Hotel/motel-tax recipients might not lose out to Event Center for awhile

The City Council Budget Committee on Tuesday gave the go-ahead for organizations to apply for a piece of the city's hotel/motel tax revenue for the budget year beginning July 1, 2011.

The city's finance director, Casey Drew, asked the committee how it wanted to proceed with the popular program and its annual pot of about $2.5 million because Mayor Ron Corbett had put recipients on notice earlier this year that he likely would steer some of the money away from them and to the city's $67-million Event Center project.

It was not entirely clear if the Event Center would impact the hotel/motel program in fiscal year 2012, which begins next July 1, or not.

Council member Kris Gulick thought the impact would come in the next fiscal year, beginning July 1, 2012.

Corbett pointed out that the city will once again next year ask the Iowa Legislature to allow cities to raise the rate of their hotel/motel tax from the current 7 percent to 9 percent, an increase, if it comes, that he said he could go to the Event Center payments.

Corbett's idea has been that the city would sell bonds for the Event Center project and pay them off with a portion of annual hotel/motel revenue.