In the context of limited budgetary resources of the regional authorities, it is advisable to search for new opportunities to form the tourist attractiveness of the territories. The need to involve the local social environment in managerial-decision making for tourism development actualizes research on the motivation and readiness of the local community to interact with authorities in tourism. The research purpose is to determine the priorities for the development of the tourism industry in the region through identifying the position of local residents. The research method is a questionnaire survey of the population of a regional entity the Republic of Kalmykia. The findings demonstrate the confidence of the majority of respondents in the possibility of positioning tourism as one of the priority sectors of the region’s economy. According to the respondents, the key tools for tourism development are the formation of a project for the integral development of the tourist and recreational potential of the region and its financing from the state and regional budgets, as well as the introduction of digital end-to-end technologies in this area. The respondents’ support for the thesis about the need to involve local residents in the formation of the tourist attractiveness of the territory can be considered as a potential opportunity for a wider use of social resources of local communities and internal territorial development sources). In the respondents’ opinion, tourism development tools are associated with traditional practices that require financial investments in the creation of tourism infrastructure, objects of tourist attraction.