City councilors on Wednesday approved a 3 percent tax on room stays at Tulsa’s largest hotels.
The assessment program, known as a Tourism Improvement District, applies only to hotels of 110 rooms or more. Hotels with fewer than 110 rooms can opt into the assessment district.
The $2.4 million a year the TID is expected to generate will be used to market the city and participating hotels.
Ray Hoyt, president of VisitTulsa Regional Tourism, spearheaded the effort to get the assessment district implemented.
“We are super positive,” he said after the vote. “It’s going to just provide opportunities for the city and this hotel class to be marketed at a much higher level and help improve tourism and all the benefits the city gets from that.”
Nine million people visited Tulsa in 2017 to attend events, Hoyt said, but only three million stayed overnight in hotels.
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The TID funding will be used to promote the city’s many tourist attractions and, in doing so, hopefully, get more people to stay longer, Hoyt said.
“So that more of that 9 million people stay the night, and those 9 million grows to 10 or 11 million,” he said.
The City Council approved the creation of the TID on Nov. 7. Wednesday night, councilors approved the assessment roll, which spells out the formula to be used to determine a hotel’s annual assessment and the maximum amount a hotel could be charged in a year. The assessment takes effect April 1.
The TID has not been without its critics. A group of hoteliers has argued for the last year that representatives of the city and VisitTulsa, the tourism arm of the Tulsa Regional Chamber, have not been transparent and inclusive in dealings with them.
Earlier this month, an attorney for the group presented councilors with a list he said shows that 18 of the 33 hotels on the assessment roll do not support the TID and want it dissolved. The attorney, Trevor Henson, has also filed a lawsuit in Tulsa County District Court to prevent the TID from being implemented.
The TID could be dissolved after three years — and any year thereafter — if hotel owners representing a majority of the hotel rooms subject to the assessment vote to do so.
Hoyt said he’s already heard from about a dozen hotels that plan to opt in to the TID.
“It’s going to be good for Tulsa,” he said.
