Letter: Give The City Some Slack

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A recurring issue for Laguna Beach is that tourists, particularly daytrippers, that don’t spend enough money here to cover the $20 million incremental non-reimbursed cost to the city for additional fire, police, public works, and increased pension fund requirements. The city uses a portion of your property tax, about $2,000 per parcel to pay these costs.

The city’s options to raise revenue from tourists are limited by state law and regulations. City parking revenue is limited by the Coastal Commission.

There has been much controversy about new or renovated hotels here. Hotels and lodging TOT (transient occupancy tax) generate significant revenue for the city. This is the reason that the city is promoting additional hotel rooms for Laguna. There are other ways to make tourists pay their way, such as a local sales tax, gross receipts tax, increased commercial parcel fees all o  which will affect locals to some degree and become political.

Additionally online shopping is changing the types of businesses that can survive here. So part of the city’s development plans for downtown and elsewhere in the city is to attract businesses that can make it here and generate still more sales tax revenue. The parking structure is certainly controversial.

Few are aware that part of the city’s strategy may be to horse trade a  parking structure for permission from the Coastal  Commission to allow resident-only permit parking in parts of Laguna. I guess my point here is that there are tradeoffs in anything the city is trying to do to raise additional money from tourists. So, we need to cut them some slack.

George Orff, Laguna Beach

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