Documents suggest that either due diligence was not done on the firm College Park selected as its new destination marketing organization, or city officials were aware of alleged false information included in the winning bidder’s proposal.
Chris Hardman President and CEO of the Georgia Hotel & Lodging Association has filed a complaint with the Georgia Department of Community Affairs requesting an investigation into College Park’s selection of Destination Must Visit as its new marketing organization.
Hardman believes the city violated Georgia’s Hotel-Motel Tax Law in replacing the ATL Airport District. He is asking the Hotel-Motel Tax Performance Review Board to reject the city’s selection of Destination Must Visit Tourism Alliance Incorporated. The Maryland-based firm was officially formed on May 26, 2026.
More than 100 pages in Hardman’s complaint include emails from tourism organizations in Dunwoody, Roswell, Gwinnett County, Savannah, Augusta, Macon and Dahlonega that say they have never worked with Destination Must Visit, despite claims on the company’s website stating otherwise. A College Park resident provided the documents to SaportReport.
“Unethical, illegal, fraudulent and a deceitful intent.”
That’s how Explore Gwinnett described Destination Must Visit after discovering the company had listed the local organization as a successful business relationship on its website.
Lisa Anders, chief operating officer of Explore Gwinnett, wrote to Hardman that the claims of doing business with Gwinnett were entirely fabricated.
“Consider me astonished as every word on the page is false and is egregiously fraudulent,” Anders wrote. “As the COO of our organization for the past decade, I can unequivocally state I have never spoken with anyone, worked with anyone, or received any services from them.”
Screenshots of a section of Destination Must Visit’s website, which now appears to have been deleted, show a host of cities, events and resorts as the organization’s success stories.
Heather Larson, president and CEO of Chicago Northwest, told Hardman she sent a “cease and desist letter” to Destination Must Visit after learning her organization was also featured on the website.
“It looks like they took us off their website along with Meeky Media, Choose Chicago, the Chicago Bears and Bandwango, and maybe a few others,” Larson wrote.
Destination Must Visit did not respond to a phone message seeking comment.
College Park’s controversial decision to hold a special called council meeting in Savannah on June 28 to vote on the new destination marketing organization is being questioned by the state Attorney General’s Office, and has been highly criticized by residents and Mayor Bianca Motley Broom.
Among the concerns is that the agenda packet containing information about the firms under consideration was distributed only to council members. Residents who traveled to Savannah to attend the meeting were not provided copies, and the packet was not made available online.
In Hardman’s complaint, he challenges a new College Park ordinance that would expand the uses of hotel-motel tax revenue to direct $2 million to the Roderick Gay Botanical Garden and other areas that do not comply with the law.
In a June 25 memo to city council, City Manager Michael Hicks said a review panel evaluated seven proposals before recommending Destination Must Visit.
On June 26, Councilwoman Jamelle McKenzie defended the upcoming vote in a social media post.
“… At the end of the day, this is simply the City Council doing the work the residents elected us to do — making timely decisions, following established procurement procedures, and ensuring continuity of services for our community,” McKenzie wrote.
McKenzie, Hicks and City Attorney Winston Denmark did not respond to phone calls or emails seeking comment.
