OPENPUBLICA · PUBLIC MEETING RECORD
Record of Proceedings

San Antonio Budget Work Session on Convention, Arts & Culture, and Tourism – September 2, 2025

City Council — Tuesday, September 2, 2025
BodySan Antonio, Texas
SessionCity Council
DateTuesday, September 2, 2025
StatusFILED
Video Record
0:00 / 2:24:50

Transcript — Verbatim
0:04

Good afternoon.

0:05

The time is now 2 p.m.

0:06

on Tuesday, September 2nd, 2025, and the City of San Antonio budget work session has called to order.

0:11

Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

0:15

Councilmember Corps.

0:17

Councilmember Castillo Angia.

0:20

Councilmember Via Gran.

0:21

Here.

0:22

Councilmember Mungia.

0:24

Councilmember Castillo.

0:26

Councilmember Galvan.

0:28

Councilmember Alberete Gavito.

0:30

Here.

0:30

Councilmember Mesa Gonzalez.

0:33

Councilmember Spears.

0:35

Councilmember White.

0:37

Mayor Jones.

0:38

Here.

0:38

Mayor we have Core.

0:39

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

0:40

This meeting is to hear about the budgets for the conventions, sports facilities department and department of arts and culture and visit San Antonio.

0:46

Eric, over to you.

0:47

Thank you, Mayor.

0:48

Good afternoon, Mayor and Council.

0:49

So uh Justina's gonna start us off with an overview of the Hotel Occupancy Tax Fund.

0:54

We'll transition to Patricia Mousquis Contor with Convention Center, uh, then to Crystal with Arts, and then finally uh Mario Bass uh with visit San Antonio.

1:08

Mayor and City Council, my name is Justina Tate, I'm the budget director for the city of San Antonio.

1:13

And today I just wanted to provide a quick overview of our hotel occupancy tax.

1:18

The current hotel occupancy tax is 16.75%, and that is levied on all eligible hotel room nights.

1:28

Of that amount, the city receives 9%.

1:32

7% goes to fund our convention center in Alamo Dome, tourism, visit San Antonio, history preservation, and our arts and culture.

1:45

So this next slide shows a history of our hotel occupancy tax collections.

1:50

Our actuals include from fiscal year 2020 2019 to fiscal year 2024.

1:57

So those years reflect actual uh collections for our hotel occupancy tax.

2:02

And this slide also includes our estimate for 2025 as well as the proposed budget for 2026.

2:09

As you can see from the graph, the pandemic had a significant impact on this hot on this revenue source.

2:16

However, we were fully recovered from the pandemic by fiscal year 2023, where you can see our hotel occupancy tax collections were about 99.7 percent.

2:28

For fiscal year 2025, we are projecting about a 6.4% increase over 2024.

2:36

And this is a result of more of our short-term rentals coming into compliance, and the short-term rental platforms are collecting the city's portion of our hotel occupancy tax.

2:49

In fiscal year 2026, we're projecting about a 2.8% increase.

2:54

And this is also driven by an increase in our short-term rental collections as well as a slight increase in our average daily rate.

3:03

That concludes uh my portion of the presentation, and I'll turn it over to uh Patricia for Convention Sports and Facility.

3:13

Thank you, Justina.

3:18

Good afternoon, Mayor Council.

3:20

My name is Patricia Musquis Cantor.

3:23

I'm the director of the Convention and Sports Facilities Department.

3:26

Thank you for the opportunity to present our department's fiscal year 26 uh budget.

3:32

In my presentation today, I will uh provide a quick overview of our facilities and talk about the current uh competitive landscape within convention centers and discuss the convention center's booking window.

3:45

I will also uh review the historical budget and trends for the Alamo Dome and Convention Center and go over the department's proposed fiscal year 26 budget.

3:56

Next, I will present the department's revenue enhancements and efficiencies, and finally, I will highlight some of the capital projects we are proposing for next year and leave you with some final thoughts about the future of our facilities.

4:09

But before I begin, I want to direct your attention to the picture on the slide.

4:14

Uh for a while now we have operated under this philosophy.

4:18

We call it one team.

4:20

It's about working together uh to provide excellence and commitments, service, and execution.

4:25

It's a philosophy we hope you'll experience when dealing with our staff.

4:30

None of these events would be possible without the hard work and dedication of the CSAF employees.

4:36

I want to introduce and especially thank uh the leadership staff that has joined me here or is joining us here today.

4:42

I'm gonna start off uh with Monica Ramos, she's the assistant director over the administrative services for the department, Mr.

4:50

Ilafonso Rodriguez Sola is the assistant director over the convention center operations, Mr.

4:56

Steve Sido is uh the assistant director at the Alamo Dome, Ms.

