Latest / Conversations: Special Guests with Preston Scott / Bay County Considers Half-Cent Surtax Renewal

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Bay County Considers Half-Cent Surtax Renewal · Conversations: Special Guests with Preston Scott

• 0:08
  Speaker 1: And make any of you laugh. Terrorist organization having offices
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: did you hear that in the national news?
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: So like.
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: Isis with offices in Baghdad, New York, in London and
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  Speaker 1: I don't know anyway. Great to be with you. And
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: it's the third hour of the Morning Show with Preston
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  Speaker 1: Scott and as promised, Bay County folks, a very important
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: vote is here. The early voting has started, with of
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: course the final day being on the fifth of November.
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: And joining us from the Bay County Chamber of Commerces
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  Speaker 1: the President CEO Patrick Chapin, Pat, how are you.
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  Speaker 2: I'm doing well. Thanks for having me my pleasure.
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  Speaker 1: How first of all, let's go back in time. When
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  Speaker 1: did this surtax begin in Bay County?
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  Speaker 2: Started in twenty sixteen, So the Chamber actually led the
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  Speaker 2: charge back then and the voters passed it in twenty
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  Speaker 2: sixteen and is back up on the ballot November fifth.
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  Speaker 1: It is one of the smartest things that Leon County's
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  Speaker 1: ever done. We call it the blueprint sales tax. It's
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: a one cent sales tax. Here talk about the benefits
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  Speaker 1: of this tax. Candidly, I'm hoping that this is almost
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  Speaker 1: a no brainer in your community. But I know you're
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  Speaker 1: trying to make sure that people understand the importance of
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  Speaker 1: this syrd tax.
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  Speaker 2: Prustin, that's encouraging. I appreciate your endorsement, and I wasn't
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: familiar with Leon County, so I'll have to look into that.
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: That's fantastic. And yeah, the even the most conservative people
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  Speaker 2: call it the Farris tax. If there is a tax,
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  Speaker 2: absolutely Yeah. In our case, we have five billion visitors
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  Speaker 2: to Bay County each year, and about forty five percent
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  Speaker 2: of the revenue generated through this tax will be kind
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  Speaker 2: of shouldered by our visitors, so it actually keeps the
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  Speaker 2: property taxes down. We're able to leverage the dollars and
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  Speaker 2: forty five percent of it is paid for our visitors.
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  Speaker 1: You know, it's interesting because when you said I was
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  Speaker 1: watching yesterday and one of your guests on the podcast
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  Speaker 1: kind of the Facebook live thing, the zoom meeting whatever
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: you had, I was watching that, and when I think
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  Speaker 1: you mentioned, yes, one of the leading conservative voices in
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  Speaker 1: our communities in favor of this calls it one of
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  Speaker 1: the fairest taxes out there. I privately assumed you were
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: talking about me, but well, the truth is it is
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  Speaker 1: the best form of taxation because it's a consumption tax,
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  Speaker 1: and you're right, people that visit your community are helping
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  Speaker 1: pay the costs of the infrastructure projects that are needed
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  Speaker 1: to keep the community, I guess properly operating.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's interesting. I'm relatively new in this role in
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  Speaker 2: the Bay County and I was thinking actually this morning
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  Speaker 2: about what we have a couple hundred thousand people, maybe
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  Speaker 2: two hundred hundred and fifty thousand people total residents and
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  Speaker 2: five million people come. So yeah, there's a lot of
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  Speaker 2: wear and tear on our roads, our infrastructure, and uh,
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  Speaker 2: not only you know, resurfacing and making dirt roads paved,
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: but we can also do stormwater projects, sidewalks around schools.
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  Speaker 2: We've done just encounter in Bay County Loan, I believe
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  Speaker 2: six bridges repaired or created. So it's so far in
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  Speaker 2: the eight years we've been able to create this this
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  Speaker 2: revenue source, it's about two hundred and fifty million dollars
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  Speaker 2: that has been generated and maybe another seventy million dollars
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  Speaker 2: that we've been able to leverage. And if I can
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: take them minute, I'll explain that. Yeah, Basically, when a
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  Speaker 2: community goes to the state or the Fed for a
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  Speaker 2: road project or infrastructure project. You know, the FEDS in
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  Speaker 2: the state usually said, well, where's your skin in the game,
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  Speaker 2: and if you hand out, if you hold out your
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  Speaker 2: hand without money in it, they say, you know, get
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  Speaker 2: in the back of the line. We're able to go
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  Speaker 2: with money in our hand. So we kind of jump
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  Speaker 2: to the front of line and all the money that
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  Speaker 2: we get days here in Bay County. But we've been
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  Speaker 2: able to leverage just in Bay County government alone, one
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  Speaker 2: hundred million dollars has been generated and we've been able
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  Speaker 2: to leverage it to forty two million dollars, so pretty
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  Speaker 2: good return.
