Maria Gonzalez
Special to the Minden Press-Herald
SPRINGHILL — Lieutenant Governor Billy Nungesser attended Springhill’s 64th Annual Chamber Awards Banquet Thursday evening to discuss tourism and its new slogan “Feed Your Soul.”
For more than seven years, “Pick Your Passion” was the slogan for Louisiana’s Tourism Department. But on Fat Tuesday 2018, the new slogan, “Feed Your Soul’” was rolled out in several different states across the US.
“We took food trucks and handed out King Cakes and Mardi Gras beads all over the place — Dallas, Houston, Atlanta,” said Nungesser. “I even stood out on a street corner in Washington D.C. passing this stuff out, doing my part, and seeing the joy it brought to people’s faces. Feeding their souls!”
Nungesser also discussed state parks, and the idea of private-public partnerships to help meet funding needs.
He said the state has cut appropriations to the parks to about 60 percent of what it was 10 years ago, with still more cuts to come.
“We’re going to use our state parks to do private-public partnerships, and this is where you can help,” said Nungesser. “If it [the partnership] makes good sense for both the park and the surrounding community, we want to talk to you.”
He continued to give examples of tourism ideas already being used in other parks that are generating money – everything from building resorts, to zip-lining, to horseback riding, etc.
“We would not let anything happen that would take away from the quality of life in a park,” said Nungesser. “It’s not gonna work if it’s not a win-win.”
The overall goal simply being to attract more tourists, by letting them know just what a soulful and rewarding experience visiting Louisiana can be.
“You can feed your soul with music. You can feed it with art. You can feed it with fishing. And, with food of course.
But there are just so many ways to feed your soul here in Louisiana. People just need to visit us to see it!” Nungesser said.