Budgets approved budgets for Bay County marketing organizations

BAY COUNTY, Fla. (WMBB) — Bay County Commissioners approved the Tourist Development Council’s budgets for the individual marketing organizations, the Mexico Beach CDC, Visit PCB, and Destination Panama City.

Each receives bed tax revenue. Mexico Beach’s budget will be about $860,000. Panama City’s is around $4 million and the beach’s budget is $54 million. That includes $21 million in the upcoming budget and about $30 million rolled over from previous budgets.

The TDC will use the rollover money for large projects like the proposed complex that will be built at the sports park.

“Focused on how do we continue to grow visitation to Panama City Beach on a year-round basis so it’s not just focusing on the summer, we spend most of our energy trying to bring visitors into Bay County, into Panama City Beach, you know, from Labor Day to Memorial Day, because that helps increase year now year-round employment,” Bay County Tourist Development Council Executive Director Dan Rowe said.

1% of the bed tax collections are earmarked for beach renourishment projects.