Vol. 4, No. 5, May 2007
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The Highest Standards
The Atlantic City Host Awards honor the people who make AC unique
How important are the Atlantic City Host Awards? Think about the last time you were in a different city or destination and received poor customer service. Did you want to go back or did the experience spoil your visit, even just a little? How often have you heard people rave about how friendly the people were when they were on holiday and how that correlates into a great vacation? All it takes is a smile, a kind word or a gesture of generosity, to make or break a visitor’s vacation in Atlantic City.
While the beach and Boardwalk, the entertainment and nightlife, and the dining and casinos all make Atlantic City one of the premier vacation resorts on the East Coast, it’s the little things like common courtesy and hospitality that bring them back again and again. That’s why the Host Awards and outstanding customer service are integral parts of Atlantic City’s continued success as a tourist destination.
On Wednesday, May 16, more than 500 people will assemble in Adrian Phillips Ballroom at Atlantic City Boardwalk Hall for an elegant awards banquet honoring those in the hospitality industry who consistently put their best foot forward.
Twenty-three winners will be chosen that night. They are the people who represent the highest standards of hospitality in Atlantic City, from bartenders and housekeepers to casino floor employees and cocktail servers. It’s the 10th annual Atlantic City Host Awards, sponsored by the Atlantic City Convention & Visitors Authority, and it will be the event of the year for those people who walk away winners.
The Atlantic City Convention & Visitors Authority began the Atlantic City Host Awards 10 years ago. All of the employees who are nominated for Host Awards are as important to the local tourism and hospitality industry as the current boom in new developments. Those people are what will set us apart from similar destinations. They are the face of Atlantic City.
Also during the Host Awards, an outstanding individual who has made a significant long-term contribution to the region’s hospitality and travel industry is bestowed with a “Spirit of Hospitality” award. Past winners include Henrietta Shelton, co-founder of the Chicken Bone Beach Historical Foundation, Inc.; talk show host and columnist Pinky Kravitz; James A. Crawford, former executive director of the South Jersey Transportation Authority; Don Guardian, executive director of the Atlantic City Special Improvement District; and Atlantic City historian and author Vicki Gold Levi.
This year, that award is being presented to former state Senator William Gormley. I don’t have to tell you what a supporter of Atlantic City Senator Gormley is and has always been. Senator Gormley has helped develop and pass legislation for the betterment of the Atlantic City region since he was first elected to public office in 1975 as a member of the Atlantic County Board of Chosen Freeholders. In 1982, Senator Gormley was first elected to the State Senate in a special election, and has since been reelected to the Senate until retiring from office on February 15, 2007.
During a long and distinguished career, Senator Gormley sponsored the bill permitting state funding for the Atlantic City Convention Center to improve tourism in Atlantic City, was instrumental in the renovation of Atlantic City Boardwalk Hall into a modern special events and sports arena and wrote legislation that established the Casino Reinvestment Development Authority Urban Revitalization Incentive program. This measure generates hundreds of millions of dollars in urban construction as well as thousands of jobs through the use of sales tax incentives.
It will be my pleasure to bestow him the Spirit of Hospitality award on Wednesday, May 16, along with 23 others during the Atlantic City Host Awards. For more information regarding the Atlantic City Host Awards, visit www.atlanticcitynj.com and click on the Host Awards logo, or call Host Awards Chairwoman Jacqueline Carole at 609- 449-7174.
