The city of Snoqualmie will be taking steps to improve the effectiveness of its public events planning by developing ways to measure return on investment, citizen enjoyment and value, and impact on local businesses.

Lizzy Billington, events coordinator consultant for the city of Snoqualmie, had her contract with the city renewed early this year with some changes in the frequency of reporting to the city and techniques to increase the data collected from events. Billington must now provide a monthly report on the events held and how they were accomplished.

Bob Larson, city administrator, explained the changes. Billington was not available for comment.

“We needed a way to measure the event as far as success, number of participants, residents satisfied with the events we offer, get a sense of return on investment, and talk to businesses that may be impacted,” he said. “We had some of that in 2016, but it hasn’t been refined, right now we are trying to work with (Billington) on what we would like to see.”

The city has been running events not only to increase visitors and tourism for the city, but also to further engage the citizens and business in the community. One of the steps the city wants to take is to poll residents on their thoughts about city events and talk to business owners, both on Snoqualmie Ridge and in historic downtown, about how city events affect the business they receive.

Currently, the city has no way of knowing if their events bring local businesses more customers, Larson said.

Taking advantage of the timing of community events organized by outside groups is a goal for 2017 as well. By timing city programs to coincide with established events such as the Boeing Classic or any of the railroad-themed events, the city hopes to draw visitors and citizens alike into local businesses.

“Are residents satisfied? We need to poll the residents, talk to them, looking at some other tourism promotion or events, maybe doing it in conjunction with other events,” he said. “We could poll the crowds that come into the Boeing Classic. We get thousands that come and we can start promoting some of the opportunities, offer other events.”

In addition to events coordination, Billington acts as the city’s liaison to merchant group meetings, both for downtown and the Ridge. Larson said the contract requires her to coordinate the merchant meetings, and indicated she will add meetings for the Kimball Creek Merchant Group this year.

In 2013, the city combined park maintenance and public works under one director position. This change left a role for events coordination which elected officials identified as something necessary in their growing community.

“The council said we really want to have a stronger position and looked at a consultant that can coordinate those activities, because of the growing number of these events,” Larson said.

The council decided that because the task of coordinating events wasn’t a standard nine-to-five desk job, but demanded availability in the evenings and weekends when events were taking place, a consultant position was more appropriate than a city staff position.

“If you have a consultant, the means, methods and hours are up to that consultant. You have labor agreements when you have an employee and you would be subject to overtime issues,” Larson said. “Live events and activities are on the evenings and weekends. It requires and demands a lot of flexibility. It is really intense in the summer.”

Larson said to determine the value of the position, the city looked at how that role would be paid as if it were within the city’s staff hierarchy as well as similar positions in other cities. The one-year contract was approved at $118,560.

“We looked at where that would be placed in our hierarchy, looked at benefits, and tried to bracket the range of what would be expected,” he said. “We determine it is going to be a full-time job, but with a consultant that person has to decide vacation time, how many hours to get the job done and how they get it done.”

In addition to her work for the city of Snoqualmie, Billington is also in the process of starting in a similar role for the city of Duvall. Matthew Morton, Duvall City Administrator, said the city is developing a contract to bring on Billington to help with the Duvall Cultural Commission and the city’s Summer Stage music events. The Duvall contract will have Billington submit weekly status reports.

The need for someone to help with Duvall’s events came after the city’s previous events managing contractor, Kass Holdeman, left in December.

“Kass Holdeman created events like Summer Stage that we do. She left us at the end of December and then we did a search process and selected applicants,” Morton said. “We trimmed it back for this year with the performance outcomes we have drafted, just coordinating Summer Stage and coordinating with the Duvall Cultural Commission.”

Morton said the city administration discussed the position with Billington to make sure there were no conflicts with her full-time contract with the city of Snoqualmie.

“We have a great relationship with Snoqualmie, they provide all of our IT services.We talked at length to be sure there was not an apparent conflict,” Morton said.

Details of the contract are still in the works, but Morton said his goal to have it finalized on March 1.

Lizzy Billington