SIDE STREETS: What would Katharine Lee Bates think if she saw us now?

What would Katharine Lee Bates think today?

Would she still be inspired to write “America the Beautiful” if she took an SUV up Pikes Peak this spring and looked down to see boarded-up neighborhood community centers, empty flower beds, darkened streetlights and litter blowing across the dead grass in Colorado Springs parks?

More important, what will tourists and conventioneers think? Will they still come and support the hospitality-related businesses that account for 14,000 jobs and pump $20 million into the city’s budget in tax revenue?

Those questions run over and over through the mind of Terry Sullivan, president of Experience Colorado Springs, the city’s convention and visitors bureau.

“Travel and tourism is very fickle,” Sullivan said. “Travel plans can be tremendously affected by stories about air safety, or forest fires, or drought, or gasoline prices. They are all detrimental to travel plans.

“And the most influential thing is a destination’s reputation.”

Sullivan’s job is convincing folks from Texas to Tahiti to visit Colorado Springs, retrace Bates’ 1893 wagon ride up America’s Mountain and experience that feeling of endless beauty from sea to shining sea.

His job has gotten tougher with the ongoing budget crisis threatening to shut down local tourism jewels like the Pioneers Museum and Rock Ledge Ranch. Add in the prospect of parks not being watered next summer, pools and community centers closed, and Sullivan starts really losing sleep.

Could it get any worse?

It did last week when a story surfaced in the Denver Post about our budget crisis, the decision to turn off 10,000 streetlights on Feb. 1 to save money, to sell the police helicopters, eliminate some police and firefighters, even to remove trash cans from parks.

Unfortunately for Sullivan, that one story spawned untold others. It raced across the Internet and found its way into the hands of ABC News anchorwoman Diane Sawyer, who described our troubles to millions of viewers on her Monday night newscast. Soon, CBS News had a blog post about it. Web pundits weighed in.

Could 28 seconds on TV really do so much damage?

Of course. Ski resorts know snow during a nationally televised Broncos football game ignites ski fever.

For now, Sullivan is holding his breath.

“Our image has not been devastated by that brief story,” he said. “But if there is continued coverage and they come back in May when our parks should be green and they find brown grass and litter and things, then the story becomes a traumatic issue.”

To him, it’s all about Katharine Lee Bates.

What would she write today? Hmmm.

Oh beautiful for spacious skies,

For trash cans in our park,

For water in our swimming pools,

Streetlights after dark . . .

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