ST. MICHAELS, Md. - A proposed accommodation tax increase in Talbot County.
The Talbot County Tourism board voted to pursue a 2% accommodation tax increase. This was voiced during the St. Michaels commissioner meeting Wednesday night.
Small business owners of Bed and Breakfasts' and Inn's in St. Michaels voiced concerns with WBOC. They say they are worried this increase will drive guests away and run them out of business because the guest would need to pay the tax difference.
Any tax increase would need to go through state legislation and require a number of public hearings.
However, Debra Alms, owner of the Waterfront Hambleton Inn Bed and Breakfast in St. Michaels says it's still a worry. She says, "my guests, I know, will be turned away when they have to pay that extra 2%. Right now it’s at 4% so this is a 50% increase and it will really affect my business."
Willard Workman who owns the George Brooks House B & B and the Parsonage Inn says the increase would be unfair to the lodging industry. He says, "There is a fairness issue. Lodging is raising almost $1 million in St. Michaels. The restaurants are not raising money for bringing tourists in nor are the retail establishments."
President of the St. Michaels commissioners, David Breimhurst says he understands the concerns and encourages a tourism tax instead.
"We’ve encouraged the county to partner with us to start lobbying Annapolis to enable the county to impose a tourism tax, not just an accommodations tax. That would benefit all the towns in the county, including St. Michaels, and it would spread the load around a little more evenly than it is right now," says Breimhurst. He added, "I think the accommodations tax falls a little bit unfairly on just one sector of the tourism economy, the lodging industry bares the brunt of that tax entirely."
If the accommodation tax is to take place, Breimhurst says, "by law, it is specifically targeted at supporting the infrastructure that makes tourism possible in the first place. That means things like the police department, the sidewalk, streets, and the comfort station that we just built overtime for the public works crew that has to empty all the trash cans when there’s a large influx of visitors during the weekends."