CLARION, Pa. (EYT) – Three new appointments to a reconstituted Clarion County Hotel Tax Committee at the Tuesday meeting of the Clarion County Commissioners raised concern from business managers in the Clarion and Cook Forest areas.
(Pictured above from an earlier meeting: Matt Kaye, Robert Hargenrader, and Larry McFadden.)
Appointed to the committee were Pamela Zahoran, Sue Geiring, and Shannon Barrios. Zahoran and Geiring are members at large, and Barrios represents the Clarion County Economic Development Commission. Tim Reddinger, part-owner of the Microtel Inn and Suites, was also appointed to the committee in August.
The hotel tax provides approximately $250,000.00 a year.
“The purpose of the bed tax was to put heads in beds,” said Larry McFadden, owner of cabins in Cook Forest. “These people don’t even operate hotels or anything else. They don’t have a nickel in the game. I want to know why you are loading that committee with bureaucrats. You know what a bureaucrat is? – These people sitting around the table (pointing to the meeting table with commissioners and department heads). They have a job; they don’t have any investment or interest in that bed tax other than how they can get their little grubby paws on it. I just don’t understand where you guys come from adding these people to this committee.”
“What do they know about how to advertise or how to promote lodging? – Nothing.”
Commissioner Ted Tharan said he disagreed.
“I don’t know if I would make that statement,” said Tharan. “I don’t know what they know. I would like to have public input on how that money is spent to bring people to Clarion County.”
McFadden recounted that the Tourist Promotion Agency (TPA: PA Great Outdoors) was supposed to get 100 percent of the hotel tax in the original law, but a deal was struck to ensure passage of the tax where half of the fees went to the Clarion County Commissioners for county projects and half to the TPA.
“The commissioners decided to include economic development and others on the committee, and it just makes no sense to me,” said McFadden. “You’ve bastardized the system.”
Tharan: “You’re entitled to your opinion.”
McFadden: “I know I can have my own opinion, and I can get pretty loud and noisy.”
Tharan: “We’re looking at what we feel is best for Clarion County as did other commissioners.”
McFadden: “Obviously, you haven’t done anything. Prior to you, the bed tax committee gave you (the commissioners) $25,000.00 to do a study about putting in a convention center, and what have we heard from it? We gave that to the county to do, and we have very little information back. They’re not doing anything with it. That’s my opinion, too.”
At a previous meeting of the commissioners an August 12, Robert Hargenrader, a board member of the PA Great Outdoors and manager of the Hampton in Monroe Township, questioned if anything had been done with the $25,000.00 feasibility study for a Clarion County Convention Center.
At that meeting, Hargenrader explained that the study was paid for by hotel tax money and contracted by the Clarion County Economic Development Corporation. He asked the commissioners if anything was being done with the study that has been completed for some time.
Tharan and Commissioner Wayne Brosius both responded that they weren’t aware of anything being done with the study, and there were no plans to move forward with the project because there were doubts if any private investor was interested in pursuing the project.
“The county isn’t going to build a conference center, and you should contact the Clarion Economic Development Corporation for any information,” Tharan suggested.
At Tuesday’s meeting, Hargenrader asked what the hotels are getting in return for the $25,000.00 of tax money that’s supposed to be benefiting the lodging operators.
“I was told to go talk to economic development. And, your response now is to put the economic development person on the hotel tax committee. How do I know if this person will get the best return from the tax I collect from my customers?”
Matt Kaye, an owner of cabins in Clarion, Forest, and Jefferson counties, felt Northern Clarion County is being ignored.
“I’m president of the Cook Forest Sawmill Board, and we got $5,000.00 from the county for years,” said Kaye. “We did not get it this year. That $5,000.00 on a $200,000.00 budget is crucial. I can do my own marketing; I don’t need bed tax money. Everybody that goes through Clarion County goes through Cook Forest and spends money in Clarion. They’re stopping at Walmart and stopping all the way through.”
A meeting of the hotel committee was scheduled for Wednesday, but Tharan said he would cancel the meeting because of concerns raised about lodging representation.
“I think we should hold off on the grant program until we have a full committee representing lodging to balance it,” said John Straitiff, Executive Director of PA Great Outdoors. “I don’t think we should have it tomorrow until we have a full complement.”
After the meeting, Tharan said he was interested in members who could bring new ideas and a bigger bang for the buck.
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