Halifax Tourism and COVID-19: Scenario-Planning Exercises for Summer 2021 Discussion Paper September 2020 HALIFAX TOURISM AND COVID-19: SCENARIO-PLANNING EXERCISES FOR SUMMER 2021 Discussion Paper September 2020 AUTHORS Kevin Quigley Kevin Quigley is the Scholarly Director of the MacEachen Institute for Public Policy and Governance and a professor in the School of Public Administration at Dalhousie University. He is the co-author of the book Too Critical to Fail: How Canada Manages Threats to Critical Infrastructure, which was shortlisted for the Donner Prize in 2018. Brianna Wolfe Brianna Wolfe is a Research Assistant at the MacEachen Institute for Public Policy and Governance at Dalhousie University. PROJECT TITLE Halifax Tourism and COVID-19: Scenario-Planning Exercises for Summer 2021 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This project is a collaboration between Discover Halifax and the MacEachen Institute for Public Policy and Governance at Dalhousie University. This project was made possible by financial contributions from the Change Lab Action Research Initiative (CLARI). https://actionresearch.ca/ 2 Table of Contents Executive Summary ...................................................................................................................................... 5 PART A 1. Introduction ............................................................................................................................................... 8 2. Risk Governance ....................................................................................................................................... 8 2.1. What is risk governance? ................................................................................................................... 8 2.2. What is an uncertain risk? ................................................................................................................. 9 3. Scenario Planning ................................................................................................................................... 10 3.1. What is scenario planning and when do you do it? ......................................................................... 10 3.2. Scenario-planning design ................................................................................................................ 11 4. Selected Comments on COVID-19 in the Atlantic Region .................................................................... 13 5. Overview of Halifax tourism .................................................................................................................. 17 5.1. Snapshot of Halifax tourism ............................................................................................................. 17 5.2. Impacts of COVID-19 on Halifax tourism ....................................................................................... 20 5.3 Polling data: Selected observations .................................................................................................. 23 5.4. Halifax Tourism’s response to COVID-19 ....................................................................................... 24 PART B 6. Project Description .................................................................................................................................. 25 6.1. Purpose ............................................................................................................................................ 25 6.2. Goals ................................................................................................................................................ 25 6.3. Deliverables ..................................................................................................................................... 25 6.4. Session structure .............................................................................................................................. 25 7. Scenario-Planning Variables ................................................................................................................... 26 7.1. Timeline............................................................................................................................................ 26 7.2. Sample variables .............................................................................................................................. 26 7.3. Chatham House Rule ....................................................................................................................... 27 7.4. Facilitated discussion on critical drivers in Halifax tourism .......................................................... 27 7.5. Selected variables ............................................................................................................................ 28 8. Discussion of Four Scenarios .................................................................................................................. 30 8.1. Scenario descriptions ....................................................................................................................... 30 8.2. How do we respond to these scenarios? .......................................................................................... 35 9. Discussion ............................................................................................................................................... 37 9.1. Method ............................................................................................................................................. 37 9.2. Observations about the four scenarios ............................................................................................ 38 9.3. Comments on session discussions .................................................................................................... 39 10. Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................ 40 11. Appendix ............................................................................................................................................... 41 Appendix A: Information about the MacEachen Institute ....................................................................... 41 12. References ............................................................................................................................................. 43 13. Further Reading .................................................................................................................................... 45 3 Table of Figures Figure 1: Four Plausible Scenarios for Halifax ............................................................................................. 6 Figure 2: 2 x 2 Matrix ................................................................................................................................. 12 Figure 3: 2 x 2 Matrix Example .................................................................................................................. 12 Figure 4: Total Confirmed Cases of COVID-19 Reported Across Canada as of March 31, 2020 ............. 14 Figure 5: Total Confirmed Cases of COVID-19 Reported Across Canada as of June 1, 2020 .................. 15 Figure 6: Total Confirmed Cases of COVID-19 Reported Across Canada as of July 29, 2020 ................ 15 Figure 7: Active Cases of COVID-19 in Nova Scotia ................................................................................ 16 Figure 8: Active Cases of COVID-19 in Ontario ....................................................................................... 16 Figure 9: Total Number of Visitors by Trip Purpose .................................................................................. 17 Figure 10: Number of Cruise Ships Visiting Halifax.................................................................................. 18 Figure 11: Number of Cruise Passengers Visiting Halifax ......................................................................... 18 Figure 12: Total Visitor Spending .............................................................................................................. 19 Figure 13: Visitor Origin ............................................................................................................................ 19 Figure 14: Mode of Transportation ............................................................................................................. 20 Figure 15: Nova Scotia Unemployment Rate, June 2019 vs June 2020 ..................................................... 21 Figure 16: March 2020 Hotel Room Bookings ........................................................................................... 22 Figure 17: Average Number of Hotel Rooms Occupied Jan 2019–June 2019 vs Jan 2020–June 2020 ..... 22 Figure 18: Percentage of People Who Feel Comfortable Engaging in Activities ....................................... 23 Figure 19: Impact/Uncertainty Visual ......................................................................................................... 29 Figure 20: 2 x 2 Matrix with Selected Variables ....................................................................................... 30 Figure 21: 2 x 2 Matrix with Named Scenarios .......................................................................................... 31 4 Executive Summary Project Description This project was devised jointly by Discover Halifax and the MacEachen Institute for Public Policy and Governance