Let me get this straight. The Buncombe County Commissioners just x-ed an opportunity to let an RV park expand to meet growing demand. Then, Asheville put the kibosh on renting out rooms in private housing short-term. So now, the Buncombe County Commissioners want to increase the hotel tax from 4 to 6 percent to collect money to bring in more tourists. It sounds demented, but, you see, the city and county want the tourists to fill empty hotel rooms being built. They don’t want any of that trailer-trash.
Actually, only 75 percent of the projected $14 million in tourist-extracted revenues will go toward advertising. The rest will pay for anything that can be claimed to attract tourists – except for-profit ventures. Let’s see, my messed up foot caused me to incur big hospital bills, which support hospital workers, who spend money in restaurants, so the restaurateurs can improve the menus to be more enticing to tourists. Bingo!
