After wrapping up the 2011 election season on Nov. 8., Culver City voters have a reprieve of five months before the 2012 municipal election becomes the talk of the town.
While City Council elections will take front and center, a ballot measure to raise the city’s transient occupancy tax will also be part of the political, as well as election conversation.
Known to some as the hotel bed tax, the transient occupancy tax is charged in California when occupying a room or rooms or other living space in a hotel, inn, tourist home or house, motel or other lodging for a period of 30 days or more.
Camping sites and recreational vehicle parks can also be subjected to the levy.
Vice Mayor Scott Malsin was on a council subcommittee recently that examined the merits of asking Culver City voters to raise the tax by 2% through a ballot initiative called Measure X, which would bring the levy on par with cities like Santa Monica, Beverly Hills and Los Angeles.
The reasons given for the proposal are largely centered on finances.
“The City Council has been grappling with this issue for several years. Our goal is to achieve financial sustainability for the long term,” Malsin explained. “In order to achieve that goal, we have reduced staffing levels, negotiated concessions with our employees and adjusted fees to recover the full cost of services such as inspection and planning fees.
“We are asking the voters to consider increasing Culver City’s transient occupancy tax as part of our overall strategy.”
Culver City Assistant City Manager Martin Cole said the initiative could generate a significant amount of revenue for the city’s coffers.
“In accordance with the city attorney’s impartial analysis of the proposed Measure X filed in my office [on Nov. 7], the anticipated annual revenue from such an increase [if approved by voters] is estimated at $510,000,” Cole told the News.
“Our hotels generate a good deal of revenue for Culver City and we want them to remain competitive,” Malsin added. “The council took into account the fact that our [transient occupancy tax] is lower than surrounding communities as we considered the option of increasing it.”
There is no official opposition to Measure X, and the deadline for filing an argument against the measure was Nov. 7.
An executive at one of the city’s premier hotels sees some merit to raising the hotel tax if it is done for specific reasons.
“Any additional tax that is utilized to drive business into Culver City and to benefit hotels is something that the ownership of this hotel would support,” Culver City Hotel General Manager Seth Horowitz told the News. “Unequivocally, any additional tax that is not utilized to drive business into Culver City and does not benefit hotels is not something that the ownership of this hotel would support.”
City officials say that due to fewer tax dollars and the skyrocketing of expenditures, a change in political and fiscal strategy is necessary.
“The way of doing business that government has relied on for decades will not work any longer. Revenues do not keep up with increasing costs even in a small city like ours – one that focuses on a limited range of basic services,” Malsin asserted. “While this fundamental problem predates the ‘great recession’ of the past few years, the economic downturn has only made matters worse.”
Jewett Walker, a Culver City political consultant and strategist, said because the ballot initiative would make Culver City’s transient occupancy tax uniform with the majority of the surrounding cities in the region, he thinks that many would find it difficult to argue against.
“If it’s the same in Los Angeles, [Marina del Rey] and Santa Monica, there probably aren’t a lot of reasons to fight it,” Walker said.
Horowitz, who has been at the hotel for about one month, pointed out that Santa Monica and Marina del Rey both have Visitors and Conventions bureaus, which are designed to attract attention and commerce to local merchants and businesses.
The Downtown Business Assn. and the Culver City Chamber of Commerce are entities that, among other activities, gear to bring business into the city, and Horowitz believes some of the new tax, if Measure X passes, should be used toward that end.
“It would be very beneficial to hotels to have an allocation with a public relations aspect,” he said. “The message needs to get out that Culver City is a different city…a rising city.”
Culver City voters have largely backed initiatives put forth by their local government. In 2004, voters defeated Measure U, the user utility tax reduction measure that city officials urged against; in 2004, many City Hall representatives campaigned for Measure V, which restructured the city charter and voters overwhelmingly approved Measure EE in 2009.
Measure EE was a parcel tax that raised $6 million over five years for the Culver City Unified School District and was supported by a variety of well-known and politically diverse factions.
Malsin believes there are concrete explanations why the Culver City electorate has been supportive of previous ballot measures.
“I attribute the successful passage of past ballot initiatives to three factors: The council enjoys the public’s trust, it has made a good case for the initiatives it has supported and voters recognize and appreciate the quality of service our city provides,” he said.
Walker does not foresee any potential pitfalls for Measure X. “It’s going to be a yawner, a slam-dunk,” he predicted.
