Mar. 26--GULFPORT -- Harrison County likely will have a new tourism director by May 1 as it continues to recover from Hurricane Katrina and officials work to draw more people and conventions to the area.

The Tourism Commission voted unanimously Monday afternoon to hire Richard Forester as the executive director of the Mississippi Gulf Coast Convention and Visitors Bureau.

Beverly Martin, president of the commission, said members will enter contract negotiations with Forester, now president of the Topeka Convention and Visitors Bureau in Kansas. She said the contract likely will be approved at the commission's meeting next Tuesday.

If he accepts the job, Martin said the commission will ask Forester to start work May 1.

Forester was one of more than two dozen applicants for the job after Steve Richer retired last November. Richer held the position for 11 years.

"He's got heavy convention experience and that's something we felt like we needed since we are doubling the size of our convention center," Martin said of Forester.

Forester has worked in Topeka since 2001. Before that, he was president of the Bryan/College Station, Texas, Convention and Visitors Bureau for nine years. He also served as the director of convention sales and services in Longview, Texas, and worked in broadcasting for many years.

Forester was contacted by the Sun Herald on Monday afternoon but he said he couldn't comment about the job.

"My board of directors is meeting right now, and I won't be able to comment until (Wednesday)," he said.

Forester's experience with convention centers was one factor that appealed to the commission. The Convention Center is undergoing an expansion, and tourism officials hope to draw more meetings and conventions to the area.

In fact, the Gulf Coast Business Council's Tourism Committee has said its goal is to be a Tier 1, or Premier, destination by 2012. In order to be a Tier 1 destination, an area has to have 30,000 first-class hotel rooms and a convention center with 1 million square feet of meeting space, as well as an airport that can handle the number of people such facilities would bring to the Coast.

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