Hamilton County commissioners may divert money away from the Chattanooga Tourism Co. amid a dispute over salaries and what some officials describe as its lack of cooperation with a newer agency focused on sports tourism.
Commissioner Chip Baker, R-Signal Mountain, introduced a resolution Wednesday that would siphon $480,000 in hotel-motel tax funding from the tourism company, which is in charge of marketing Hamilton County for visitors and attracting major events to the region. The panel will consider the action during its meeting Wednesday.
The money would still be allocated for the same fundamental purpose, Baker said — boosting sports tourism in Hamilton County — but the funding would instead support the recently formed Sports & Events Corp. in those endeavors. The nonprofit is led by the former vice president of sports at the tourism company, Tim Morgan, who lost his job there after a reorganization at the agency. The $480,000 would be on top of $500,000 in hotel-motel tax money the County Commission set aside for the Sports & Events Corp. in the current budget year, which runs through June 30.
Over the past four years, the tourism company has increased spending on salaries by 46% while it reduced spending on advertising, Baker said, which he described as the “main purpose of the organization.” As a proportion of overall spending, the amount of money going toward administrative overhead increased from 9% to 12% over that time frame, Baker said. Advertising expenses, meanwhile, declined from 24% to 18.5%, he said.