At the Block Island Tourism Council meeting last month, members were a bit flabbergasted that no-one showed up to represent the Block Island Visitor Center request for funding for the second month in a row.The Visitor Center was spun off from the Chamber of Commerce last year as a separate legal entity, although there are still staff in common and they share the same spacedowntown by the ferry docks. The head of the Chamber directs the center, but currently there is no executive director as Lars Trodson departed at the end of May after almosta year-and-a-half in that position.Running the Chamber has been left to employees Irina Murphy and Sarah Potenza.The Tourism Council first reviewed the request for funding at its May meeting, but the members requested a “plan,” or a budget, for the Visitors’ Center. Then in June,no one from the Chamber or Visitors’ Center showed up.Tourism Council member Neal Murphy (no relation to Irina Murphy) volunteered to go down to the Chamber and talk with them.So, on Tuesday, July 12, Irina Murphy, along with Chamber board member Suzy Milner, came to the Tourism Council meeting to ask for the funding in person and to answer any
