"Virginia officials will launch a new multi-state marketing campaign aimed at patriotic travelers too nervous to fly. Their goal: luring enough visitors to undo damage to the state's tourism industry and overall economy following this month's terrorist attack on the Pentagon.

The campaign will seek to attract Americans who live within 750 miles of Virginia, said James M. Wordsworth, vice chairman, Virginia Tourism Corporation.

'We are the original colony of the 13 colonies,' Wordsworth said. 'We're going to emphasize history. Right now there's a lot of patriotism.'

The Virginia is for Patriots push is part of an effort by state officials and business leaders to stem economic losses associated with the Sept 11 attack and the indefinite closure of Reagan National Airport. According to state officials tourism is Virginia's third largest industry behind business services and health services.

Gov. James S. Gilmore III (R) opened the first meeting of what officials call the Virginia Post-Attack Economic Response Task Force yesterday at a Crystal City hotel devoid of its usual rush of business travelers.

Representatives of more than 130 businesses, organizations and local governments, from Colonial Williamsburg to the Virginia Department of Minority Business Enterprise to Raytheon Co., set about calculating terrorism's economic costs and coming up with a strategy for recovery to be delivered to Gilmore by the first week of November.

One initial indicator, according to Secretary of Commerce and Trade Barry DuVal: More than 2,700 people have applied for unemployment benefits from the state after the attacks and the subsequent dip in tourism cost them their jobs.

Officials hope that relief funds donated across the country can be used to cover expenses for unemployed families, he said.

'We want to make sure Virginia families are receiving the benefits of those funds,' DuVal said, adding that he wants to see money distributed more widely - not restricted to the families of the dead and injured. 'We want to broaden that to include those who are indirectly affected.'

The task force will investigate which charities allow donations to be used for such purposes, officials said. Many charities have restrictions that allow only those directly affected by the attacks to receive funds.

The more comprehensive solution, Gilmore said, is to reopen National Airport, a cause he continues to take up with congressional and Bush administration officials, he said.

'People don't want to be on unemployment. They want to be in their jobs,' he said. 'I want that airport open.'

The state estimates that 11,000 people are out of work because of the attack. At the airport alone, there are 10,000 workers.

The economic impact on tourism is being felt beyond the general vicinity of the Pentagon and airport.

Wordsworth, for instance, runs J.R.'s Stockyards Inn, an upscale restaurant in Tysons Corner. Business was down before the attack and continues to slump, he said. September sales thus far are off 30 percent from last year, after multiple corporate cancellations and a general pullback in expense account dining, Wordsworth said.

Wordsworth also is Virginia's representative on the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. He argued that terrorists are seeking not just to end American lives. 'It was an attack on the American way of life,' he said, adding that that includes eating nice meals and traveling.

'The international tourist is not coming to the U.S. now,' he said. He added that Virginia has had a sharp drop in the number of foreign travelers, who have been key to the state's multibillion-dollar tourism industry.

Tourism officials have scrambled to revamp their marketing plan, given the new realities.

International advertising has been slashed. Officials hope to saturate the airwaves in nearby states by Thanksgiving, appealing to those who don't want to be cowed from traveling but are still 'scared of airline travel,' Wordsworth said." (Michael Laris, The Washington Post, September 27, 2001)