travel

Hotel ‘bed taxes’ are here to stay.

Hotels, , , , ,

(This is a story we first wrote for NBC News)

Ever check out of a hotel and notice a “transient occupancy tax” on your bill?

Unfortunately for your wallet, the Biden administration’s crackdown on “junk fees” won’t do anything about it.

But unlike some of the add-ons hoteliers and booking sites charge, this common type of tax doesn’t pad corporate margins, and the projects it funds are evolving in step with the post-pandemic tourist economy.

These levies — often known generically as “bed taxes,” though they go by many names — are imposed by state, county and local governments or tourism improvement districts.

They can drive up the cost of an overnight stay at hotels, motels, bed and breakfasts, campgrounds, and short-term rentals like Airbnbs, sometimes by up to 20%.

The jurisdictions typically decide how to allocate the revenue these taxes pull in. Sometimes they supplement governments’ operating budgets; other times they’re used to finance tourism campaigns, build convention centers, support cultural programs, or hire beach lifeguards.

New Uses For Hotel Bed Taxes

But in Estes Park, Colorado, bed taxes are now subsidizing housing and childcare costs for local workers.

The mountain community, known as a base camp for adventures in Rocky Mountain National Park, voted for that move after a law Colorado enacted in March 2022 began allowing cities and counties to use hotel tax proceeds to cover housing and child care for the tourism-related workforce

In Estes Park, the decision came after advocates flagged a proliferation of second homes and short-term rentals that they said had strained affordability in the area.

Last November, the city raised its hotel bed tax to 5.5%, up from 2%, and earmarked funds from the increase — an estimated $5.3 million in 2023 — for the housing and child care initiatives, said Kara Franker, the CEO of Visit Estes Park, a local tourism group. That beefed-up bed tax now combines with town, county and state sales tax to add a cumulative 14.2% onto the cost of a nightly stay in the city, she said, helping to fund a range of public services alongside the new workforce-related initiatives.

According to Colorado tourism officials, at least 17 municipalities have imposed a new bed tax or modified an existing one over the past year, many of them putting the revenue toward new types of projects.

Similar moves are happening in tourism-heavy areas across the U.S., said John Lambeth, CEO of travel consultancy Civitas, reflecting a more expansive approach that is “more about stewardship of the destination and giving back to the community.”

Jack Johnson, chief advocacy officer for the travel industry group Destinations International, said the disruptions of the pandemic have motivated some communities to consider whether broader social and economic policies “can be tied to travel in tourism, either directly or indirectly, and therefore paid for out of the bed tax.”

Hotel taxes were first adopted in the U.S. by New York City in 1946, became commonplace nationally by the 1970s, and are what guests typically see itemized on their hotel bills today, said Elizabeth Strom, an associate professor at the University of South Florida’s school of public affairs. Public officials have long loved bed taxes because they generate easy-to-raise income from out-of-towners, not local voters.

“Every state either has such a tax at the state level or permits such a tax at the local level or both,” Strom said.

The newer breed of bed tax experiments, like those in Colorado, are being driven as much by windfalls from rebounding travel demand as by evolving civic attitudes.

Tourism revenues dipped sharply during the pandemic, but in 2023, hotel-generated state and local tax revenue — which includes bed taxes along with the other levies lodging operators contribute to government entities — is expected to reach $46.71 billion nationwide, up 13.6% from 2019, according to a study by the American Hotel and Lodging Association and Oxford Economics.

Bed taxes already account for nearly half of the hotel-generated taxes in the U.S., the AHLA said, and it expects bed taxes this year will likely exceed the $19 billion they generated in 2019.

In Florida, which has been hit by multiple hurricanes that affect beaches and islands, Broward, Collier, Lee and other counties are applying tourism revenues to rebuild and protect those travel assets, Johnson said. Bed taxes now contribute financing for dune restoration, shoreline stabilization, erosion control, and other coastal management activities, he said.

The shift has raised some concerns from the hospitality industry.

“In general, the more taxes states and cities levy on hotels, the more of a competitive disadvantage they create for local businesses, as potential hotel guests may seek out other destinations with lower tax burdens,” AHLA CEO Chip Rogers said.

As for the industry-imposed fees the Biden administration is scrutinizing, AHLA spokesperson Curt Cashour said that only 6% of hotels nationwide charge “a mandatory resort, destination or amenity fee, at an average of $26 per night,” adding that they “directly support hotel operations” like staff wages and benefits.

Cashour said the AHLA is continuing to work with authorities “to ensure that the same standards for fee display apply across the lodging booking ecosystem” so guests aren’t caught off guard.

Bed taxes may send extremely cost-conscious leisure and business travelers to lower-taxed destinations, Strom said, “but if you are a unique location, I don’t think an extra few dollars a night in taxes matters.”

“If people want to see the Space Needle,” she added, “they aren’t comparing the cost of rooms in Seattle to the cost of rooms in Portland.”

Some top tourist destinations say they aren’t worried about turning away tourists at the moment.

Hawaii, for example, is seeing a strong post-pandemic tourism recovery, even though its 13.3% state and county transient accommodation taxes combine with 4.5% excise taxes to add close to 18% to nightly hotel bills. State revenue forecasters expect Hawaii’s bed tax alone to bring in more than $785 million this year, up from $645 million last year.

