After a lengthy discussion, a divided Cortez City Council on Tuesday passed an ordinance that sets the language for a November ballot question. The measure will ask city voters to approve an increase in the lodgers’ tax from the current 2 percent to 6 percent.
The lodgers’ tax applies only to short-term rentals such as motels.
Council member April Randle strongly argued that half of the resulting revenues, which are estimated to be about $750,000 a year, should be dedicated to improving Cortez’s water infrastructure.
A recent engineering report said the city’s water treatment facilities and distribution system will need more than $100 million of work over the next 20 years.
Randle said the city should prioritize essential systems such as water over uses such as tourism marketing, landscaping, and arts and cultural events, which are listed in the ballot language.
“I am proposing and will continue to propose that 50 percent goes toward water infrastructure,” Randle said “Public perception is everything. We’re acting like we have this money We don’t have it. We need the public to support us.”
The ballot question says the lodgers’ tax revenues “shall be used for the following purposes:
· investing in tourism marketing, including advertising the community;
· attracting and facilitating economic development and redevelopment of properties and infrastructure within the city, including improving walkability, landscaping, structures, and other improvements; and
· investing in arts and cultural events, programs and facilities.”
Two Cortez residents spoke during public comment in favor of specifying that some of the tax revenues be used for water infrastructure.
Council member Bill Lewis said he agrees the city needs to put money into infrastructure, but lodgers’ tax money isn’t the way to do that.
“This is potentially $750,000 compared to what we need,” Lewis said. “It is minimal.”
Instead, he said, the funds should be used for things such as maintaining existing green spaces and perhaps improving the South Broadway entrance to Cortez.
Mayor Dennis Spruell said tourists bring money into the city, so it’s important to attract them.
“I don’t want to be a Moab,” Spruell said. “I don’t think anybody on this council wants to be a Moab. The tourists have destroyed their home town. I don’t want that.
“However, I believe. . that we need to attract tourists, and water isn’t the way to do that. What will attract them is statues, pretty things, little things.”
Lewis said the new funds could offer an opportunity to market Cortez in different ways, such as investing in arts and cultural events. He praised a recent drone show in the park system
City Manager Drew Sanders recommended the council be cautious about amending the ballot language. He said if the measure passes, people can then decide how to spend the funds raised.
The board early in the discussion said it will create an advisory committee to recommend uses for the funds if voters approve the increase in the lodgers’ tax.
But Spruell said the public wants to know what the money will be used for, and he thought the discussion should continue.
Randle said the ballot language was “extremely vague.”
“We have a huge financial load coming down the road,” she said. “Could we not just say we’re going to take a portion of this money and relieve our citizens from having to carry this on their own back?”
The council finally voted 5 to 2, with Randle and Kathleen Swope dissenting, to pass the ordinance as it was proposed, without changes to the ballot language.
