Durango Exhibit 24: City of Durango, Colorado: Economic Impacts of Whitewater Recreation Final Report

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City of Durango: Economic Impacts of Whitewater Recreation Final Ror-t 2006 III. COMMERCIAL USE As the Commercial River Use in Colorado 2005 compiled and distributed by the Colorado River Outfitters Association describes, whitewater industry experienced "explosive growth between 1988 and 1998 with annual increases of up to 23% per year." Although there was some decline in commercial rafting during the record setting drought of 2002, rafting statewide has increased by 14.1% from 2004 -2005 and was up nearly 49% on the Lower Animas between 2004 and 2005. Three components of the commercial rafting industry are of interest when quantifying economic impacts - commercial client user days and expenditures, commercial equipment rentals /classes, and total employment generated by the industry. COMMERCIAL USER DAYS AND EXPENDITURES The 2005 Commercial River Use in Colorado Summary report closely tracks existing and historical commercial user days on every major River in Colorado. Moreover, the report estimates direct expenditures of those customers utilizing data common to recreation studies developed by federal and state land agencies. In addition, the report employs previous research conducted regarding direct expenditures by rafting clients and also establishes an appropriate economic multiplier for those direct expenditures. Multipliers are simply a means of quantifying the overall value of dollar expenditures as the flow into and through an economy - in the case of whitewater rafting and Colorado tourism in general, each dollar spent is expected to have an economic multiplying effect of 2.56 times yielding a total economic impact per user day. Figure 8 demonstrates the total user days, direct expenditures, and the total gross economic impact per user days of those expenditures - which is well over $14 million per year. Figure 7. Commercial Whitewater Economic Impacts Commercial User Direct Expenditures Total Economic Impact Days Lower Animas River 52,700 $ 5,50 $ 14,089,867 COMMERCIAL EQUIPMENT RENTALS AND CLASSES Not accounted for among typical commercial user days are raft and kayak rentals or organized skill classes. Interviews with two key providers of these services in Durango allowed relatively accurate estimates of total user days and direct expenditures by these groups. Figure 9 outlines the total user days and expenditures as well as the total economic impact per user day of these individuals. Because both rentals and classes cost more than a typical guided trip the direct expenditures per user day used in these calculations was conservatively estimated to be the same as a commercial user day. The economic impact multiplier is also the same as for commercial users. a. -i coa ms r• 970.382.9153 8