Hotel bed tax revenue soars in September

• By SCOTT DYER
• Advocate staff writer
• Published: Dec 5, 2008 - Page: 5B - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

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Bed tax revenue at East Baton Rouge hotels and motels in September scored their second-biggest month ever, thanks to business generated by Hurricane Gustav.

Baton Rouge Area Convention and Visitors Bureau Finance Chief Sid Jackson said the bureau collected $434,257 in bed taxes in September, the month that Hurricane Gustav hit Baton Rouge.

“It’s only about $10,000 less than our biggest month after Hurricane Katrina,” Jackson said.

The all-time record was in March 2006, when local hotels were jammed with evacuees from hurricanes Katrina and Rita and bed-tax revenue totaled $443,565.

The near-record collections in September put the bureau $407,252 ahead of last year’s bed tax revenue. Jackson said he expects the Gustav-effect to continue when bed tax revenues for October are announced later this year.

Visitors who stay in East Baton Rouge Parish hotels and motels pay a bed tax of 13 cents on every dollar of room rates.

Of that, the bureau receives 3 cents on every dollar to promote local tourism and bring conventions to Baton Rouge.

Also Thursday, the bureau’s governing board approved a $3.7 million budget for 2009, a 6-percent increase over the current year’s budget.

Jackson said the proposed budget is based on actual revenues that are anticipated for 2008, less $200,000 for the estimated Gustav effect.

However, Jackson said the actual impact of Gustav won’t be known until February, when December’s bed tax revenues are slated to come out.

In other action Thursday, the board voted to give Bureau President  Paul Arrigo  a 4.5-percent pay raise for next year, increasing his annual base salary to $143,667. Arrigo will also be eligible for a 10-percent bonus if the bureau meets or exceeds goals for bed tax revenues and for room night booking, and gets a clean audit.

The board has been extending Arrigo’s five-year contract every year, but agreed Thursday to let it renew automatically.

If the board decides to terminate Arrigo without cause, the bureau will be obligated to pay him a year’s salary in termination pay, according to Chuck Elkins, an attorney who provides legal advice to the bureau.