Discussion Breakdown — Share of Meeting
Tourism█████████████████████████████████████████████45%
Arts And Culture████████████████████████████28%
Budget███████7%
Public Engagement███████7%
Economic Development██████6%
Film Industry Development████4%
Public Transportation██2%
Public Art█1%
Summary of Proceedings

San Antonio Budget Work Session on Convention, Arts & Culture, and Tourism – September 2, 2025

The City of San Antonio held a budget work session on September 2, 2025, from 2:00 p.m. to 4:25 p.m. to discuss proposed fiscal year 2026 budgets for the Convention and Sports Facilities Department, Department of Arts and Culture, and Visit San Antonio, funded primarily by the Hotel Occupancy Tax (HOT). Presentations covered revenue trends, economic impacts, competitive challenges, and proposed investments.

Hotel Occupancy Tax Overview (by Justina Tate)

  • Current HOT rate is 16.75%, with the city receiving 9%. Collections recovered by fiscal year 2023 at 99.7% of pre-pandemic levels. Fiscal year 2025 is projected to see a 6.4% increase over 2024, driven by short-term rental compliance. Fiscal year 2026 projects a 2.8% increase.

Convention and Sports Facilities (by Patricia Musquis Cantor)

  • Facilities include the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center (1.6 million square feet, 260 events/year, $364 million direct spending in 2024), Alamo Dome (65,000 seats, 120 event days/year, 1 million attendance), and Carver Community Cultural Center.
  • Convention center occupancy is 73–74%, above practical maximum capacity; Alamo Dome has only 49 open dates to sell in fiscal year 2025, indicating capacity.
  • Expenses have increased $8.5 million at the convention center and $8.7 million at the Alamo Dome since fiscal year 2019 due to salaries, maintenance, and utilities. Alamo Dome made its first profit in over two decades in fiscal year 2023 ($21 million revenue vs. $19.7 million expenses). Fiscal year 2026 estimated HOT transfer of $11.5 million.
  • Proposed total budget is $91.9 million, including $59.2 million for operations, $2.9 million for hosting obligations, and $23.3 million in capital projects. Capital projects include $8.3 million for elevator/escalator replacement, $3.9 million for HVAC renovations, $2.1 million for West Building Park Entrance Remodel, $1.5 million for fire panel replacement, and $700,000 for upgrades to the Lila Cockrell Theater.
  • Revenue enhancements: 3% increase in facility rental fees (estimated $39,000), facility access fee increase from $1–2 to $3–5 per ticket, and $278,000 in efficiency savings from zero-based budgeting.
  • Urgency: Competing Texas cities (Dallas, Austin, Houston) are investing billions in convention center transformations. The booking window requires an expansion announcement soon to capture 2030–2035 business. Alamo Dome no longer meets NCAA standards for Final Four.

Department of Arts and Culture (by Crystal Jones)

  • Economic impact: $5.1 billion annually, creating over 20,000 direct jobs. Proposed fiscal year 2026 budget is $13.5 million from HOT plus $500,000 from the general fund (flat from fiscal year 2025). 65% goes directly to artists and nonprofits.
  • Grants: $6.2 million to 41 nonprofits for operational support; $874,000 to be allocated in fall 2025; $158,000 for 25 event grants; $495,000 for 54 artist grants ($7,500–$15,000 each).
  • Public art: 30th anniversary in 2026; 50 projects ongoing through 2028; 7 dedications planned in Districts 1, 3, 5, and 10; 8 pieces incorporating shade; 22 maintenance projects.
  • Cultural events: 26 department events with 35,000 attendees, 87 artists showcased.
  • Film and music: State film incentive ($300 billion over 10 years); local film incentive at 7.5% rebate. Planning to refresh local incentive and explore media production development zones. Make Music Day featured 40+ artists.
  • Artist development: Partnership with Artists Thrive (March 2026) and Artist Inc. Express (June 2026).

Visit San Antonio (by Mario Bass)

  • Total visitation: 39 million in 2024 (nearly pre-pandemic levels). Regional domestic visitors make up 78% (29 million), meeting attendees 5.7 million, international 2.4 million (15% increase over 2023).
  • Economic impact: $21.5 billion in 2023 (record). Directly generated $1.4 billion by VSA efforts. Return on investment: $33 for every $1 spent ($42 million budget).
  • Group booking pace is strong for 2025–2029 but drops for 2030–2032 due to competitors' new convention centers. Potential group business of $900 million if expansion occurs.
  • Proposed fiscal year 2026 budget is essentially flat to fiscal year 2025.
  • Key performance indicators: forecasting to achieve or exceed all fiscal year 2025 KPIs except sales leads (still 98% above pre-pandemic averages).
  • Community: 912 members (80% non-hotel), 150,000 hospitality professionals (1 in 8 employees). San Antonio Hospitality Foundation raised $100,000 for scholarships.

