❒ Sales tax receipts up in 4th quarter of 2011

By Keri Luiz
Assistant Editor

As with so many city groups and panels, the subject of the imminent closure of the Benicia State Recreation Area reared its head Wednesday before the city Economic Development Board.

Acting Economic Development Manager Mario Giuliani shared the latest updates on negotiations to keep open the SRA, one of Solano County’s two state parks and one of about 50 expected to be shuttered by the state July 1.

As Giuliani told the City Council the night before, an agreement between the state and the nonprofit Benicia State Parks Association to transfer operating responsibilities for the other Solano state park — the Benicia Capitol State Historic Park, the icon of the city and an integral part of its downtown — as well as the adjacent Fischer-Hanlon House is “a few weeks away” from being ratified.

A city takeover of the Recreation Area, however, has proven to be a more challenging matter, Giuliani said, in part because of its size — nearly 500 acres.

“To put that in comparison, it would double the size of the park land in Benicia. We have about 500 acres’ worth of parks in Benicia that the city maintains,” he said.

Giuliani told the board that pedestrian and ADA access to the SRA will continue after July 1, but “there will be an elimination of restroom services, trash services to the park. Therefore moving forward, our task is to restore some of those services,” he said.

One of the big concerns is preservation and operation of the Forrest Deaner Native Plant Botanic Garden, which sits inside the borders of the SRA and which is one of the largest collections of California native plants in the Bay Area. “It has received grants from many organizations,” Giuliani said, but concerns remain over volunteers’ access should the SRA’s gates be locked.

City staff is working on three key priorities, Giuliani said: delivering water to the Forrest Deaner garden, scheduled vehicle access to supply the garden, and supplying some type of chemical toilet at Dillon Point, a popular spot for area fishermen.

In other business, Giuliani presented a sales tax review from the fourth quarter of 2011, covering the months of October, November and December. “On average it takes four to five months to collect and report the data from the preceding quarter,” he wrote in the report.

The total sales tax received by the city in the quarter was $1,409,675. In addition, $60,638 was received from the transient occupancy tax, or hotel tax, during this same quarter.

“I’m happy to say that our trends are positive,” Giuliani said.

Downtown sales tax, transient occupancy tax and the Industrial Park sales tax all were up from the fourth quarter of 2010, he said.

Giuliani also briefed the board on the Business Retention Program, the roundtable forums held recently at the Southampton Shopping Center and the Benicia Industrial Park. The latter’s purpose was “to provide some value to our companies out in the Industrial Park related to employee training programs from the state of California related to financing options, and we had staff from the Small Businesses Development Center there. We had staff from the (Employment Training Panel) partnered with Solano EDC to provide a series of value-added services to our companies to make them aware that there’s certain resources available, above and beyond what the city is offering,” Giuliani said.

He said though only eight businesses attended, feedback was good. “I think the businesses that attended found value in it. Now, it is a matter of getting more businesses to the table.”

The Southampton merchants’ roundtable, originally expected to be an opportunity for city staff to share information derived from the city’s Business Development Action Plan and to give merchants the opportunity to share their views, instead turned into a voicing of serious concerns regarding the shopping center’s owner, Weingarten Realty, a Houston, Texas-based firm.

“You could clearly tell there was a breakdown in communication between the tenants and the landlord,” Giuliani said. “I’m happy to say that I think it got Weingarten’s attention, because they’ve been more responsive to the merchants there.

“We’re still trying to schedule a meeting with representatives of Weingarten and city staff. It’s just a matter of coordinating the right personnel for the city and Weingarten.”