this should include all the programs the old hall had, many of which were geared to local residents, such as roller skating and dog obedience training, while developing new programs that fit the performing arts aspect of the new facility. The new facility could handle conventions and cater to events such as jazz and film festivals, boosting tourism.

Students also will collect visitor data to aid future marketing decisions.

"We need to know where they're coming from, why they're coming here, and what they want when they arrive," Mahaney said.

Other aspects of the deal include a public information office, running new special events, and providing training to convention hall workers before the facility opens.

The agreement, which took four months to negotiate, should lead to a larger Department of Civic Affairs and Recreation - but with some outside help.

"The city wanted to maintain control of the building, but we didn't have the experience to manage it," Mahaney said.

E-mail Richard Degener:

RDegener@pressofac.com

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