Amid criticism, plans continue to track spending at this year’s national high school finals rodeo

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The Campbell County Joint Powers Lodging Tax Board has voted to move forward with a contract with a Utah-based geofencing software company that will track spending habits during this year’s National High School Finals Rodeo (NHSFR) in July.

The 5-1 vote on April 26 upheld the contract between the board of directors, which includes members from the county and the city of Gillette, and Zartico, the company that provides the geofencing technology. But the plans have angered some community members, raising privacy concerns and questioning the intentions of local tourism officials.

We appreciate the public vote [and them] come and give their opinion last week and this week. It’s important that we hear from citizens and their opinions, said Jessica Seders, executive director of the Campbell County Convention and Visitors Bureau.

The goal is to break down spend so it’s better understood by local elected officials and businesses so they can adjust marketing strategies for future events. Seders said some visitors travel and have different spending habits than others. NHSFR data would be collected and made available to local authorities, businesses and the public as well.

On a larger scale, from a marketing perspective, we’re trying to bring people into Campbell County, we have to decide where we’re going to use those marketing dollars to [and] whether we will advertise in other states, other countries and other [and] where to use our marketing dollars where they are most effective, so we can capitalize on this economic growth that is coming to Campbell County, Seders said April 20 in a town hall meeting.

Geofencing technology has been used by political campaigns to gather voter data and by businesses to gather information on current and potential customers. They use radio frequency identification, Wi-Fi, GPS, or cellular data that triggers a mobile device each time it leaves or enters an imaginary boundary set for a specific geographic area.

Zartico compiles the data but does not collect it itself. They receive it from other companies that collect data, and also receive geolocation data from Near, a company that hosts the world’s largest commercially available geolocation dataset, according to Jay Kinghorn, co-founder and director. of Zartico’s innovation. He said credit card data is provided to Zartico by a company other than Near.

One of the things I want to emphasize is about Zartico and how we use data, and our partners use data, [is that] we do not contain any personally identifiable information, all data is anonymized, Kinghorn said.

This means that credit card and geolocation data is anonymized before it is collected by Zartico. Kinghorn added that the company is not interested in individual user data such as addresses, social security numbers, banking information or other personally identifiable information and what is collected is already collected through opt-ins. -ins through mobile applications, agreements with financial institutions and cell phones. suppliers, among others. This data is then commonly sold to third-party companies for marketing purposes. The data Zartico receives is aggregated and is intended to show trends rather than individual habits. Even though the company is only a few years old, the data it receives can sometimes go back a decade, Kinghorn said.

The information that would be collected during the rodeo would tell Zartico whether a mobile device was local or from out of state as well as other locations such as restaurants or hotels the device has been. Data on the ownership of the device or the amount spent by this person would be unknown. Expenditure data would come from a different data set.

During the public meeting, questions were raised about the amount of data Near collects through its partnership with Zartico. But Seders said it didn’t matter what Near got because the data was being collected anyway.

Some participants in the meeting accused officials of the Tourism and Accommodation Tax Board of being lazy and not seeking out spending information themselves from local businesses. State Sen. Troy McKeown (R-Gillette) asked why collecting this data was necessary at the April 20 meeting.

We have all the data in the state to do this analysis, there is no way to interfere in people’s lives and collect their personal data, he said.

He added that he thought marketing might not be the only reason this data was being collected.

There are other reasons why they are geofencing in my mind, he said.

Seders said they relied on data from the Wyoming Office of Tourism to understand how money is being spent within the community, but there are limits to what can be analyzed with this. Collecting data from individual companies would be time consuming and some may not want to disclose this information. She added that geofencing is the best way to get this data and distribute it in shorter time frames than they would otherwise get.

Local officials have declared their support for the geofencing technology, saying it will help in decision-making.

I don’t think any of you are the enemy at all, County Commissioner Del Shelstad said at the April 26 meeting. I know you are trying to give us the information we request. It’s important as we look after the interest of the taxpayers of Campbell County, to know when these events take place, how much these people are spending overall, how much the event brings to our community.

Explanations of what geofencing entails and its benefits to the community did not convince others.

One of the most concerning things was that it appeared our accommodation board and tourist board had not done their due diligence in finding this business, said Gillette resident Sally White who opposed the follow-up at the April 20 meeting. I don’t agree with geofencing. I think there are other ways to collect this data and the data is already collected currently by the state through monthly and quarterly reports.

The NHSFR celebrates its 75th anniversary this year and officials expect record attendance. It will take place at the Cam-plex facilities from July 16 to 22.

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