Huntington Beach Goes Hunting Tourists : Promotion: The City Council hears of efforts to lure Japanese visitors fearful of Los Angeles.

Once best known for its oil wells, this coastal community is now promoting itself as a tourist destination, the City Council was told in a special report Monday.

Representatives of the city’s new Conference and Visitors Bureau told the council that the agency is helping bring in tourist and convention dollars by publicizing the attractions of Huntington Beach.

“Tourism is on the rise, and I feel very good about it,” said Diane Baker, president of the bureau.

Baker said Huntington Beach is going to join Newport Beach and possibly Dana Point and Laguna Beach in regional advertising about the attractions of the Orange Coast.

“This will be stretching our dollars,” she said, noting that the participating cities will share the advertising costs.

The Los Angeles riots initially caused some problems for Huntington Beach tourism because virtually all Japanese tour groups canceled excursions to Southern California, Baker said. “The No. 1 issue with people traveling from Japan is safety,” she said.

Huntington Beach responded to the fears by sending out letters stressing the safety of the city, Baker said. Japanese tourists are now returning to Huntington Beach, and Orange County seems to be getting many Japanese tourists who would otherwise be going to Los Angeles County, she said. However, she did not have any statistics on how many Japanese tourists actually have made the switch.

The tourism report was released during the City Council’s afternoon study session, prior to the regular council meeting.

The Conference and Visitors Bureau was formed in 1989 with help from the city government. The city each year since then has funded the independent agency, this year giving the tourism agency $172,000 for its operating expenses.

In a written report to the council, Deputy City Administrator Barbara Kaiser noted that many city businesses now are geared for tourism.

“Within the past several years, a tremendous amount of activity has taken place within Huntington Beach that has served to expand visitor-serving uses, not only within the downtown area, but the entire community,” she said.

The move to encourage tourism brings the city full circle back to its naming in 1904. Early settlers in the tiny community--first called Shell Beach, then renamed Pacific City--longed for a transportation link to bring in visitors from wealthy Los Angeles County.

The major land firm in the village, the Huntington Beach Co., negotiated with Henry Huntington, owner of the electric Red Car trolley in Los Angeles. As a trump card, the land company told Huntington the tiny community would rename itself Huntington Beach if he would bring in the transit cars.

Huntington agreed, and the first Red Cars arrived in the village on July 4, 1904. The event was marked by an inaugural Independence Day parade that has since become a city tradition.

Although the electric transit brought in tourists, the town did not really boom until oil was discovered 16 years later. Thereafter, much of the city was dotted with oil wells, and the petroleum industry reigned. But in the 1980s, oil companies began phasing out many wells, and local businesses increasingly sought tourism as an alternative source of income.