NATCHEZ &045; The Convention and Visitors Bureau plans to spend $100,000 in the coming months targeting convention and tour groups displaced from the area directly impacted by Hurricane Katrina, enticing them to visit Natchez instead.

Of that amount, $50,000 is from a state grant and $15,000 from the CVB itself. In addition, $8,000 has been raised from local businesses &045; with another $7,000 left to raise from the business community.

And the CVB plans to ask the City of Natchez and the Convention and Visitors Bureau to put up the remaining $20,000, Tourism Director Walter Tipton said at the Convention Promotion Commission’s Wednesday meeting.

The CVB plans to use that money to target 15 large and mid-sized markets in Louisiana, Alabama, Tennessee, Georgia, Texas and Mississippi with radio and TV ads, as well as $5,000 in direct mail to meeting planners. Cable ads will primarily be broadcast on Fox News, the Travel Channel, Lifetime and HGTV.

Of that amount, a little more than $13,000 has been spent on Baton Rouge electronic billboard ads, ads in regional and meeting planner publications and cable ads.

&8220;We’re interested mostly in convention and motorcoach groups displaced by the hurricane,&8221; Tipton said.

The Baton Rouge billboard, located at College Boulevard and Interstate 110, depicts Natchez as &8220;untouched, unspoiled, unhurried Š just 90 minutes away&8221; and directs onlookers to the Natchez tourism Web site, www.visitnatchez.com.

Natchez has already gotten some meeting business as a result of Katrina &045; and sometimes in spite of it.

The Mississippi Realtors Association convention that had been cancelled after Katrina has been reset for early December. The State Governor’s Conference, once scheduled for the Coast, will instead be in Natchez Feb. 25-28.

Natchez will also be hosting the Mississippi Municipal League’s small town officials’ conference Nov. 7-9.

In other business, the commission voted to buy, for $2,600, the electronic version of the Bacon media guide, which lists 250,000 travel media contacts throughout the nation. The guide is updated on an ongoing basis.

&8220;To put this in perspective, $2,600 is the cost of a third-of-a-page ad that would run one time,&8221; Connie Taunton, director of visitor services, said.

Commissioner Ren Adams said that if the bureau invests in the media guide, it needs to make sure it has the staff to write and follow up on the press releases.

Taunton said she and CVB media liaison Sally Durkin already write the press releases but that the Bacon guide will be an additional tour to make sure those releases get to the right people.

In addition, the CVB plans to send a letter to tourism-related groups and businesses in the area asking them to contribute stories that can be the basis of press releases sent to those media outlets.