A private tour company is in talks to take over operations at Fort Conde, with plans to transform the historic downtown Mobile site into a new interactive attraction highlighting the city’s colonial past.
Scott Tindle, co-owner of Gulf Coast Ducks, Inc., told the Mobile City Council that his company is negotiating a contract with the History Museum of Mobile to rent the space and turn it into a rotating museum experience. The company’s ownership group includes Tindle along with Grant and Matt Zarzour.
According to Tindle, the museum would rotate quarterly to represent the Spanish, French, British and American periods that shaped Mobile’s early history, with staff dressed in period-appropriate colonial attire.
“We want to make it vibrant and fun,” Tindle said in an interview. “It will be Mobile’s colonial fort.” He added that the new attraction would charge admission once it opens.
The announcement comes amid uncertainty over the future of the welcome center housed inside Fort Conde, a concern raised by longtime volunteers and members of the local tourism industry during Tuesday’s council meeting. Management of the welcome center has shifted between Visit Mobile and the History Museum of Mobile in recent years. During budget negotiations in September, the city told council members it would take over management of the center directly, a move that cut $200,000 from its budget while maintaining $600,000 in level funding for Visit Mobile.
Mobile resident Ronald Hunt told council members that volunteers still don’t have clarity on what will happen to the space going forward.
“The visitor center has been a shell game for five years,” Hunt said.
Hunt argued the center needs a full-time manager and asked each council member to contribute $5,000 annually from their discretionary accounts over the next five years to help fund the position. Councilman Fred Richardson said that request wasn’t legally possible, citing the Zoghby Act, the law that established Mobile’s current form of government.
“I don’t think the issue is money,” Richardson said. “I don’t know what the issue is, but I don’t think it’s money.”
Council President Gina Gregory told Hunt that Mayor Sandy Stimpson has said he’d personally prefer to relocate the welcome center out of Fort Conde altogether, potentially to the Arthur R. Outlaw Convention Center, where Visit Mobile’s offices are currently located.
“Wherever you put it in the city, it needs a manager,” Hunt responded. “It needs somebody dedicated to its mission.”
Owners of two other local tour companies also addressed the council, echoing calls for a stronger focus on tourism citywide. Arthur Clevenger, of Gulf Coast Tours, said that while he remains passionate about Mobile, he has noticed declining enthusiasm within the local tourism industry, pointing to the closure of the GulfQuest maritime museum, a lack of free visitor parking and adequate signage, and a recent dispute between the city administration and council over branding as contributing factors.
“We have so much to offer,” Clevenger told council members. “We can become a tourism destination, but we need your support.”
Ross Peterson, of Bay City Convention and Tours, also urged the council not to underestimate the importance of the welcome center to the city’s tourism efforts.
For now, the future of the welcome center remains undecided, and Tindle said any final decision about its location and management rests with the city administration.
In other business Tuesday, the council unanimously approved a $288,519 contract with Constantine Engineering for program management services tied to several 2017 capital improvement projects. Architectural Engineering Director Kimberly Harden told council members the contract would allow the firm to help manage 56 projects currently beyond the capacity of city staff. Harden said funding for the contract was built into each individual project’s budget, and that the work spans projects in all seven of Mobile’s council districts.