CARIBOU – Training sessions aimed at providing front line workers with the tools they need to properly prepare and welcome tourists to Aroostook County are being offered at three locations this month.
Anyone who provides services to the general public would benefit from the class, including gas station attendants, taxi drivers, front desk workers at lodging establishments, retail store clerks, convenience store clerks, waiter-waitress-host, bartender and grocery store employees.
The services are offered courtesy of the Maine Woods Tourism Training Initiative and are supported by funds from USDA Rural Development.
Bangor Daily News, April 14, 2011, page B3
AL: Hey, Jesse, glad I ran into you. I may be out of town for a little while.
JESSE: What’s up?
AL: My sister who lives in Aroostook County has invited me up there to enroll in Tourism Training.
JESSE: How are you going to train tourists to do anything?
AL: No, no, you’ve got it all wrong. I am going to be trained about how to welcome tourists.
JESSE: Oh? What’s wrong with the way tourists are treated right now?
AL: I will have to find out specifics when the classes start. But apparently the federal government believes that tourists are not well treated in Aroostook County.
JESSE: Are there any tourists up there?
AL: Actually, I don’t know.
JESSE: Who is paying for this training?
AL: The money is coming from some U.S. Department of Agriculture Rural Development program.
JESSE: You mean our taxes are paying for this?
AL: Looks like it.
JESSE: Well of all the pork barrel, confounded wastes of money, this sure takes the cake. Wait a minute: is this part of the stimulus money?
AL: Could be. You know how long it takes trends to reach Aroostook County.
JESSE: If it didn’t break my frugal heart so much I could get a real laugh out of this tourism training idea.
AL: It’s more than just the USDA. Have you heard of something called the Maine Woods Tourism Training Initiative?
JESSE: No, no, stop, I can’t take this anymore. Help me, I just filed my tax return.
AL: Relax, Jesse. What with gas prices going up, there won’t be many people who can afford to drive to Aroostook County this summa. But if the people from away do get there, the local folks will know how to welcome them. We are learning from the experts. Who else but the government would know how to train people to take someone else’s money?