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  Speaker 1: Absolutely, Patrick chapin with us, we're going to stick around
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  Speaker 1: talk some more. President and CEO of the Bay County
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  Speaker 1: Chamber of Commerce, and we're talking about the half cent
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  Speaker 1: Sytex that all residents of Bay County. You've got to
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  Speaker 1: say in this and I cannot encourage you enough with
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  Speaker 1: let me just point it out this way is economically
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  Speaker 1: one of the strongest states, if not the strongest state
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  Speaker 1: in the nation. Consider we use a consumption tax, we
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  Speaker 1: don't have a personal income tax, and we all benefit
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  Speaker 1: from it. It's the same thing you're basically doing in
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  Speaker 1: Bay County you're you're you're not taking money away. You're
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  Speaker 1: adding to everyone's bottom line by virtue of having all
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  Speaker 1: of all of all of the visitors contribute to the
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  Speaker 1: infrastructure projects that you all use every single day. It
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  Speaker 1: is a half a cent sir tax on every dollar
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  Speaker 1: spent and taxed at the stores. For us in Leon County,
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  Speaker 1: we pay a full penny, and we have renewed this
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  Speaker 1: tax repeatedly because of the value. We get so much
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  Speaker 1: in return for that investment and visitors to our county,
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  Speaker 1: even though it's not nearly the number of visitors you
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  Speaker 1: get in Bay County because of your proximity, the bees
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  Speaker 1: and so forth. It's a smart thing to do in
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  Speaker 1: joining us. Is Patrick Chapin with the Bay County Chamber
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  Speaker 1: of Commerce, what kind of projects pat are on the
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  Speaker 1: agenda of things that need to get done that this
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  Speaker 1: will help fund.
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  Speaker 2: Well, resurfacing for sure, paving some of the dirt roads
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  Speaker 2: up in the northern part of the county. As I
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  Speaker 2: said earlier, we have five or six bridges already repaired.
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  Speaker 2: There's three projected projects just bridges alone. The county has
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  Speaker 2: done sixty four projects and the county has thirty two
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  Speaker 2: already planned with engineering and so forth, so stormwater, road surfacing, intersections,
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  Speaker 2: sidewalks around schools. You know, wherever you see infrastructure, it
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  Speaker 2: is going to that. And let me point out it
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  Speaker 2: only goes to infrastructure, so this doesn't go into the
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  Speaker 2: general fund. There's an oversight committee that makes sure the
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  Speaker 2: projects are done correctly and under the statute. Actually, in
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: Bay County, the general fund back in twenty sixteen when
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  Speaker 2: this was passed by the voters, had about only two
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  Speaker 2: or three million dollars in the general fund from for
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  Speaker 2: road surfacing, et cetera. That's not a lot of money,
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  Speaker 2: and that was obviously advlorm tax. Since then, Bay County
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  Speaker 2: has been able to take that three million dollars out
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  Speaker 2: and replace it with about sixteen dollars sixteen million dollars
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  Speaker 2: a year and lower property tax. So again sort of
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  Speaker 2: a no brainer. But we've got to really educate the
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  Speaker 2: folks out there.
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  Speaker 1: Is there any organized opposition to this path?
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  Speaker 2: Not no, not organized certainly. Our partner in this is
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  Speaker 2: the is c PAR Central Panhandle Association of Realtors, and
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  Speaker 2: they have been out there knocking on doors just like signs, billboards,
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  Speaker 2: social media and what I've found spoken to you know,
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  Speaker 2: three dozen different organizations homeowners Association, quantus clubs and so forth,
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  Speaker 2: And it's really about education. Once you know, once they
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  Speaker 2: understand what you and I are talking about, they kind
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  Speaker 2: of start shaking their head in the affirmative. So not
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  Speaker 2: real organized, but you know, it's it's a it's a
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  Speaker 2: crazy year.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah it is. You know, what I wanted to remind
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  Speaker 1: everybody at the front end, and I want to reiterate,
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  Speaker 1: is that, you know, the makeup of the communities. You know,
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: Leon County is far more Democrat than republican. Bay County
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: more Republican than Democrat. But even here it is overwhelmingly
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: supported by both sides of the aisle because of the
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: value that it presents. And I think the same thing
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: has got to be true even more so there because
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: you're a tourist community. We're not. We're more of a
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  Speaker 1: you know, kind of the backpacking, camping kind of tourism,
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  Speaker 1: maybe a little fishing here and there. You guys have
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  Speaker 1: it all going on in Bay County, and this is
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  Speaker 1: a huge boon to the to the the economy to
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: have these infrastructure projects taken care of with such a simple,
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  Speaker 1: low cost tax.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah. You know, as I said, we championed it in
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  Speaker 2: twenty sixteen, before we got ahead of it this time around,
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  Speaker 2: we went to our members and polled them. Eighty nine
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  Speaker 2: percent of our members support this, so we thought for
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  Speaker 2: sure that we had to get out there. We're partnering
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  Speaker 2: with the Panama City Beach Chamber, so there's a real
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  Speaker 2: collaborative effort going on to get this thing across the
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  Speaker 2: finish line.
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  Speaker 1: Pat thanks for the time today, and I'll be very
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: anxious to see its passage because I suspect it will
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  Speaker 1: pass very, very convincingly, and look forward to all the
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  Speaker 1: projects that get done in the community for you.
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: Great really appreciate your time. Press