City creates Tourism Business Improvement District

By Samar Fay

Published: Wednesday, September 23rd, 2009

The Glasgow City Council unanimously passed a resolution at its Sept. 14 meeting that creates Tourism Business Improvement District No. 0001, instituting a $1-per-night-occupied assessment on hotel rooms to provide funding to promote and market Glasgow. Betty Stone, one of the owners of the Cottonwood Inn and Suites, said it took two years of work to form the TBID. "I'm very excited that all six hoteliers signed off on it," Stone said. "It creates new opportunities for us," said Diane Brandt, executive director of the Glasgow Area Chamber of Commerce and Agriculture."Glasgow is just as competitive as some larger venues. We just have to look for them. Now we won't just depend on summer revenues." The 2007 Montana legislature passed legislation that allows local governments to create TBIDs. Glasgow's district was modeled on the successful Billings TBID. Glasgow is the smallest city in Montana to have a TBID. Another resolution passed at the same meeting established a TBID board of trustees comprising owners of all six hotels in the city: the Campbell Lodge, the Cottonwood Inn, the Koski Motel, the LaCasa Motel, the Roosevelt Hotel and the Star Lodge. The purpose is to promote Glasgow to increase tourist trips and benefit the tourism and lodging industry in Glasgow. The board will develop plans to attract convention and trade shows, market Glasgow to the travel industry, and recruit major sporting events. They will submit to the City Council for approval a work plan and budget for each fiscal year. The Council may modify the work plan and budget. The amount of the assessment may be modified annually by a resolution of the City Council. The TBID will exist for 10 years. If owners of more than 50 percent of the hotel property petition the City Council, the district will be terminated at the end of any fiscal year. The start date of the assessment was left up the the new board, but Betty Stone recommended Oct. 1, to capitalize on fall tourism and avoid hitting the quarterly state bed tax dates.The city will charge the board for the cost of the annual audit and collection costs. Close a street Valley County Commissioner Dave Reinhardt gave the council a proposed design of the new county jail, showing its footprint on West Court Street next to the courthouse and on adjacent land belonging to St. Matthew's Episcopal Church. He explained that the commissioners had the building placed so it would not block the alley between West Court Street and 6th Street South. It will not affect the building south of the alley or its parking.Reinhardt made a request on behalf of the county that the city close West Court Street, something that the council has informally said it would be willing to do. City Attorney Dave Gorton said that the county must get signed petitions from half the owners of the lots on both sides of the street. The county courthouse is on one side, and the church is the only owner on the other side. Lots of volunteers The Glasgow Fire Department has an interesting problem: too many volunteers. Chief Ryan Stone said that as far as he knows, this is the first time they have more applicants than positions. He has five applications, two old ones and three new ones. He recommended that the Council approve the old applications and proposed that the fire department vote on which two of the three new ones to accept. The leftover applicant would wait for another opening. Or Ryan could go through the roster and ask if one fairly inactive person would like to resign. City Attorney Gorton said that appointment to the fire department is made by recommendation of the mayor and resolution of the City Council. This could be done at the next meeting. He said a waiting list might be a good idea. Recreation Director Jory Casterline said that the American Red Cross has asked to use the Civic Center for a shelter facility in emergencies like snow storms or floods. They have no shelter in this area. Mayor Dan Carney asked Casterline to consult with FMDH CEO Randy Holom, to see if this would interfere with the memorandum of understanding that allows the hospital to use the Civic Center as a contact center for patients' families in the event of a mass casualty. New clerk The City Council accepted the resignation of Jean Davis-Anthony as city clerk-treasurer, effective Oct. 2. They promoted Stacey Amundson to the position, and are advertising her deputy clerk position with Job Service. Amundson said they hope to have someone hired by the end of September. Davis-Anthony has accepted a position at the National Weather Service office in Glasgow. The Water Committee, the city's director of public works and the Glasgow school superintendent have met to resolve a big water bill incurred when some meters the school installed were not read for quite a while. Their solution was to set up a three-year payment plan to pay off the bill. The school will finish this season with new meters and have all new meters installed next year to see what the usage is. With this best guess at the true usage, payment for the next two years will be adjusted accordingly. "This was an oversight by the city and the school," Carney said. "The school got a large bill and asked for an adjustment. By statute, the city can't do that." School Superintendent Glenn Hageman said it sounded like "a fair and equitable solution."Dike work The city may get phone calls when crews start cutting trees on the dike, warned John Peterson, chief of the Street Department. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has inspected the dike with city officials and told them that unless vegetation and fences are removed down to the toe of the dike, they will withdraw their certification of the dike. This would mean that residents on the south side would have to buy flood insurance. Letters have been sent out to residents along the dike explaining the situation, but Peterson said, "There will be a few angry people (if we do this) - but there will be more if we don't." The director of public works, Robert Kompel, said he has talked to eight people, and they were positive when they understood why the work had to be done. Carney said he knows three people who aren't happy.Kompel said the city is trying to get easement agreements from the affected residents but it might take another month. Peterson said his crew could hold off on the work if the council wants them to, but he was told to get started. Dry Prairie easements The city has met with an engineering firm to get some recommendations for handling Dry Prairie water pipeline's crossing of city lines and easements. Dry Prairie has asked to run pipe parallel to city services on some easements, but the mayor said the easements are exclusive. "There is nothing we can grant them. They have to go to the landowners," Carney said. "The city of Glasgow is not anti-Dry Prairie. We just want to protect what's ours, the same as they would." Gorton said the city still needs to know the number and location of crossings.Grants A contract was approved to use the services of Laura Gittings-Carlson as a grant consultant for the city. She will be an independent contractor working for $25 an hour. Linda Twitchell, executive director of Great Northern Development Corporation of Wolf Point, is working with Two Rivers Economic Growth to establish a public-use commercial kitchen in the Civic Center. She told the City Council that the rehab project on the old kitchen can't qualify for certain grants because the average income here is too high. However there was a possible grant with a deadline of Sept. 23. Deb Swanson, executive director of Two Rivers, would write it if the city would sponsor it. Twitchell said the grant uses stimulus money and it is fast. The council approved the sponsoring of this grant and will ratify the decision at the next meeting.