On the American Resort & Lodging Affiliation, advocacy on behalf of our 30,000-plus members is on the coronary heart of all the pieces we do. Due to the help of members such as you and the arduous work of our unbelievable crew, AHLA racked up a number of spectacular advocacy victories in 2023. Listed here are the highlights:
Advocacy Wins Throughout All Branches of the Federal Authorities
- After months of AHLA lobbying, the Normal Providers Administration in August introduced its fiscal yr 2024 per diem charges that may govern reimbursement for federal workers’ official lodging and meals bills. The rules included a $9 enhance to the lodging charge inside the continental United States, which is able to generate an estimated $300 million for hoteliers.
- The H-2B Workforce Coalition, which AHLA co-chairs, labored arduous to persuade the Biden Administration to make accessible a further 64,716 H-2B short-term nonagricultural employee visas in fiscal yr 2024. This can almost double the yearly allocation of H-2B visas.
- In June, at AHLA’s request, the Small Enterprise Administration issued new Paycheck Safety eligibility pointers clarifying that lodge homeowners who utilized third-party administration firms and took part in PPP are eligible for PPP mortgage forgiveness for payroll bills they paid through a administration firm.
- AHLA helped safe U.S. Senate introduction of the bipartisan Resort Charges Transparency Act in July. The invoice would create a single customary for necessary payment show throughout the lodging ecosystem—from inns to on-line journey businesses, metasearch websites, and short-term rental platforms.
- In Could, greater than 200 hoteliers from greater than 30 states participated in AHLA’s Inns on the Hill fly-in on Capitol Hill in Washington. The occasion included greater than 100 conferences with Home and Senate places of work about how labor shortages are impacting inns and what Congress can do to assist develop the lodge workforce.
- Hoteliers scored an enormous victory this yr when the Supreme Court docket started listening to arguments within the Acheson Inns, LLC, v. Laufer case in October. The case entails a serial litigant who has sued tons of of inns beneath the People with Disabilities Act (ADA) with out having any intention of staying in these inns. AHLA is hopeful the court docket will rule in favor of Acheson Inns, thereby limiting future litigation to solely these instances with true advantage. This can present peace of thoughts to hoteliers, who now dwell in fixed concern of drive-by and click-by lawsuits from serial “tester” litigants searching for to make a fast buck off hardworking small-business homeowners.
State and Native Advocacy Victories Across the Nation
- In Anaheim, the California Resort & Lodging Affiliation (CHLA) and AHLA labored to efficiently defeat a poll measure that might have mandated a $25/hour lodge and occasion middle employee minimal wage and double pay for all the day if lodge room attendants cleaned rooms totaling above sure square-footage thresholds.
- Additionally in California, AHLA labored with CHLA to develop language in two payments (AB-537 and SB-478) requiring uniform price-and-fee shows for inns and short-term rental properties. The payments degree the taking part in subject amongst inns and short-term-rentals like Airbnb by setting one common customary for price-and-fee show.
- AHLA and a number of other companion state associations across the nation teamed as much as cease or defeat laws in 12 states that might have prevented native governments from regulating short-term rental properties by the identical requirements as inns. AHLA will proceed to battle for authorized and regulatory landscapes that deal with all lodging institutions equally.
- In Montana, AHLA labored with the Montana Lodging and Hospitality Affiliation to safe passage of a invoice that gives grant funding to inns that home home violence and human trafficking survivors.
- AHLA labored with HospitalityTN to safe passage of the Defending Tennessee Companies and Staff Act, a legislation that may stop native governments from concentrating on small-business lodge homeowners and workers with pricey new pink tape. Tennessee Gov. Invoice Lee signed the legislation in Could.
- In New York Metropolis, tens of hundreds of unlawful short-term leases had been faraway from the market because of an AHLA and Resort Affiliation of New York Metropolis-backed legislation that requires short-term rental companies to register with town authorities and limits short-term rental companies to owner-occupied houses.
- And in Illinois, AHLA was happy to see passage of a legislation that reinforces safety for inns that take away or refuse to serve verbally abusive or disruptive clients. The Illinois Resort & Lodging Affiliation led advocacy efforts in help of the “Be Form” laws, which was modeled on an analogous legislation that handed in Rhode Island in 2022.
Thanks in your steadfast help in serving to AHLA obtain these noteworthy accomplishments. In 2024, we sit up for persevering with to work with companions, interact members, and put money into advocacy at each degree of presidency to guard hoteliers and hold our trade shifting ahead.