Since drawing more tourists isn’t the main challenge, said Ilihia Gionson, a public affairs officer with the Hawaii Tourism Authority, the agency is using some of the funds it gets from hotel taxes to try to influence what types of visitors it attracts.

“The wheels were turning before the pandemic and accelerated during the pandemic,” he said. “We want visitors that align with our economic and community goals — who will shop at local businesses, eat in local restaurants, participate in ‘voluntourism’ and be mindful of their economic impact. So, it’s less about, ‘Come here,’ and more about, ‘Here’s who we are and what we’re about.’”

Keys for Trees

San Luis Obispo, along California’s Central Coast, is also earmarking some of its hotel tax income for projects that authorities hope will benefit the community.

Its existing transient occupancy tax supports the city’s general fund. But last year a new “Keys for Trees” program began setting aside some proceeds from the city’s tourism assessment tax — another government surcharge on hotel bills — to help plant 10,000 trees by 2035 as San Luis Obispo pursues its carbon neutral goals, said Tourism Manager Molly Cano.

The city’s business improvement district raised $1.6 million from this assessment pre-pandemic and $2.1 million in fiscal 2022, Cano said. Previously, all these funds were used to market San Luis Obispo to visitors. But now 1% of that revenue is steered toward the new program, with some $17,000 reserved for planting 35 trees this fiscal year.

“There’s no extra step to take,” Cano said, “and we think visitors will enjoy knowing that just by booking an overnight stay, they are helping to preserve the beauty of our community.”

United Airlines Promises Families They Can Sit Together

family travel, ,

Traveling with kids and want to make sure you get to sit together?

Airline seating policies and fees for choosing seats often make that a frustrating, sometimes impossible, and expensive undertaking.

President Biden ragged on airlines for this practice during his State of the Union address in early February

And in July the US Department of Transporation issued a notice encouraging US airlines “to do everything in their power to ensure that children who are age 13 or younger are seated next to an accompanying adult with no additional charge.”

Airlines Beginning to Pay Attention

On Monday United Airlines announced a new plan to make it easier for parents and children under 12 years old to sit next to each other without paying an extra fee. That includes passengers who purchase Basic Economy Tickets,

The airline said the policy will extend to customers who purchase Basic Economy tickets. That category usually doesn’t allow seats to be assigned until boarding.

United says a new seat map feature that finds available adjacent seats at the time of booking makes this new policy possible. The seat map program will first review all available free Economy seats and then opens complimentary upgrades to available Preferred seats if needed, according to United.

Other airlines may follow suit by adjusting their policies to follow United’s lead.

For now, Delta Air Lines’ website says the carrier “strives to seat family members together upon request” and urges passengers who can’t find seats together to contact Reservations for help.

American Airlines’ website says”if you’re unable to choose seats, don’t want to pay for seats, or chose a Basic Economy fare, our system will detect that you’re a family traveling. The system will search for seats together automatically before the day of departure. We’ll try our best to keep you together, but if seats are limited, we’ll assign seats so children under 15 are next to at least 1 adult.”

Alaska Airlines’ site states that “if are unable to obtain seat assignments together for your family, we will make every effort to seat at least one adult with any young child (age 13 and under) from the same party.”

Like other carriers, JetBlue’s statement on family seating urges families to book early. But says “if seats together are not available, please let our airport gate crewmembers know when you arrive at the airport. They will do their best to find a seating solution. We cannot guarantee that seats together will always be available.”

New book filled with marvelous maps

Maps, , , ,

If you’re a serious traveler, you likely love maps.

And if you love maps, you’ll love the maps in a new book from the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, England that celebrates the art of atlases with a look inside the museum’s collection of maps, globes, and map-related ephemera.

A is for Atlas: Wonders of Maps and Mapping, is a highly illustrated celebration of cartography from the thirteenth century to today.

Celestial globe, unknown maker, first half of the 17th century

The book draws on the museum’s collection of more than 40,000 maps, charts, globes, and atlases, including a sixteenth-century map of the world replacing the face of a jester, a nineteenth-century inflatable globe, and a twentieth-century waterproof map that saved lives during the Second World War.

Fool’s Head World Map, by unknown artist, around 1590
 
Inflatable Globe, George Pocock, 1830

The oldest object in the book is a manuscript map of Mesopotamia by Abu Ishaq Ibrahim ibn Muhammad al-Farisi al-Istakhri, dated before 1282. Mountain ranges are illustrated in a deep red with floral and geometric patterns, while the rivers Tigris and Euphrates flow across the page in a majestic blue.

Islandia, Abraham Ortelius and Anders Vedel, 1585

The most recent object is a football globe made for Mark Wallinger’s First World War centenary artwork, One World by Mark Wallinger. This 2018 football is a photographic representation of the Earth as seen from satellite imagery. This globe was commissioned to mark the centenary of the First World War, commemorating the ‘Christmas Day ceasefires’ that took place on the Western Front in 1914.