Council Discussion and Questions

  • Mayor Jones requested data supporting the "build it and they will come" assumption, specifically on group business decline from 7.1 million in 2019 to 5.7 million in 2024 (a 20% decrease), and a breakdown of capital project urgency and opportunity costs.
  • Councilwomen and councilmen discussed regional visitor trends (majority from Texas, 25% from Houston), need to market niche assets (boxing, conjunto, military, arts), improving riverwalk infrastructure and ADA accessibility, and enhancing small business engagement.
  • Councilwoman Villagran emphasized transportation connectivity, marketing the city's story, and prioritizing convention center expansion, land bridge, and arena.
  • Councilwoman Spears asked about reducing construction disruptions, Alamo Dome funding structure (MERP, SALOC loans), and data on HOT-funded arts by district.
  • Councilwoman Alvaradejo-Gavito requested comparison of HOT rates across cities and average spend per visitor type.
  • Councilman Castillo Anguiano asked about citywide occupancy rates and local hotel rentals by San Antonians.
  • Councilman Mesa Gonzalez requested a breakdown of hospitality workforce by geographic origin and commute methods, and clarification on VSA other revenue ($2.7 million from membership and riverwalk activation).
  • Councilman Mungia asked about PFZ financing for competitor convention centers and riverwalk investment concerns.
  • Several members praised arts programs, public art, and film incentives, and expressed support for continued investment.

Key Outcomes

  • Council requested additional data and written responses on: capital project urgency/opportunity cost, HOT rates comparison, group business decline causes, economic impact of grantee programming, hotel occupancy breakeven rates, case studies for attracting high-end travelers, and breakdowns by district and visitor type.
  • Department of Arts and Culture will provide information on HOT-funded arts by district, public art locations, and ROI data.
  • Visit San Antonio will provide data on visitor spending by type, hotel employee geographic distribution, and marketing campaign details.
  • Proposed budgets remain under consideration; amendments may be brought forward in fall regarding film incentive refresh and riverwalk strategic planning.
  • No votes were taken during this work session.

Meeting Transcript

Good afternoon. The time is now 2 p.m. on Tuesday, September 2nd, 2025, and the City of San Antonio budget work session has called to order. Madam Clerk, please call the roll. Councilmember Corps. Councilmember Castillo Angia. Councilmember Via Gran. Here. Councilmember Mungia. Councilmember Castillo. Councilmember Galvan. Councilmember Alberete Gavito. Here. Councilmember Mesa Gonzalez. Councilmember Spears. Councilmember White. Mayor Jones. Here. Mayor we have Core. Thank you, Madam Clerk. This meeting is to hear about the budgets for the conventions, sports facilities department and department of arts and culture and visit San Antonio. Eric, over to you. Thank you, Mayor. Good afternoon, Mayor and Council. So uh Justina's gonna start us off with an overview of the Hotel Occupancy Tax Fund. We'll transition to Patricia Mousquis Contor with Convention Center, uh, then to Crystal with Arts, and then finally uh Mario Bass uh with visit San Antonio. Mayor and City Council, my name is Justina Tate, I'm the budget director for the city of San Antonio. And today I just wanted to provide a quick overview of our hotel occupancy tax. The current hotel occupancy tax is 16.75%, and that is levied on all eligible hotel room nights. Of that amount, the city receives 9%. 7% goes to fund our convention center in Alamo Dome, tourism, visit San Antonio, history preservation, and our arts and culture. So this next slide shows a history of our hotel occupancy tax collections. Our actuals include from fiscal year 2020 2019 to fiscal year 2024. So those years reflect actual uh collections for our hotel occupancy tax. And this slide also includes our estimate for 2025 as well as the proposed budget for 2026. As you can see from the graph, the pandemic had a significant impact on this hot on this revenue source. However, we were fully recovered from the pandemic by fiscal year 2023, where you can see our hotel occupancy tax collections were about 99.7 percent. For fiscal year 2025, we are projecting about a 6.4% increase over 2024. And this is a result of more of our short-term rentals coming into compliance, and the short-term rental platforms are collecting the city's portion of our hotel occupancy tax. In fiscal year 2026, we're projecting about a 2.8% increase. And this is also driven by an increase in our short-term rental collections as well as a slight increase in our average daily rate. That concludes uh my portion of the presentation, and I'll turn it over to uh Patricia for Convention Sports and Facility. Thank you, Justina. Good afternoon, Mayor Council. My name is Patricia Musquis Cantor. I'm the director of the Convention and Sports Facilities Department. Thank you for the opportunity to present our department's fiscal year 26 uh budget. In my presentation today, I will uh provide a quick overview of our facilities and talk about the current uh competitive landscape within convention centers and discuss the convention center's booking window. I will also uh review the historical budget and trends for the Alamo Dome and Convention Center and go over the department's proposed fiscal year 26 budget. Next, I will present the department's revenue enhancements and efficiencies, and finally, I will highlight some of the capital projects we are proposing for next year and leave you with some final thoughts about the future of our facilities.

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