The Penticton Business Development Society has folded, less than two months after its contract to provide tourism, economic development and visitor information services for the city came into effect.
Penticton chief administrative officer Annette Antoniak confirmed the society was disbanding after a meeting with the city Wednesday.
Antoniak, who also held a board director position with the society, explained the matter boiled down to access to the additional hotel room tax (AHRT), which is collected by members of the Penticton Hospitality Association.
“They had made every attempt to try to work with the accommodators with respect to securing the extension on the hotel room tax,” Antoniak said. “After several attempts trying to get meetings scheduled, it has become clear that the Penticton Hospitality Association does not want to work with the society, and that they want to go down another track.”
Antoniak said the city and council have not seen any proposals to date from the accommodators, but “we’ve heard there’s potential out there.” In the interim, tourism, economic development and visitor centre staff would function under the city’s umbrella.
“It’s extremely disappointing. I believe the chair Eric Sorenson and the board members had the interests of the City of the Penticton, the accommodators and all the tourist operators at heart, including economic development and visitors services. They were an extremely seasoned, professional group of individuals who volunteered their time and they were not being paid. At some point, one has to look at how we move forward. If there isn’t the desire to work together and move forward, then decisions have to be made.”
Mayor Dan Ashton said in a release that council thanks the society's volunteer board, consisting of Sorenson, Rod King, JP Kaumeyer, Robert Hodson, Gordon Ferguson and Marko Cucnik.
"The dedication, professionalism and competence of these individuals, displayed from the day the contract was awarded, were a tremendous benefit to the citizens of Penticton," he said. "These individuals were a tremendous asset in creating a true vision to the mandate of enhancing the tourism and related business activity.
"Clearly they brought a level of business acumen to this organization that will not be easily replaced."
Hospitality association chair Trinka Pontes said the problem stemmed from “how things were done” without discussing the matter with accommodators in town.
“Suddenly the city took the money and contract away from the chamber of commerce and tourism advisory board that were in place,” she said. “This all happened without any consultation of the people who collect the tax.”
In December, the association wrote about their concerns to the finance minister, who must approve the tax via cabinet order. Since then, Pontes said accommodators had been invited to sit on the society’s board, herself included, but “that was too little, too late.”
The association held its annual general meeting on Feb. 6 and voted on whether to extend the tax past its expiry date of July 1. Accommodators voted no on the extension, “unless the city was willing to negotiate with us,” she said.
“We want the money in our hands. We don’t want the money to go to some elaborate board who’s going to spend it on a CEO. The money should be used on marketing, and marketing only,” she said.
Pontes couldn’t reveal what the Penticton Hospitality Association’s vision was moving forward, because the details were not set. They are “working around the clock,” she said, to put something together.
“I believe we can have something in place fairly soon if the city co-operates with us. The timing is of a great concern to us. Here it’s the end of February, and we should be working on marketing already,” she said.
“All we want is to put lots of people in our rooms and bring lots of visitors to Penticton. We are the stakeholders. If anybody is concerned about it, it’s us.”