Local chambers of commerce may soon be forced to show how they spent hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars. If they don’t comply, one elected leader said, their funding could be stripped.
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In a letter sent this week to the Hilton Head Island-Bluffton Chamber of Commerce, the Greater Beaufort Port Royal Convention & Visitor’s Bureau and the Beaufort County Black Chamber of Commerce, County Administrator Ashley Jacobs requested the organizations show exactly how they spent $748,000 in tax money provided by the county.
The letter asks the groups to provide the county records and receipts of the tax money spent in 2019 and 2020 by Aug. 31.
“The purpose of the letters is to bring some transparency to how they spend public funds,” Jacobs said in a statement Thursday.
Jacobs’ letter comes less than a year after the Hilton Head Chamber denied three County Council members’ request for a slew of documents and accounting for how the chamber spends the money it gets from the county.
The county’s ongoing fight for the records to be public is important because the chambers are responsible for making sure tourism thrives on Hilton Head, in Bluffton and Beaufort County. The industry, which has been hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic, is Beaufort County’s second largest, at $1.48 billion. Local governments provide a large percentage of the chambers’ budgets, but without an accounting of spending, it’s hard to tell how successful the marketing effort is.
Jacobs’ request was sent at the direction of her bosses, Beaufort County Council.
“This is another step in the right direction of getting clarity and transparency on the public’s money,” Council member Mike Covert said. “If they want to continue to receive public tax dollars, then they must comply. No receipts, no money. The ball is in the chambers’ courts.”
“If they don’t comply, we’ve given the county administrator latitude to use whatever legal means she has to get those records,” he said.
The letter cites a county ordinance that says officials are “empowered to make inspections, examine and audit books and records of entities that receive ATAX and HTAX funds.”
Robb Wells, president and CEO of the Greater Beaufort Port Royal Convention & Visitor’s Bureau, said Friday his organization plans to comply with the county’s request.
“We will be submitting our numbers. We try to do that every year. This is not anything new for us,” he said. “Our goal is to be good stewards of the money. They want to see where the money went, so we’ll show them the money.”
Wells added that he also would sit down with reporters to show how the money was spent.
“We’re not trying to hide anything,” he said
Charlie Clark, spokesperson for the Hilton Head Chamber, said in a statement Friday that her organization would reply to the county’s request and said it has told County Council “on four separate occasions that we welcome the same detailed oversight agreement we have with the towns of Hilton Head Island and Bluffton, whereby officials have the opportunity to review chamber financials.”
“There is arduous oversight of our organization and we welcome that scrutiny,” the statement said. “We’ve consistently demonstrated complete compliance with, and in many cases, exceeded the transparency standards set forth by federal, state and local law regarding ATAX expenditures.”
Representatives from the Beaufort County Black Chamber of Commerce did not immediately return calls and emails for comment on Friday.