BEND, OR -- Kevney Dugan, President and CEO of Visit Bend, says he’s stepping down to take a position with Travel Oregon.

He tells KBND he’s excited for his new opportunity as Vice President of Destination Stewardship beginning in February, “When I saw this come out, I was like, ‘man, this is all the work I really love and this is where I want to grow into’ and it just seemed like such a natural fit. And luckily for me, I think Travel Oregon saw it the same way and said, you know, the work that I had been able to achieve here with the team in Bend was some of the work they wanted to see brought into their organization.”

He says it’s a recently developed position, “One of the new silos within the organization was this destination stewardship area where all their grant giving, the regional cooperative tourism program, the destination management studios they operate, all sort of fit nicely under this silo.”

Dugan has been with Visit Bend since 2010, and CEO since 2017. He’s pleased with his efforts to steer Visit Bend out of the great recession and the pandemic. “Thinking back about the amount of work we went through to do our jobs and introduce this community to new people and how successful those efforts were,” he says.

Dugan plans to continue working from Bend, but says he looks forward to guiding all parts of the state's tourism efforts, “Getting out to the Baker Cities and really understanding what a community like Baker City wants or does not want and helping them evolve… or the Oregon Coast. I'm really eager for that diversity of ideas and the diversity of concepts that I'll be able to work in because every community is going to want something different. And I think that's the most exciting part; to bring the strategy to achieving what those communities want.”

Dugan says he will remain based in Bend.