MLT Pushes to Renew TBID,

Recent tax confusion sours business owners

The Mammoth Lakes Tourism Business Improvement District is now up for renewal. This renewal date comes hot on the heels of a tax discrepancy between Mammoth Lakes and the California Department of Tax and Fee Administration, which caused many business owners to be audited for taxes they did not know they owed on TBID assessments. With the tax confusion and the severe impact from recent storms weighing on peoples’ minds, it remains to be seen how business owners will react to the call for TBID renewal in Mammoth Lakes.

The TBID has been in place since 2013 and in the past 10

years the resources provided have allowed MLT to educate visitors, fill in shoulder seasons for businesses and has generated millions of extra funds for the Town of Mammoth Lakes to invest in workforce housing, recreation infrastructure and programs for our visitors and residents.

“Nearly 10 years ago, our business community pulled together to approve a secure funding source to promote the Mammoth Lakes area and increase visitation revenues for our local businesses and the town,” says the mammoth Lakes Board of Tourism. “Most recently those funds have been heavily invested in educating our visitors on how to respect our community and the environment. Since well before the pandemic, MLT has collaborated with other local agencies on spreading the ‘Recreate Responsibly’ message as far and wide as possible.”

Over the course of the last nine years, the TBID has allowed MLT to promote midweek winter, shoulder seasons and other need times driving Transient Occupancy Tax up more than $8 million on average annually- a 75 percent increase. According to MLT, the vast majority of these dollars are retained by the town’s general fund and have been instrumental in building trails, sidewalks, parking, parks, directional signage, restrooms, as well as the current construction of the Parcel’s 450 units of much needed workforce housing. MLT claims that in the absence of the TBID, Mammoth Lakes would forfeit $1.3 billion in visitor spending and $58 million of city government revenue over the next decade.

Yet, business owners have voiced some concerns regarding the TBID renewal.

“We’ve had some feedback with concern about TBID assessment rates being raised in the future,” Mammoth Lakes Tourism Director John Urdi said. But Urdi does not believe that this is an imminent possibility. “It’s not something that would be done willy nilly,” he said. “The plan right now is not to raise rates while we’re moving forward. And if something were to come up where we felt that we needed to, then that would be a bigger discussion with this board and the community.”

MLT is accepting petitions to renew the Mammoth Lakes Tourism Business Improvement District for a ten-year term beginning September 1, 2023, running through August 31, 2033

Petitions must be in by no later than March 28. A workshop will be held with the Mammoth Lakes Town Council on April 5 where the TBID renewal will be discussed in detail.

IF YOU WANT TO KNOW MORE:

Information on the TBID and the renewal petitions can be found at WWW.MLTBID. com. For more information, contact John Urdi at jurdi@visitmammoth.com or 760-9342712 ext. 1259.