Latest / Rick Outzen: (we don’t) color on the dog / How To Destroy Tourism
Transcript
- Rick Outzen: Welcome back. I'm Rick Alpson. This is Rick's Blog Live. A hot issue this month tourist development and we're not paying the people that are marketing ⁓ our As you up at the visit, Pensacola Executive Board, got ⁓ about $600,000 in cash. The county clerk owes $1.3 million. They have another $1.7 million ⁓ in advertising that they like to place, but they have no idea they're going to get paid. It came up at the TDC meeting also. It is just a cluster that we've got to try to figure our way through to help us understand it. A man who's been dealing with this for a very long time David Baer. He a member of the Tourist Development Council. David, thank you for joining us. David Bear: Thank you, Rick. Thanks for having me. Rick Outzen: Explain for our viewers reimbursement mechanism, how it's working and why money's getting stuck. David Bear: Well, the way it's supposed to work and the way that it used to work was ⁓ the county does an appropriation agreement with the outside agencies. They for their programs and the programs are outlined in the appropriation agreement. So the county knows w exactly what they're funding. ⁓ It's under the statute of ⁓ how use the tourist development tax. And what would do is they'd go out and do the marketing programs. They're ⁓ paying for money is being used to pay for some of the programs. ⁓ lot of advertising and promotion and are being placed. They've got inch advertising agencies all the creative that they're placing. And what would is agency, the outside agency who received the money from the county ⁓ would place the ads, pay their agencies ⁓ their fees and they also pay for the placement of advertising. They would get copies of those checks Match them up with the invoices that they paid for those with those checks turn those over to the county to prove that they had made the actual expenditures. And so what up has happened well, and let me back up. So that would happen, and then the clerk's office would reimburse them for Everything ran smoothly and the was flowing, the product was being developed, placed, ⁓ all this stuff. And then the programs would happen and they were all successful. continues to grow. We've diversified it. Rick Outzen: The numbers have state is flat. We're actually showing an increase for the last quarter. David Bear: Year over year we're making record numbers in tourism. ⁓ number of people showing up here collecting the tax. so not only have more people come, that's created demand, so the the folks been able to raise their their rates and that collects more tax. But now what's happening the money is ⁓ the being created. The agencies are placing the the outside agencies are taking their checks that they've paid those agencies to create that work and place the ads with the invoices and those over to the county. The county submits those to the clerk's and the clerk sits on them. And it could be days, it could 60 days, 90 days, nobody knows. And they just don't get paid. And then all of a a check may come through ⁓ and there could be multiple Right. And they don't know what's being paid, they don't know what's being refused to be Rick Outzen: And you and part of that challenge, particularly in the advertising world, is if you're placing ads, let's say, in in Nashville, know, and doing it over a series of months, well they the radio television station, ⁓ wants to paid every, you know, the month. Right. ⁓ And now the agency's having hold pay or not pay ⁓ then r ruin a relationship or you know, or they'll go ahead pay and hold that ⁓ for the end of the contract. You know, and it and then what's happened in Foo Foo Fest is got small nonprofits trying to things that are worthwhile, been approved, and they're trying book, let's say night moves, the concerts, trying to book concerts, but they need to money to do it, and they're not able to the that they've been approved. Even though we've said we've have no issue, no one's been able to show that there's major embezzlement, major theft going on in tourism, we've got pretty good people ⁓ people that are trustworthy in the community. So it's got it it's it's been snowballing. We've seen it happen in other places. We last you know this past week. ECAT, their st temporary company has over three hundred and sixty thousand dollars owed to them. they pull their workers from ECAT. They're they're back right now. We've got nonprofits suing to get two and three thousand dollars from the clerk that she won't pay. it it's it's the don't you believe, has to has to the county commission has got to push harder. David Bear: I think so. I'm not sure well it yeah, it's I mean they can push all day long and the clerk still does what she wants to do. I mean that's what's happened ⁓ now and while there's ⁓ there's been this lawsuit filed against her by these outside you know, these two charities ⁓ because they push, they push, they push, they've appropriated, they voted five to zero to fund those agencies and she's not reimbursing it and so they've been forced those outside agencies have been forced to Rick Outzen: Kind of hard how much they can. David Bear: filed a lawsuit because they'd committed, they have contracts, they're not getting paid. And so with with tourist development tax, it's gotten ⁓ unreasonable, ⁓ the level of documentation that the office Pam Childers is asking or demanding before she'll even consider reimbursement. It's ⁓ it's so unreasonable. not clear checks that match up with contracts for those services that match up with the appropriation agreement that the money was appropriated for, okay, you bought advertising and so we're gonna wait until all those advertisements were placed. And so they're doing a bulk buy where they may buy for a magazine gonna run they place it today to run, ⁓ you know, three four months from now, they don't get reimbursed until after it runs and they have to provide the evidence that it ran. If they have posters they have to take pictures of the posters and windows. I mean I what's next that if there's the tourist development tax can be pay can be used to pay for per diems. Are people gonna have to take pictures of themselves eating a sandwich ⁓ submit to the clerk's office? I mean I I we we make a joke about it, but it's not funny. Rick Outzen: There's it's reasonable documentation and unreasonable documentation. That is the issues that's in front of us. that is what is could the golden goose, which because tourism is such a big part ⁓ of community. Fufu Fest has been highly successful. ⁓ You Ray Palmer stood before the TDC ⁓ this meeting, and he's know, he said our last set of invoices had 900 pages of documentation. It it's it's more than it's David, I really appreciate you've been willing to to step out on this issue for a while. understand it ⁓ because of all your work in Foo Foo and Tourism. yeah. David Bear: It's it's important to our community. I mean, tourism is an economic driver for our community. ⁓ obviously creates whole lot of quality of life for our citizens, but bringing here, ⁓ letting them how we love to live and what a beautiful community we have, ⁓ the natural the assets, arts, culture, entertainment, sports, you know, all of of things that we here, people want to move here. Right. They to move their businesses. That's the ribbon. They want to employ our children. I mean this is and and for anyone that wants to be an obstructionist to that type of growth is bad for our community. It's bad for our citizens. Rick Outzen: All right. David, thank you so much for coming. I appreciate it. We'll go ahead and take a break. We'll be right back. We're Rick's Blog Live.