Hotel Tax Delinquencies in Oklahoma City Rise

By Colleen Chen, NEWS 9

OKLAHOMA CITY – Anyone who gets a hotel or motel room in Oklahoma City pays a 5.5 percent hotel tax on the bill. That money is supposed to be turned into Oklahoma City every month, but city finance leaders said more and more businesses are holding on to the cash.

"That is fraud. They are keeping money that is not theirs to keep. It's the city's," said City Finance Director Laura Johnson.

In the last fiscal year, hotel taxes decreased by 11.6 percent in the same time period.

"We took the downturn in the economy into account when estimating our target, but the amount of delinquencies caused us to miss that goal. We're not trying to put anybody out of business, but that hotel tax is money already owed to us. It's not an option to turn it in," Johnson said.

As a last resort, the city can file liens on properties. Recently, a Super 8 Motel, 3030 S. I-35; a Quality Inn, 7800 C.A. Henderson Blvd.; a Howard Johnson, 6200 N. Robinson Ave.; and a Holiday Inn, 1400 NE 63rd St., have all had liens filed against them because of repeated delinquencies. The four make up over $220,000 of delinquent tax collections. Three of the four are working on payment plans with the city.

To help secure collections from hotel and motel operators that may be delinquent in the future, the city is asking the legislature to give municipalities more power. Finance leaders are working on getting the ability to charge delinquent operators with embezzlement.

Johnson said the money is very important because hotel and motel tax funds are used to pay the bonds on improvements at the fairgrounds. The funds also go towards promoting tourism and conventions.