Joplin City Council Informal Meeting on February 2, 2026
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Joplin City Council Informal Meeting – February 2, 2026
The Joplin City Council held an informal meeting on Monday, February 2, 2026, featuring updates from the Convention and Visitor Bureau (CVB) and the Planning, Development, and Neighborhood Services Department. The meeting concluded at 5:48 p.m., with the regular session to begin at 6 p.m.
Convention & Visitor Bureau Update
- CVB Director Mr. Tuttle reported the bureau is fully funded by lodging tax, with a four-person staff. Joplin has 22 lodging properties and 1,907 hotel rooms, representing about 686,000 room nights annually.
- A digital advertising campaign on Expedia.com (April–September) tracked approximately 667 hotel room nights, $103,000 in gross sales, and a 4.3-to-1 return on investment; $53,000 of sales were attributed to three devices.
- In 2025, the city hosted 39 bus tours and supported four conferences; 42 bus tours are already booked for 2026. The visitor center guest book recorded 3,695 entries, including 1,319 U.S. visitors from 47 states and 2,269 international visitors from 46 countries.
- Smith Travel data showed 416,000 room nights sold, 61% occupancy, and $47,047,618 in revenue, yielding $1.6 million in lodging tax.
- CVB worked with the Missouri Film Commission on the Netflix "Twister" feature and the 2026 Harley Davidson motorcycle videos shot in Joplin.
- Upcoming 2026 events include the final street painting festival in June (14 international, 6 domestic artists), a May rodeo, a two-day Renaissance Festival, and September hot air ballooning. The Schiffendecker and Zelikan homes open in late March with hologram displays. The Vella Solutions UCI Pump Track qualifying event will be held August 15–16 at Momentum Bike Park, one of four U.S. sites.
- During Q&A, Mr. Tuttle discussed possible old-school baseball tournaments and FIFA World Cup room demand. Council member Patrick relayed constituent requests to bring back "Boomtown Days" and asked staff to research it.
Planning, Development & Neighborhood Services Update
- Director Troy Bolander and staff member Joanne presented the department's update. The department has 27 positions, nearly all filled; one staff member is on military leave, and a temporary replacement may be needed.
- Priority initiatives include a revised sign code for beautification, a vacant and dangerous building ordinance (anticipated for summer adoption), and an annexation plan.
- 2025 statistics: commercial and residential plan reviews increased; permit valuation declined due to fewer large projects, with Eagle Pitcher the largest at $10–15 million.
- Infrastructure highlights: East Town stormwater and sanitary sewer completed; sidewalk work underway; North Heights sidewalk replacement using CDBG-DR funds in an LMI area (Census Tract 110); citywide broadband sign-ups starting by end of February.
- Housing programs: JHAP 3 applications due February 13, assisting 25–35 additional homebuyers; rehab program completed 77 homes and expended $1.3 million, with full expenditure expected by end of July; ARPA demolition wrapped up after roughly 54–55 homes demolished (Bolander), though Joanne's count was garbled; housing revitalization program has seven homes under construction; Home ARP consortium plans 10 units at New Hampshire and 20th Street; North Heights historic survey is in its first phase with seven consultant responses.
- Mr. Copeland suggested partnering with recycling staff for the tool lending library, and staff agreed to explore the idea.
Key Outcomes
- No formal votes or resolutions were adopted; the session was informational.
- Council directed staff to research the feasibility of reviving "Boomtown Days."
- Staff will explore a partnership between the tool lending library and recycling department.
- The regular City Council session is scheduled for 6 p.m. following the informal meeting.
Meeting Transcript
Good evening, everyone, and welcome to the John City Council informal meeting for this Monday, February the 2nd, 2026. We have two items on the agenda this evening. We're going to get started with the convention and visitor bureau update. I think that would be you. Mr. Tuttle. Good evening. Welcome. I thought PMZ was first, but all good. We're ready to go. This is your annual update on the Commission of Visit Bureau and the activities we've been involved with. The staff we're working. There we go. We still have a four-person staff, myself, uh director of sales as well as a marketing manager and our guest relations person. There's the beautiful people right there. We uh work real hard in greeting all of our folks in here that come into town. And I just left the staff, and there's two people from St. Louis and just came in today. So uh reminder the CVV is uh department of the city. We work solely off the lodging tax. We get nothing from the general fund. Uh at twenty currently we have twenty-two properties that are functioning in the city. Uh 1,907 hotel rooms that bounces back and forth based on the inventory from time to time, which equates about 686,000 hotel rooms a year we work with. Uh it's always a fun fact that 85% of our restaurants are in Jasper County, and while 90% of our hotels are in Newton County. So it's a fun little divide there we have going on. Uh the CBB functions of selling Joplin as a leisure and travel destination. We do it through group travel, business travel, conferences and conventions and tour operations, uh primarily focused on people who live 70 plus miles away from the community. We do that through destination marketing as well as through destination sales. And I kind of hit on both of those individually as it is. On the marketing side, uh, we do a lot of advertising mostly on the digital side. You probably won't see it because again we'll work with people that are 70 plus miles away. If somebody is here locally and has a different area code than 417, they might see it on their devices. It's because that's where it's picking up from. But as one example, uh, this is an ad that ran from April through September on Xpedia.com. This one particular ad had five different images that rotated. This would have been the sidebar you would see on your Google search or Facebook or something like that. Uh this particular rotation uh drove six hundred and sixty six hundred and sixty-seven hotel room nights were tracked through uh Xpmedia Plus, which also includes Travelocity, the orbit and cheap ticks. At a rate of 155 room night, that's about 103,000 in gross sales, about a 4.3 to one ad. Uh these three devices attributed to 53,000 of that uh that side. We also advertise both uh nationally as well as regionally. We've done a lot of work recently with the centennial and the street painting in Omaha, Iowa, Kansas City, Tulsa. Uh we had a really good deal through the state. We had a matching grant for this uh USA Today piece that uh was there. We also have a state grant uh to promote uh Momentum Bike Park. We've been working with Drew and his team and putting together some ads. These are being in place uh this month and next month in Iowa, Kansas City, uh, Omaha, and in the Wichita area. Uh we kind of dubbed our new bike park as Silmi State's biggest ride. Let them anybody challenge us that. We'll be uh we'll challenge Worlds of Fun and Six Flags everybody else. On the sales side for 2025, we had 39 bus tours that came through.
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