The Ocean Shores Lodging Tax Advisory Committee last week began to review more than a dozen requests for an estimated $1.05 million in hotel/motel sales tax revenue next year, but those requests total at least $427,104 more than the city will have available to disburse.
Of the money available, the city has requested $1.06 million for operations at the Ocean Shores Convention Center, including debt payments of $416,994, operations costs of $559,855, repairs and maintenance reserve of $75,000 and $15,000 to run the Visitors Information Center.
The advisory committee met on Sept. 22 also to consider and review applications from a number of events, projects and proposals, including another $200,000 for the ongoing Ocean Shores/North Beach Marketing Co-Op group advertising campaign, and a $60,000 request to move the Visitors Information Center to the Ocean Shores/North Beach Chamber of Commerce on Point Brown Avenue.
Another request comes from the city itself — a proposal already reviewed by the LTAC committee by the Pinnacle consulting and marketing company from San Antonio, Texas, to first conduct a review and make recommendations on Convention Center operations ($20,000), followed by a consulting agreement ($30,000) and another $40,000 reserve to begin to make some of the recommendations.
Other applications were:
• $8,000 for the city’s inclusion in a promotional “Here &Now” marketing publication in 2017, and $7,200 for 2016 too.
• $4,500 for the Lion’s Charitable Foundation to help fund the annual Toast of the Harbor festival.
• $12,000 for the Coastal Interpretive Center.
• $25,000 for Toughman Enterprises to run a triathlon in Ocean Shores.
• $5,400 to continue paying for a promotional Ocean Shores billboard on State Route 109.
The applications combined added up to requests for $412,100.
City Councilman John Lynn, a member of the advisory committee, told other members the amount of revenue is set by the state, and the LTAC body can only make recommendations that have to be approved by the City Council under a state ruling.
“If they change whatever we recommend, they can send it back to us and we have another 45 days to consider what we would do,” Lynn told the other members, made up of three local members of the business community/hotel industry and a member from the Coastal Interpretive Center.
Lynn noted that with few funds available, how the money is disbursed might be a “moot point.”
That’s because the city is obligated first to pay for the Convention Center debt, operations and maintenance.
The committee heard from several of the groups and organizations that have applied for the funds under a formal process set by the LTAC.
Dru Garson, CEO of Greater Grays Harbor Inc., said he was applying for the funds for the Toast of the Harbor event because it seemed like “a good fit,” and that the intent was to advertise the annual event outside of Grays Harbor, to the Tacoma-Olympia market.
“This is an event that is held during the shoulder season, so it is great to be able to have opportunities to bring people in at that time when there is not a lot of visitation going on,” he said.
One of the concerns about the request for the Toughman event was that the non-profit company promoting it was based out of state.
“One of the requirements of the lodging tax is that they be a state of Washington non-profit, and they are not,” said Jim Nagan of the Coastal Interpretive Center. “They are licensed as a non-profit in the state of New York.”
The proposal to move the Visitors Information Center originally surfaced during discussions last year on how the lodging tax funds were disbursed.
Mark Plackett, interim director of the Chamber of Commerce, said the money requested would be used to make the move of the center to the Chamber offices as well as hiring staff to keep it operating, especially over the weekends.
“One of the board’s concerns is that there are so many visitors information centers in town that consolidating them would be a real plus expense-wise,” Plackett said.
He noted the Chamber “spends a huge amount of our time at the Chamber talking to visitors, talking on the phone, sending out packets of information” and doing other promotions to attract visitors.
“Probably 50-60 percent of our time is taken up working with visitors,” Plackett said. “So we’re already doing it.”
Some of the issues raised were the availability of parking, particularly for larger RVs, motorhomes or trailers, around the Chamber office as well as staffing levels.
Plackett also represented the Marketing Co-Op, which received $40,000 two years ago and $60,000 last year for an ongoing campaign to promote Ocean Shores as a tourist destination.
“What we are doing with the Marketing Co-Op is really trying to do what the name implies — make partnerships with other entities in Ocean Shores and the North Beach to bring people to Ocean Shores,” Plackett said.
While the campaign has focused on Metro Seattle-area bus panel advertising, digital billboards, radio and other advertising placement in the past, the goal is to have enough money next year to begin a television advertising campaign too.
Mayor Crystal Dingler made a presentation on behalf of the Convention Center. It includes a $315,000 fixed sum to pay for the Convention Center’s 206 Fund debt to pay for the publicly financed facility, combined with repayments for interfund loans the city made in the past during the economic recession. Dingler said the city hopes to triple the minimum payments to pay those interfund debts off as soon as possible.
The city sold $9.37 million in bonds in April 2104 to replace the bonds issued by the Grays Harbor County Public Facilities District that went to pay for the construction of the Convention Center. The Public Facilities District has pledged all of the related sales tax from the facility back to the city, and debt service is paid with combined hotel/motel tax revenues.
“We have to also look long-term when we begin to make our decisions and what we’re going to do,” Lynn said, pointing to the debt.
The mayor also made the presentation in support of the proposal by Pinnacle to begin looking at how to improve overall Convention Center marketing and operations as part of what could be a longer-term consulting agreement. The first phase would be a study of the Convention Center by the Pinnacle group to recommended “changes to us — things they think we could do that would enhance our business and how we do our business,” Dingler said.
“I think our folks do a great job,” Dingler said. “They don’t, however, have a breadth of experience with other businesses like this. Something Pinnacle brings to us is that they have a great breadth of experience.” She noted the company currently is working with a similar facility in Florence, OR.
“They were very pleased with Pinnacle,” Dingler said of the Florence Event Center. “And their concerns are the same concerns that we have.”
After the initial study by Pinnacle, the company then would use the other funds to help implement some of the recommendations and eventually hire a marketing director largely funded by the city and by commissions.
The advisory committee chose not to take any action yet on recommendations to be sent to the City Council, with members asking for more time to review the funding dilemma.
The committee will meet again at 5:15 p.m. Oct. 12, while the City Council will hold an all-day budget study session Oct. 6 at the Lions Club.
