The country's premier music celebration -- the Juno Awards -- will return to Winnipeg after a nine-year absence.

Sources say Premier Greg Selinger and Mayor Sam Katz will make it official today: Winnipeg has beat out Victoria as the host city for the 2014 Juno Awards. The announcement will be made at the MTS Centre.

The Junos were last here in 2005, just months after the MTS Centre opened...       ...Chuck Davidson, vice-president of the Winnipeg Chamber of Commerce, said the Junos brought more than $5.5 million in economic spinoffs to the city in 2005, and he sees no reason why it wouldn't be higher than that in 2014.

http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/local/and-the-junos-go-to-winnipeg-in-2014-172608131.html

When it comes to growing the Winnipeg economy, positive momentum can never be taken for granted.

The city is arguably on a pretty good roll these days, but it's not like this is Silicon Valley, where business and investment will keep flooding into the region without the need for promotion.

There's a solid core of business activity in Winnipeg, but to maintain it and see it grow, a little effort is required.

In Winnipeg, you have to work it. That is partly what Centrallia is all about.

http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/business/winnipeg-to-host-deal-making-fest-again-next-week-172608071.html

Canada has a golden opportunity to increase tourism spending and draw more visitors, but there are key problems holding the country back, according to the head of the Tourism Industry Association of Canada.

TIAC chief executive David Goldstein said improving airline access to Canada and ramping up the national marketing effort has to be top of mind.

"They are significant barriers," said Goldstein, who was on the West Coast to take part in the Western Canadian Hotel and Resort Investment Conference in Vancouver.

"The international travel base is growing and will continue to grow exponentially," he said with a nod to expanding middle classes in emerging markets like China, Brazil, India and Russia. "There's a huge opportunity. We are blessed with the basics, now it's a matter of focusing the minds of public policy makers in Ottawa."

He said time is of the essence as there is still some "gas in the tank" from the Olympics in 2010 and the Canadian brand remains strong.

http://www.timescolonist.com/business/Tourism+group+urges+ottawa+boost+funding/7342337/story.html

Michael Audain admits he doesn't know Whistler that well.

" I'm not a skier," he notes with a laugh. "I'm not a snowboarder, I'm not a mountain biker, I'm not a golfer."

But Audain is an internationally-renowned art collector, and one of British Columbia's top philanthropists. And Wednesday, he stunned the art world by announcing the Audain Foundation plans to build a small art museum in Whistler to house his extensive art collection.

Audain hasn't decided what will go into the new museum, but says it will have "the pick" of his collection, which includes works by artists such as Emily Carr, EJ Hughes and Diego Rivera.

The location will be across from Whistler's municipal hall on Blackcomb Way. Whistler will donate the land, the Audain Foundation will hire the architect, pay for the construction and supply the art.

http://www.vancouversun.com/travel/Whistler+world+class+West+Coast+museum/7337147/story.html

NEW ORLEANS - Some New Orleans residents and city officials are pushing back against tour operators who bus out-of-towners into the city's Lower 9th Ward, where Hurricane Katrina unleashed a wall of water that pushed homes off foundations and stranded residents on rooftops when the levees failed.

About 9 million people visit New Orleans each year, mostly to see its stately homes along oak-lined avenues, dine at its renowned restaurants and take in the jazz and ribaldry of Bourbon Street. But Katrina's devastation in August 2005 unleashed an unexpected cottage tourism industry, drawing a daily parade of rubbernecking tourists for a close-up look at the city's hard-hit Lower 9th Ward.

http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/world/weary-of-gawking-tourists-on-buses-katrina-victims-push-back-against-hurricane-damage-tours-172625661.html

(A complete article published originally in the WFP, Oct.  '62)

A Canadian newspaper publisher Wednesday chided business leaders for assuming a do nothing attitude toward the dollar-rich tourist industry. Stuart Keate of the Victoria Times told the closing luncheon of the Canadian Tourist Association convention that tourism — "everybody's business" — was sorely lacking support and direction from the top levels of Canadian industry. He said the tourist business failed to get a mention at the recent four-day annual meeting of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce in Vancouver. "While there may be a general stirring I suggest that it is not unfair to call tourism the forgotten industry of Canada— if not forgotten at least  underrated," Mr, Keate said. On the other hand governments "are becoming increasingly aware that the tourist business is one of the best of them all."