One World, Mark Wallinger, 2018

Rather than approach the collection chronologically, A is for Atlas draws on the collection in twenty-six themes, including ‘commemoration’, ‘manuscript’, ‘sea monsters’ and ‘treasure’.

The book also shows the results of an investigation into a nineteenth-century globe. An endoscope was fed through a hole in a Newton & Son terrestrial table globe from 1842, offering Dr Barford an unusual view – the inside of a globe. The investigation revealed proof pages from various books of the Bible lining the inside and supporting the papier-mâché hemispheres.

All photos courtesy National Maritime Museum, England

The (Not So) Impossible Road Trip

Road Trip, , , ,

Icy snow is covering our town. So we spent the holiday weekend just dreaming of places we want to go and making a list of new and old favorite sights we want to see in the new year.

“The Impossible Road Trip – An Unforgettable Journey to Past and Present Roadside Attractions in all 50 States” turns out to be a great aid to our adventure planning

When the book by Eric Dregni first showed up at our house, we thought the “impossible” in the title meant the book was all about historic roadside attractions and quirky destinations across the United States we’d never get to see.

But now that we look closer, we see that the long-gone spots mentioned here simply offer context for all the corny, quirky, and unique places that are still around.

Like the Big Duck in Flanders, NY. The World’s Largest Buffalo Monument in Jamestown, North Dakota. The Cardiff Giant in Cooperstown, NY, And many places across the country where you can spot statues of dinosaurs, muffler men, and Paul Bunyans

Here’s a look inside the book, which includes infographic maps, themed roundups, and some wonderful photographs taken by the late architectural critic and photographer John Margolies.

We checked to see if some of our favorite attractions in Washington were included and were pleased to the Zillah’s Teapot Dome Gas Station and Seattle’s Hat ‘n’ Boots included. (These photos are not from the book).

Courtesy VIsit Yakima

Travel jitters. Now due to the delta variant

Health, , , , ,

(This is a slightly different version of a story we wrote for NBC News online)

This was supposed to be the summer of “revenge travel,” catch-up trips, and rescheduled family reunions — but the surge in coronavirus cases, and in particular, the highly contagious delta variant has some travelers pausing their plans.

Summer 2021 has come with soaring prices for everything from rental cars to lobster rolls. Wildfires, heatwaves, delays, worker shortages, and an uptick in unruly passengers have all already tested the patience of the hardiest traveler.

But it wasn’t until the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention urged even vaccinated people to resume wearing masks indoors that the ramifications started to ripple through the travel and tourism industry.

Glenn Fogel, CEO of Booking Holdings, which operates sites such as Kayak and Priceline, said the rise of the delta variant and the new travel restrictions “have led to a modest pullback in our booking trends in the month of July relative to June.”

Around the country, major tourist destinations, including Las Vegas, Los Angeles County, San Francisco, and Washington, D.C. reinstated mask requirements in public indoor settings. Many communities are taking it a step further — a growing list of bars and restaurants in Seattle now require that patrons show proof of vaccination for entry. And nationwide, Yelp now has a filter that allows users to see if a restaurant or business has instituted a ‘proof of vaccination’ rule.

Later this month, New York City will begin requiring proof of vacation for indoor dining, performances, and other leisure activities. At least one hotel, Ian Schrager’s Public Hotel, in the Lower East Side of Manhattan, said it will require guests and workers to present proof of vaccination.

With changing rules and ever-tightening restrictions, travelers say they are beginning to think twice about their plans.

“I’m in the fretting stage. There’s so much that’s uncertain,” said Frieda Werden, who has a trip to Durham, North Carolina, planned for September. “I want to go see my mother, who is about to turn 96 and feels she is declining. But I don’t want either of us to get the variant.”

In Coupeville, Washington, Moe Bébé Fraser Bowman is adding concerns of the delta variant to the list of reasons why she keeps “putting off the notion of checking off the travel bucket list.”

Other travelers say they are still willing to travel, even abroad, despite the risks.

Nicole Woolcock of New York City says she won’t cancel her family’s trip to Portugal in September.

The family is booked into hotels that are taking extra precautions, she said. However, “if it looks like we won’t be able to leave our hotel and really experience Portugal, we’d reconsider our travel,” Woolcock said.

Tania Swasbrook, a luxury travel adviser at California-based Travelworld International Group, said many of her clients are also forging ahead.

“It is revenge travel with a hint of ‘the world may close down again so let’s go now,’” she said.

Deciding whether to take a trip is just one part of the puzzle, however. Travelers, or their agents, need to keep up with what can feel like a rollercoaster of changing protocols and rules. For some, the solution is to book “insurance” trips.

“Travelers are getting savvy, taking advantage of flexible cancellation policies, and booking multiple vacations for the same time but to different areas,” said Misty Belles, vice president for global public relations at Virtuoso Travel Network.

With several plans in place, “they know one will go through even if something happens in the other destinations,” Belles said.

Adding to the uncertainty of traveling right now is the fact that hotels, restaurants, and airlines are struggling to find enough workers to meet the demand.

“It is very bad right now,” said Jan Louise Jones, professor of hospitality and tourism in the Pompea College of Business at the University of New Haven. “And the variant? That’s not helping.”