After two weeks of perusal, Vicksburg Convention and Visitors Bureau board members were unanimous Monday in approving a marketing plan drafted by Compass Facility Management.

Copies of the plan were handed out at a special meeting May 5.

The board decided then, without a formal vote, to look over the plan and discuss its details at the meeting. Discussion among nine of the 11 board members who attended was brief and a few amendments were made.

The 20-page plan’s goals include continued growth of visitation and hotel room rentals, a reduced operating deficit, focus on sales efforts, rededication to communitywide customer service and establishing new sales and marketing initiatives.

It focuses on an objective to &#8220generate expanded sales of tour buses, receptive operators, sports tournaments and multiday conventions and meetings that cost-effectively generate new business revenue.”

Board member Bobbie Morrow made motions, which were approved, to add cultural tourism to a list of 10 market segmentations. She also won an OK to add the African American Heritage brochure to a list of marketing materials the VCVB will regularly maintain and update and to insert that the Warren County Board of Supervisors be listed as a partner with the city to host site visits, tours and meetings with potential clients.

Submitting the plan met a timetable Compass was given when the company was hired earlier this year after months of contentious debate on whether to contract out management of tourism development. Since created in 1972, the city-county board had hired an executive director as its manager.

Compass is also the contract director of Vicksburg Convention Center and Vicksburg Auditorium for the City of Vicksburg.

Board Chairman Tim Darden and member Jessica Williams did not attend Monday.

Larry Gawronski, director of the Vicksburg Convention Center for Compass, who was also absent, spoke at the last meeting about the need of the bureau’s presence downtown. No more action had been made on moving the bureau to a temporary site downtown, said Compass Director of Business Operations Norman Ford.

The VCVB moved its staff to City Hall after the collapse of the neighboring former Thomas Furniture building in January.

In other business, the board: