City debates rewriting transient lodging ordinance and future of parks funding

City Council members on Sept. 9 debated proposed revisions to the Dallas Municipal Code that would rename and rewrite the city's transient room tax ordinance and change how the resulting revenue is allocated.

Staff and the city attorney presented eight primary changes to the code intended to modernize language and clarify administration: renaming the tax from "transient room tax" to "transient lodging tax," simplifying terms and definitions, expressly authorizing the city's use of the electronic lien docket for nonpayments, clarifying refund authority, increasing an administrative interest/penalty from 1% to 3% for late payments or refund extensions, and aligning the ordinance with current procurement timelines for tourism services. The most contested proposal would remove project- and entity-specific mandatory allocations from the ordinance and instead rely on the city's annual budget process and discrete intergovernmental agreements for recurring commitments.

Why it matters: For decades the city's code included a provision that routed a portion of TRT receipts to the Northern Wasco County Parks & Recreation District. Speakers at the meeting said that arrangement underpinned long-range park planning and operations, including maintenance at Kramer/Cramer Field. Scott Baker, executive director of the park district, told council the 2% allocation dates to an earlier increase in the tax that repaid a loan and then provided continuing support to park operations; he and park board members said removing the earmark without a guaranteed substitute could jeopardize the district's multi-year planning.

Public testimony from Little League, parks board members and others described immediate needs at Cramer Field and urged the city to ensure reliable maintenance funding. City staff and the attorney said the change to reflect a 55% tourism-promotion practice (previous ordinance language referenced a 21% minimum) would align the code with recent practice but cautioned that increasing an ordinance's earmark can have legal "ratchet" effects under state law.

What council did: Council did not adopt ordinance changes at the Sept. 9 meeting. Instead members directed staff to engage affected partners (Northern Wasco County Parks & Recreation District, Wasco County, chamber/tourism partners) and to return with options such as multiyear funding agreements or IGAs that would preserve predictable support while enabling a cleaner, administratively modern code. Staff said timing is sensitive because the city's tourism-services contract ends June 30 and procurement for that service must be aligned with any ordinance changes.

Councilors pressed staff for written scenarios showing how funding allocations would flow under the revised code, and several asked that staff return with clear definitions of what constitutes "tourism-related" spending under state law. The attorney said some capital projects and facilities with a lifespan over 10 years can qualify as tourist-related under ORS and thus potentially be funded from tourism promotion monies, but operational support (day-to-day park maintenance) is less clearly within the tourism fund unless tied to a qualifying facility or program.

Next steps: Staff will return with an action item and recommended funding agreements or alternatives ahead of the next budget process and procurement deadlines. Councilors expressed support for keeping parks funded in the near term while creating a path to move budgeting and allocations into the annual budget/IGA processes.

Ending: The council closed the discussion without taking final action on the ordinance and asked staff to provide detailed options and partner engagement before bringing the matter back for a vote.