In a groundbreaking step, Rye Brook will be the first village in New York to levy a hotel occupancy tax that is expected to bring in about $400,000 annually in revenue from guests at two hotel and conference centers here.
The state Legislature in August granted village officials”™ home-rule request and authorized a levy of not more than 3 percent on hotel and motel guest rooms for three years. The village board will hold a public hearing Sept. 28 on a local law imposing the 3 percent tax, which on hotel bills will be added to Westchester County”™s 3 percent occupancy tax.
“I guess the phrase ”˜three times is a charm”™ has been applicable here,” said Rye Brook Mayor Joan L. Feinstein, flanked by the bill”™s Albany sponsors, State Sen. Suzi Oppenheimer and Assemblyman George Latimer, at a press conference announcing the tax. Village officials worked for five years on the home-rule measure, which twice before died in state legislative committees, she said.
Feinstein said the tax will apply to more than 800 guest rooms at the Doral Arrowwood Hotel Conference Center and the Hilton Rye Town. The estimated annual revenue generated by the tax amounts to about 3 percent of the village”™s $13 million real property tax levy, the mayor said.
Feinstein said the hotel tax will provide an additional stream of non-property-tax revenue “in these very difficult economic times ”¦ It”™s a wonderful thing for the residents of Rye Brook.”
The mayor said Doral and Hilton Rye Town operators were told of the village”™s home-rule measure earlier this year and did not oppose it. “I think it”™s fair to say that the hotels understand the need for the village to enact this tax,” she said. “Our two hotels have been wonderful neighbors.”
Managers at Doral Arrowwood and Hilton Rye Town did not respond to calls for comment.
Latimer, the bill”™s Assembly sponsor, said the hotel conference centers in Rye Brook now will pay in occupancy taxes what their competitors already pay in White Plains, New Rochelle and Rye, cities that have adopted their own 3 percent hotel levies.
Peter Baynes, executive director of the New York State Conference of Mayors, called the levy on hotels and motels “an exportable tax” and the best municipal option to raise needed revenue without raising property taxes. He said his office has received numerous calls from other villages considering an occupancy tax, which until now had been authorized only for cities and counties.
“This is an important step in taking down that barrier” between cities and villages, said Baynes.
“Are we breaking new ground? Yes,” said Oppenheimer. “Difficult times demand creative solutions.”
