Transient Lodging Tax Committee Minutes
February 17, 2022
Baker City Hall – Council Chambers
Tyler called the meeting to order at 9:00 am.
Members Present: Tyler Brown, Mandy Clark, Toni Thompson, Shane Alderson, Tori Thatcher, Buell Gonzalles, and Brian Vegter
Guests Present: Bryan Tweit, Shelly Cutler, Jerry Shaw, Lynn Weems, Eric Pinkston, Matthew Koppenhaver, Bill Harvey and Shelly Christensen
Approve Agenda: Shane moved to approve the agenda. Mandy seconded the motion. Motion carried.
Approve Minutes: Meeting minutes from the January 20, 2022 were reviewed. Mandy moved that the minutes be approved as presented. Shane seconded the motion. Motion carried.
Grant Requests:
Baker Heritage Museum, Night at Old Auburn– Lynn Weems
Baker Heritage Museum is requesting $1,000 to create and distribute colored posters and purchase gaming felt to build or refurbish gaming tables. Lynn indicated the event will not be held at the Museum this year but at the Baker Elks Lodge. In order to cut expenses, this year and in future years, they will not be hiring a company to come in to work the tables. Volunteers will be used instead and grant funds will be used to improve the tables for future use. Funds raised during the event will go to the Museum. Brian moved to award $1,000 to the event. Toni seconded the motion. Motion carried.
Huntington Lions Catfish Derby – Eric Pinkston
Huntington Lions Catfish Derby is requesting $1,000 for heaviest catfish prize money for the weekend and daily prizes. This is the 36th annual derby. Funds raised at the derby will be donated to the Lions Sight and Hearing Foundation. Mandy moved to award $1,000 to the event. Brian seconded the motion. Motion carried.
Visitor Services Update – Shelly Cutler
Shelly provided the Committee with her January report indicating the Center saw 57 travelers passing through, 26 travelers seeking lodging, 19 travelers requesting County information and 32 requesting City information. The Center also mailed 17 Visitor Packets, six Relocation Packets and received 53 visitor phone calls. Shelly expressed the need for a January event and will be working with Congressman Cliff Bentz to make the Armory a viable location to hold events. At this time, the cost to rent the location is too high. She suggested an outdoor show.
Shelly updated the Committee on her work with Jason from ORLA to set up a secret shopper service. He is excited to possibly create this program. ORLA no longer has on-site trainers for the hospitality training. They do offer video trainings. She has contacted NRLA, which will be more expensive, and BMCC has offered their conference room for Zoom training.
Shelly spoke about her suggestion to create a grant program for lodging partners to improve amenities. She would like to create a program and present it to the Committee. Bill Harvey cautioned a government entity providing tax dollars to private sector. Tyler asked Mandy and Brian how they felt about the idea of a grant program. Mandy said if we could figure out how to fund it and build on it each year that it would be really beneficial. Shelly outlined her initial thought, was to make funds available to establishments with four beds or more. If this program was created and utilized by lodging establishments the partnership would serve as a way to connect and tour establishments that participate on a regular basis to inspect the quality of items purchased and offer further suggestions. The use of the funds must be specific: bed linens, towels, etc. and must be followed. Bill recommended the funds be distributed on a reimbursement basis at 50% of cost. The lodging establishment would have to provide receipts detailing the items purchased. Shelly asked if the Committee was interested in creating this grant program. Tyler asked if a program like this, is what the Committee is tasked with in spending tourism and marketing funds. He suggested that this might be a better fit for Economic Development. Bill responded a program like this could be developed as marketing and would be a way to get us through the door and establish a working relationship with lodging establishments. Prior to Covid, Triple A would perform inspections for members and review establishments. That rating would appear on the Triple A ap. Mandy indicated the star ratings come from amenities the establishment offers and reviews they have received. Bill asked if there is a listing of how many hotel/motel rooms were available in Baker County. Shelly said they are working to update their lodging listing and would report that number. Tyler suggested that the Committee continue to talk about it and think about it as the 2022-23 budget is drafted. Brian asked if Shelly would be listing all lodging establishments on the Travel Baker County website.
The quarterly performance review format for the Visitors Center was discussed. Shelly asked what criteria will be in her evaluation. Brian listed; having information on events and how event information was being populated on the website and how she has coordinated with the event organizer. Shelly was concerned that she would be rated poorly due to the lack of response that she receives when trying to connect with an event organizer. Brian suggested that Shelly be evaluated on her event reporting; reporting to the Committee how an event went and how she worked with the event coordinator. Shelly asked for clarification on what level of event she is expected to report and coordinate. Tyler suggested referring back to the BCU’s proposal for guidelines on what her performance evaluation should include. Shelly questioned what level of events the Committee wants to see on the website calendar. Tyler responded that the Committee responsibility is not to micro manage the event calendar. Shelly expressed her concern in being evaluated poorly for not having all events on the calendar. Brian suggested getting as much information on the calendar as she felt was possible. Tyler suggested getting feedback from BCU’s board regarding evaluation criteria, as it was suggested by Jerry Shaw.
Tyler asked Tori if she would put together a rough draft evaluation and send it out to Committee members and staff.
