By: Lydia Crawley The Parsons Advocate
The Town of Davis continues its fight with Airbnb over the information it and Tucker County needs to distribute Hotel/Motel money. Town of Davis Mayor Al Tomson said he recently sent a strongly worded email to the company and threatened legal action if satisfaction was not obtained.
“I did send a pretty strong email to Airbnb saying that West Virginia code requires you to do the things that we are asking for and we will probably take legal action if you don’t comply,” Tomson said.
The result was a virtual meeting with the company scheduled for Friday, April 11th. There was no word on the outcome of the meeting with the company.
West Virginia Code 7-18-10 referenced by Tomson states that, “The hotel operator on or before the fifteenth day of each month, prepare and deliver to the taxing authority a return for the preceding month, in the form prescribed by the taxing authority. Such form shall include all information necessary for the computation, collection and subsequent distribution of the tax as the taxing authority may require. A remittance for the amount of the tax due shall accompany each return. Each return shall be signed by the hotel operator or his duly authorized agent.”
In the past, Tomson has stated that the Town has has encountered issues with prompt reporting with in some cases months worth of data being submitted at once and no identifying information as to which check or address each check was assigned to. Tomson has also stated in the past that much of the information that has been supplied by the company has been unintelligable and has required hundreds of hours to try to disseminate.
“All the statute says is the taxing authority, which is the Town of Davis, we need to get the detail that we need from Airbnb,” Tomson said. “That’s in West Virginia Code 7-18-10.”
Tomson credited Tucker County Prosecuting Attorney Savannah Hull Wilkins with the idea for the strongly worded email. Tomson also said that should the virtual meeting not yield results, Wilkins is willing to approach the West Virginia Attorney General with the matter for resolution.
“Savannah has suggested that I send that last email to Airbnb,” Tomson said. “I did. It got their attention. If they don’t work with us on Friday, she’s prepared to take this to the Attorney General. So we’re going to get some results one way or another, finally. Its a problem we’ve had for over a year now.”
