MILTON — The Santa Rosa County Board of County Commissioners unanimously moved to allow the Tourist Development Office to provide hospitality expenditures to tourism-related industry representatives and partners. Commission Chairman Rob Williamson was absent from this meeting.
County Administrator Tony Gomillion will review these expenditures, according to backup information for Thursday’s commission meeting. They will include food, beverage and tip expenses for those involved in tourism development activities on behalf of Santa Rosa County and representatives from tourist development organizations.
“If travel writers are going to be in town, familiarization tours, any kind of promotional activities that host people to promote tourism in Santa Rosa County is what that’s for,” Tourist Development Director Julie Morgan said. “In case we have a group of travel writers all day in a van with us, we need a stack of bottled water, or if we can’t find a sponsor for their lunch one day, then that gives us the ability to pay for them. That’s an allowable expense for the tourism budget.”
Other covered expenditures will include membership fees and expenses for local chambers of commerce.
The money for these expenses does not come from property taxes, according to Morgan.
“Tourist development taxes are derived solely (from) tourists that stay the night in a lodging facility in Santa Rosa County,” Morgan said. “They are taxed on top of their bill that night. Property taxes do not pay for our budget. We are a self-sustained operation.”
This article originally appeared on Santa Rosa Press Gazette: Tourism taxes to pay for hospitality, networking expenses