Council, mayor close in on budget matters

Increasing the city hotel tax was one of a number of proposals discussed during private budget talks yesterday between Mayor Nutter and City Council.

The closed-door negotiations also covered a number of Council concerns, including the elimination of tax cuts for the working poor in Nutter's five-year plan.

Council members yesterday stressed that the process is still in flux.

"I don't think there is anything that is definitive yet," Councilman Darrell Clarke said of the overall budget conversation.

The Nutter administration brought Council a pitch it received from the Greater Philadelphia Tourism Marketing Corporation (GPTMC) and the Philadelphia Convention and Visitors Bureau (PCVB) to raise the city hotel-room tax from 7 to 8 percent - a move that would require city and state authorization.

That money, predicted to be roughly $5 million to $6 million, would then go to GPTMC and the PCVB to market the Pennsylvania Convention Center, Council members said.

It wasn't clear how much support there was on Council for the tax increase.

Council also made its requests to Nutter. Among them was a plea to reinstate some version of the wage-tax break for the working poor, championed by the late Councilman David Cohen. The tax break was supposed to start in 2013, but it was eliminated from Nutter's five-year plan.

"I think there are a number of Council people that would certainly like to see it stay," said Councilman Bill Greenlee.

Last week, Nutter tried to brief Council privately on the budget, but reporters refused to leave the meeting, citing the state's Sunshine Act on public meetings.

The Sunshine Act states that official action or deliberation by a government agency must take place in an open meeting if a quorum of the agency's members attends.

Nutter got around the law yesterday because neither of the meetings had the necessary nine for a quorum.

The Nutter administration has promised to provide a revised budget to Council by the end of the week. *