EDC Update: Bryan Tweit
Bryan shared that he is amazed at the number of people in town. The job fair will be April 6th all schools in the County will be bringing in people. He is working on the event center planning. New businesses continue to want to come into Baker County. He has ten people who are looking to start new businesses in Baker City. They are working with businesses to help them set up a Facebook page. Bryan reported that he had businesses state they can’t come to Baker City because there is no workforce housing. Unemployment in Baker County is at 89-90 people, which is .005. The highest category being construction and health industries. Ten units for veteran housing will be built. Bryan spoke about the State duplex guidelines and that the City has not adopted those guidelines. The veteran housing is not limited to disabled veterans, which could include veteran workforce tenants. Bill indicated Baker County has a lot of disabled and retired veterans.
Bryan indicated there will be a youth entrepreneur summit at Churchill. Youth from Wallowa to Burns will be gathering to share ideas.
Bryan has been working with OTEC to find funding in order to put power lines on 10th street underground and installing charging stations.
Tourism Marketing
RFP
Tyler asked the Committee for thoughts on replacing Timothy. Brian expressed the need to seek a contract with someone right now to perform a portion of the marketing duties such as marketing upcoming events, coordinating with travel writers and event organizers. Mandy agreed that we could hire one person or spread the position out to more than one person. Bill indicated that in order to hire, the Committee needs to put out a Request for Proposal. He suggested the Committee put together a rough draft of what they want accomplished in the position and advised them to make it flexible. There was discussion on whether the position needs to be full time or part time. Shelly Christensen will email Committee members the last RFP and Timothy’s proposal along with the Marketing Strategic Plan and Revised Next Steps. Tori suggested holding a work session to create a draft RFP rather than during a regular meeting. Tyler asked members how important they felt social media is in advertising. Brian indicated the benefit of advertising on social media is that you can see demographics, how many followers you have, and there are so many ways to adjust who your ad is targeting. Tyler indicated that in the past Travel Baker County did not have a good social media presence. He asked if the Committee felt if improving that was important. Brian and Mandy felt that hosting travel writers was effective for their businesses. Buell and Tori agreed that it is important to hire someone for this position that has social media experience. Tori felt in the past there was a lack of pre-marketing events on social media.
Baker County & EOVA Travel Guides
Tyler met with the Baker City Herald who produces the Baker County Travel Guide. The marketing budget allocates funds to purchase the overrun of the publication, which is 4,000 guides and the buy-down of ads. Due to time constraints, the publication needs to printed now. The cost to upgrade the quality of the guide would be approximately $30,000 according to Susan Crow from Oregon Media, who publishes the Eastern Oregon Visitors Guide. There was discussion around having the walking tour map in the Baker County Visitors Guide. The Baker City Herald is willing to work in the future to make a better guide and even include QR codes. Tyler committed to the same funding as last year for this years’ publication/ad buy-down. Baker City Herald quoted a cost of $4,000 to provide a higher quality cover for the guide. Tyler asked the Herald to first target lodging establishments and then tourism industries with the ad buy-down dollars.
Invoices Paid & Pending
Shelly Christensen asked for clarification on the Advertising and Service Agreement she received from Oregon Media for the Eastern Oregon Visitors Guide ads and cooperative advertising. She will have Bill Harvey sign the agreement and email it to Susan Crow.
A work session to draft the 2022-23 budget and create a draft RFP was scheduled for March 1st at 9 am.
Financial Reports: Shelly Christensen
Fourth quarter lodging tax reports are still being filed and revenue looks great. Shelly Christensen directed the Committee to review the lodging tax revenue graph. All three months in the fourth quarter showed a higher revenue than the past ten years. Eleven past due letters were mailed.
Citizen Participation - None
Strategic Planning Update – None
Ordinance Review of Section 22 and Section 24(g) - None
Bill Harvey indicated that the legal fees and penalties need to be increased to offset costs. He suggested a letter be sent to lodging establishments reminding them of the ownership of the tax revenue. Funds collected by the establishment do not belong to the establishment but need to be reported and passed through. There is a 5% collection fee provided to the establishment to offset the cost of handling the tax revenue.
Staff Comments: None
Bill Harvey shared that he will be working at Hewitt/Holcomb parks for the next couple of weeks. They are making $100,000 in improvements to the Parks. The County recently sold property that was donated to the Parks in order to make these improvements. They are moving forward with the hopes of getting a new waterline to be run from Richland, which is a million dollar investment. This year they will lay pipe in a trench that the phone company will be digging to put in a fiber optic line. Improving the water system will be a huge boost to the Parks. The struggle still exists with water levels. He is working with Idaho Power to install a levy to regulate water levels.
There was discussion about a possible generating system at Phillips Reservoir,
Lynn Weems, Baker Heritage Museum Director, shared that Bruce Nichols and Dan McQuisten are working to help repair leaks at the Museum.
Lynn indicated the Interpretive Center is closed but the trails are still open.
Committee Comments:
Tyler shared that Shelly Cutler has been working with the State Basketball Tournament teams for meal planning but with McDonalds and Pizza Hut not offering indoor dining this creates huge burden on the other restaurants. If needed Buell indicated, there are sports teams that are willing to work as servers for tips.
Next Meeting:
Work Session March 1, 2022 @ 9:00
March 17, 2022 @ 9:00
Meeting adjourned at 11:19
Respectfully Submitted: Shelly Christensen