The Mathews County Board of Supervisors unanimously approved a transient occupancy tax ordinance during Tuesday’s board meeting.
Under the ordinance, guests staying in hotels, motels, inns, hostelries, tourist homes, rooming houses, campgrounds, or other lodging places for fewer than 30 consecutive days will be assessed a 2 percent lodging tax on their bill.
During the public hearing, two people spoke and both expressed support for the lodging tax. Emily Allen of Susan, who serves as executive director of the Mathews County Visitor & Information Center, pointed out that the county relies heavily on real estate taxes for revenue, which she described as dangerous, given the drop in real estate values that has occurred in various localities.
“A travel-related tax can help with the unpredictability of real estate values,” she said.
Surrounding localities all having lodging tax ordinances, said Allen, and there is no research that shows such a tax affects their ability to draw visitors. There are a number of cottages and houses on the MCVIC website, said Allen, plus Air B&B guest homes, the Callis House on Main Street, and a proposal to turn Hyco House into a bed and breakfast.
“We’re not going to get rich,” she said, “but we won’t bankrupt our places of lodging.”
Danette Machen of Bohannon said that she was in favor of the tax, but she said that some things in the ordinance concerned her. The ordinance requires monthly tax remittances, while home occupations are allowed to submit taxes quarterly, she said. In the fall months, when local lodging places often aren’t occupied, the owners will have to submit tax statements anyway under the terms of the ordinance. “That seems like busy work to me,” she said.
Machen also asked that the board consider making the effective date of the ordinance after the summer season. Contracts for many of the businesses have already gone out without the lodging tax included, she said, so the owners will “be left holding the bag.”
Finally, Machen said the ordinance doesn’t address how the county will identify the properties that will need to comply with the tax requirement. “There are a lot out there,” she said, “but the vast majority don’t live here and don’t know and may not have the incentive to pay.”
After approving the tax, the board set Sept. 1 as the effective date for property owners to begin collecting the tax.
Tax bills
The board unanimously decided to extend the due date for tax bill payments to June 29 instead of June 5.
Commissioner of the Revenue Les Hall told the board that his office had experienced a problem with billing. He said it ran the tax bills and sent the file to the billing software, but “it didn’t come out well.” He said the office planned to run the tax bills again, but needed to extend the deadline in case there were further problems. He said he hoped the tax bills would go out Wednesday.
County Administrator Mindy Conner said that pushing the deadline so close to the end of the fiscal year would cause the end-of-year audits to be misstated because they wouldn’t be reported in the same time frame. However, she said they would eventually “catch up” and that property owners have to be given time to receive their bills and pay them.
Planning and zoning
Planning and Zoning Director Thomas Jenkins told the board that the planning commission last week deadlocked on a request by Harvey and Sherri Hamm for a conditional use permit for an event venue in the Glebe, and therefore had no recommendation for the board. Jenkins said the commission has 70 days to make a decision and he hopes it will have a recommendation by June or July.
In other matters, the board:
—On a split vote, with chairman Charles Ingram and Pepper Love dissenting, approved extending the county’s current custodial contract by another three years;
—Established a committee of two board members, supervisors Amy Dubois and Love, to look into changing the flood plain ordinance to include an appeals process and a definition of market value;
—Unanimously voted to provide Mathews Volunteer Fire Department with an additional $50,000 after hearing a presentation from Fire Chief Ronnie Lewis and Station 2 Captain Lee Smith;
—Accepted a $15,000 grant from the Virginia Department of Emergency Management to help pay for the purchase of an emergency generator for the county’s shelter at the YMCA. The low bid for the purchase and installation of the generator was $37,316.55, said Emergency Services Coordinator Willie Love. Conner said the additional funds will come from the committed reserve;
—Heard from Building Official Jamie Wilks that the water source at Hole in the Wall, the restaurant that will be replacing the Seabreeze on Gwynn’s Island, had passed inspection, and that septic permits had been issued. He said that work on finishing the restaurant is continuing;
—Heard a report from Dubois about an intern program at Mathews High School. She said that 18 entities, from watermen to civic organizations, are “contemplating how to use interns.” She said it’s hoped that there will be an organization to match with each intern and that there will be a credit program at the high school by the fall;
—Recognized May 20-26 as Emergency Medical Services Week and expressed appreciation to members of the Mathews Volunteer Rescue Squad “for their unequalled service to the citizens of Mathews County,” and
—Approved the appropriation of $91,000 in additional state revenue and $47,832 in Medicaid Recovered Costs to the school board budget. The additional state funding is from higher-than-anticipated enrollment for the 2017-2018 year.