Staff Biographies

Director of Community Enhancement and Design

Tonya Gore is the Director of Community Enhancement and Design at the Myrtle Beach Downtown Alliance. She started in June 2022.

Prior to MBDA, she was a Designer for Toole Design Group. Toole Design Group is an international Engineering, Planning and Landscape Architecture consulting firm. Tonya worked on multiple traffic design projects to redesign city or county corridors to incorporate traffic calming initiates, complete streets and alignment for bicycle and pedestrian trails

Tonya previously worked for Lamar Advertising as a Senior Graphic Designer and a Adjunct Instructor at Horry Georgetown Technical College in the Digital Arts and the Computer technology department. She was a freelance Graphic Designer/Marketing Director for OceanView Funeral Home located in Myrtle Beach, SC. Tonya is very dedicated to her community; she currently serves as a member of the Booker T. Washington Community Organization as a board member. She is currently working as a volunteer for Habitat for Humanity to help with the efforts in redesigning Futural Park to make it an active space for all. While attending Graduate school, Tonya held an internship with The Water Institute of The Gulf who was part of the collaborated team that work alongside Charleston’s local teams during the Dutch Dialogues in 2019.

Tonya has over 15 years of experience in Graphic Design and working with community efforts. She has a master’s degree in Resilient Urban Design from Clemson University, Master’s degrees in Information Technology Management and Human Resource Management from Webster University, a Bachelor of Arts from Coastal Carolina University with an emphasis in Graphic Design and an Associate of Arts from Horry Georgetown Technical College. Tonya is a native of Myrtle Beach, her family is located here and she herself was born and raised in Myrtle Beach. Tonya has one daughter and three grandchildren.

Email : tonya.gore@mbdowntown.org