What's Going On: Why I’m opposing the hotel/motel tax

A couple weeks ago, I filled the back of my pickup truck with leaves and headed to the city brush site to unload them.

It was about 4:15 p.m. and I remembered the site closes at 4 p.m. I also remembered a conversation the Council had several months ago about keeping the site open extra hours, especially during high use times.

This was an unseasonably warm weekday and with rain and cooler temperatures forecasted for the next few days, I hoped this would be one of those days the site was left open longer.

It wasn’t.

Sometimes, the best intentions are ignored or forgotten when they aren’t written down and enacted into policy. That’s what concerns me most about next week’s vote on Red Oak’s proposed seven percent hotel/motel tax.

The ballot language mirrors state requirements for any hotel/motel tax: half to recreation and tourism and half to whatever the Council wants. Red Oak’s Council has stated, all of it will go toward tourism/recreation and the promotion thereof.

However they wouldn’t agree to etch that in stone by including that language on the ballot. Had they done that, this and future Councils could not renege on their promise to spend all of the money on recreation and tourism and use it to buy a snowplow. Or staples. Or whatever else falls under the broad-reaching clause of “any lawful purpose.”

I’m not going to try telling you how to vote. Frequently on tax issues, or other ballot referendums, I see clear right and wrong ways to vote. I’m not sure the line is as clear in this instance.

I do hope voters cast their ballots knowing what they are voting for, or against. Some of the information I have heard and read is in my opinion, somewhat misleading and I will clarify a few points:

• This is a tax and largely, one that will be paid for by businesses and not-for-profit agenciess. Our hotels are not filled with tourists. They are filled with railroaders, construction workers and other assorted out-of-town business people. This is a commercial tax that will directly affect their bottom line, and like all commercial expenses, will be passed on to the consumer eventually. This also includes your local schools and groups like the Wilson Performing Arts Center which will probably see an increase of up to $1,000 in hotel expenses if the tax passes. An advocate of this tax will argue that expense to the Wilson will be offset by increased promotion of the facility and its shows, and that is probably true. But to call this anything other than a tax or one that is paid primarily by throngs of out-of-town individuals is wrong.
•  When advocates claim this tax “would” fund A, B, and C, a more accurate word is “could.” “Would” is accurate if the ballot language required them to spend it a certain way, but it doesn’t. While today’s council and Mayor claim they are going to spend it all on tourism and recreation, it is not binding. Tomorrow, they could change their mind and do simply what the ballot requires: spend half of it on tourism and recreation and the other half on whatever they want.
• While the Council was greatly divided on practically every aspect of this tax in the past, it appears they are entirely behind it now that the time to debate it has passed. The two members who lobbied and failed to have

the ballot language changed, Larry Barnett and Jeanice Lester, have since publicly stated their support for it. They agree with the mindset that half of $70,000 is better than none of it.

And that is really the question you have to ask yourself when deciding how to vote.

Brandi Johnson asked in a letter to the editor last week “If someone gives you $100 but tells you how to spend $50 of it, will you still turn down the other $50?”

The analogy isn’t exactly fair as it raises a ton of questions such as why is this person giving me money to begin with and what am I obligating myself to if I accept it.

But the premise is sound in how it relates to this proposal. The worst case scenario is a rogue council decides to spend $35,000 a year on staples, snowplows or a pay raise for the City Manager, there will still be $35,000 a year available for local tourism and recreation that isn’t available today.

That is the worst case scenario. Only half of the money goes to where it should and if you believe that’s better than nothing, then vote for this tax.

Today, I don’t think I’m going to. That might change, but I doubt it. I’m not willing to settle for good enough or half of the pie. If we are going to go to the effort and burden of another tax, I want every penny earmarked for something above and beyond. When I hear current council members suggesting we spend this money on basic services like bulk trash pick-up, I shudder. We already pay taxes for that, along with snowplows, police protection, paved streets and clean water.

None of this money should ever go to general expenses and when presented with the opportunity to make sure it didn’t, the Council declined. Granted, in the next breath, they promised none of it would go to general expenses.

But much like with the brush site, the best intentions can be easily disregarded. I can’t support that.

Gregory Orear is the General Manager/Editor of the Red Oak Express. He can be contacted at publisher@redoakexpress.com.