BRADENTON – Over the past five fiscal years, Manatee County has seen a 48% increase in tourism development tax revenue, according to a presentation given to Manatee County Commissioners by the Office of the Collector of Taxes during the business session. of Tuesday. While island towns continue to generate the majority of revenue, the growth of hotels and short-term rentals on the mainland (along with efforts to achieve TDC tax compliance among these), has resulted in considerable revenue growth.
The island towns of Holmes Beach, Anna Maria, Bradenton Beach and the Manatee County portion of Longboat Key brought in a total of $15.8 million in tourist tax revenue in fiscal year 2021-22. While this was up from the peak year of 2020-21, in which the island accounted for an estimated $13.3 million, the town of Anna Maria saw a decrease of almost $700,000. dollars last year. The drop was attributed to a registration program for short-term rentals that landlords who wanted to rent on Airbnb and other third-party platforms must first invest in.
Manatee County Commission Chairman Kevin Van Ostenbridge said Anna Maria’s fall is proof that regulation costs revenue. Bradenton Mayor Gene Brown respectfully disagreed, pointing to the city’s growth in TDC taxes, while commenting that he believed, based on the number of complaints the city was receiving about rentals in the short term compared to the approximately 200 rentals reported, that there were many more residents renting such properties than is captured by the tax collector.
“I don’t have any statistical proof,” Brown said, “but I do believe we’re leaving a lot of money on the table because people are renting them out and causing neighborhood problems.”
Short-term rentals continued to dominate the conversation, including questions about how the county government could level the playing field between these properties and the much more regulated motels and hotels they compete with.
County Attorney Bill Clague explained that there is a difference between a municipality’s taxing authority and the very different realm of policing through land use and code enforcement, pointing out that the legislature of the state passed laws limiting the local government’s ability to regulate Airbnb-style rentals.
“Respectfully, I think it’s more a matter of state law and not what local governments can do to level the playing field between these parts of the industry, given that the legislature has already weighed in and warned us about how far we can go in this area. region,” Clague said.
Of the island towns, Holmes Beach has seen the strongest growth in TDC tax revenue, growing from just over $3 million in 2017/18 to nearly $8.9 million in the last fiscal year.
Growth in short-term rentals and a new downtown hotel has seen the City of Bradenton’s TDC tax revenue rise from $1.9 million in 2017/18 to $2.36 million this year. exercise. Unincorporated Manatee County, which owns the bulk of the county’s hotels in addition to a growing number of short-term units, saw similar growth, from $5.4 million to nearly 10. $.3 million, helped by a growth in sports-related tourism at venues like IMG Academy and the county-owned Premier Sports Campus.
The Tourism Development Tax (sometimes referred to as the “Bed Tax”) is an additional tax that Florida municipalities are permitted to levy on the rental of hotels, motels, apartments, rooming houses, parks, mobile homes, RV parks, condominiums or timeshares. resorts that are leased for six months or less.
Revenues may be used for capital construction of tourism facilities, tourism promotion, and beach and shoreline maintenance, with approved uses varying according to the particular fee. Depending on a county’s eligibility, the tax rate varies from a minimum of 3% to a maximum of 6%.
In Manatee County, the total tourist tax rate is 12%, which includes a 5% tourism development tax that is remitted to the Manatee County tax collector and a 7% sales tax that is remittance to the Florida Department of Revenue.
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