Nova Scotia's tourism minister says he and his cabinet colleagues will decide the fate of six visitor information centres at Thursday's regular cabinet meeting.
Mark Furey said Wednesday he is ready to share a report that contains recommendations he has been mulling over and discussing for months with the province's tourism agency, Tourism Nova Scotia.
"There's been a tremendous amount of discussion and dialogue, information exchanged," Furey told CBC News.
The minister said he was disappointed with the amount of speculation there has been surrounding the fate of the centres at the Halifax Stanfield International Airport, on the Halifax waterfront, and in Amherst, Peggys Cove, Yarmouth and Port Hastings.
That speculation has come from the Nova Scotia Government and General Employees Union, which represents the roughly 70 people who work at the centres.
The province's latest edition of its main tourist publication — the Doers and Dreamers guide — removed the location of the centres from the provincial map, which added fuel to the speculation. 
"Obviously if I was to have the ability to go back and change things, would we put that question mark on provincial maps, absolutely," said Furey.

'Obviously there's use of these facilities'

According to figures supplied by Tourism Nova Scotia, all but one of those centres saw more visitors in 2015 than 2014. The only place to see a traffic decrease was at the airport.
Furey said those numbers showed there is a place for the centres in growing tourism in Nova Scotia.
"Safe to say that the numbers, I would say, are significant and that obviously there's use of these facilities."
Overall, the six visitor information centres helped 356,673 people during 2015. That's 40,773 fewer than 2014, but the drop is entirely a result of the 40 per cent decrease in visits to the airport location. 
That location alone saw 57,609 fewer visitors in 2015 than in 2014. Tourism Nova Scotia attributes that to the fact there were fewer flights to Halifax from the United States.
The increase at other locations is due, according to the agency, to an increase in road traffic and the fact Nova Scotians who wanted a guide had to pick them up in person rather than receiving them through the mail.