Gulf Shores suspends tax discounts

BY JOHN MULLEN johnm@gulfcoastmedia.com
Posted 12/19/16

GULF SHORES, AL — The city council voted on Dec. 12 to suspend a sales and lodging tax discount for businesses in the city.

“Currently we allow a 2 percent discount on both sales and lodging …

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Gulf Shores suspends tax discounts

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GULF SHORES, AL — The city council voted on Dec. 12 to suspend a sales and lodging tax discount for businesses in the city.

“Currently we allow a 2 percent discount on both sales and lodging taxes if they are remitted timely,” Financial Director Cindy King said. “This proposal is to not allow that discount anymore.”

Orange Beach suspended the discounts in November of 2015. King said other cities in the area stopped discounts on lodging taxes and Mobile and Orange Beach do not give discounts on sales taxes any longer.

Stopping the discount will generate about $380,000 during 2017 and King said the money will go into the general fund.

“In their ordinance, Orange Beach said they would use the money for the beach cleanup program but use another source of revenue to fund ours,” she said.

Also at the Dec. 12 meeting, Public Works Director Mark Acreman gave a report on the widening of the bridge on Alabama 59 just north of the Windmill Ridge intersection. He added that the street-paving projects for 2016 have been wrapped up as well.

Mayor Robert Craft gave a year-end greeting, and Recreation and Cultural Affairs Director Grant Brown announced meetings have begun with the NCAA to organize the 2017 beach volleyball national championships.

BRIDGE PROJECT

The bridge work is part of the city’s effort to build eight-foot sidewalks from the south footing of the Intracoastal Waterway bridge to the beach. According to a city memo the total budget improvements will cost about $3.5 million with approximately $1 million being provided by ALDOT grant funding.

Gulf Shores will fund the $970,000 for the bridge which will take place in two phases with the east side expansion starting soon. The west side will be expanded in the 2017-18 off season.

On Dec. 12, Acreman asked to council to OK funding for a firm to complete testing before and during the construction. The work will cost the city about $12,000.

“Southern will help us test the pilings as well as the concrete work that’s being done on the bridge itself,” Acreman said. “These expenditures were budgeted as part of the overall cost needed for the bridge project. These are normal testing procedures required by ALDOT.”

Barring a few roads needing permanent striping, Acreman said, the annual street-paving project has been completed.

“We’re also working to finish up the sidewalk work between West Second Street and Highway 59 on the north side of Clubhouse Drive,” he said. “We’re also going to be correcting a couple of drainage problems at the entrances here at city hall. We’ll no longer have ponding water in our driveways.”

NCAA VOLLEYBALL

The tournament returns May 5-7 at the public beach by the Hangout. The NCAA released a promotional video on the championships Brown played it during the council meeting on Dec. 12.

Originally the NCAA said it was going to award a bid for hosting the tournament beyond 2017, but Brown said that announcement has been delayed.

“We have been told that they will not award it until after the 2017 national championship,” Brown said.

CITY RECAP

To end the meeting, Craft recounted a busy year that included work on a lot of projects that will be continued during the coming year. Among those are the bridge project, Beach Revitalization Project and expansions by businesses at Jack Edwards National Airport

“We’ve had a challenging but productive year,” he said. “The pace is pretty quick around here. We’ve got a lot of projects we are working on around here, a lot of things in the fire. We accomplished a lot because of those people sitting in this room and others who aren’t here who work for the city. This group up here has worked really hard.

“I’m real proud of what we’ve been able to do this year to set the stage for next year. We’ve got fantastic group of people who work for this city and I couldn’t be prouder to be a part of that and sitting in this chair.”