MAHONING COUNTY Officials to use part of bed tax for airport

A meeting will be next week to discuss forming a regional visitors bureau.
By BOB JACKSON
VINDICATOR COURTHOUSE REPORTER
YOUNGSTOWN -- Mahoning County commissioners are going ahead with a plan to earmark bed-tax revenue for the Youngstown-Warren Regional Airport but won't increase the bed-tax rate to do it.
Their decision comes a day after a four-hour meeting with the Youngstown-Mahoning County Convention and Visitors Bureau, during which local hotel and motel operators adamantly opposed a bed-tax increase.
"We heard them loud and clear," said Commissioner Vicki Allen Sherlock.
Since 1987, commissioners have assessed a 3-percent tax on all hotel and motel room rentals in the county. The revenue is given to the bureau, which uses it to promote tourism within the county. The tax is in addition to state and local sales taxes.
The 3-percent tax brings in about $450,000 a year.
A recent change in state law allows commissioners to impose an additional 2-percent bed tax as a means of generating operating revenue for the airport, which is in Trumbull County and jointly operated by Mahoning and Trumbull counties.
No increase
Commissioners said Thursday that given the lodging community's overwhelming opposition to a bed-tax increase, they won't increase the bed tax.
Instead, they will realign the way the current 3-percent tax is distributed, giving 2 percent to the airport and 1 percent to the bureau.
They also want to merge the Mahoning and Trumbull visitors bureaus into one agency.
"We have one port authority and one chamber of commerce," said Commissioner Ed Reese. "It doesn't make sense that we should have two convention bureaus."
Commissioners plan to schedule a meeting soon with all affected agencies from both counties to see whether such a plan can be worked out.
Attorney's concerns
"I don't think it's a good idea," said Atty. Lawrence Richards, chairman of the Youngstown-Mahoning County Convention and Visitors Bureau. "They think you can market both counties together, but I don't think that's necessarily true."
Richards fears that a merged visitors bureau would eventually be caught up in dissent over promoting one county against the other. He said the combined two-county area would be too big to effectively promote for tourism.
"I'll bet that five years from now they'd want to dissolve it and go back to each county having its own bureau," Richards said.
Sherlock said she's arranged a meeting next week with Trumbull County commissioners to talk about the merger and about the bed-tax issue.
Trumbull Commissioner James Tsagaris said he and his colleagues are willing to listen to Mahoning's proposal.
"If she can convince me that one convention bureau is enough, that's fine with me," Tsagaris said. "I have no problem with it."
Sherlock said if the counties agree on earmarking 2 percent of their respective bed-tax revenue for the airport, it should be the end of doling out general fund dollars to the Western Reserve Port Authority, which operates the Vienna Township facility.
"Once that permanent funding is in place, I think it's time to say enough is enough in terms of dollars from the counties," Sherlock said.
bjackson@vindy.com