There have been some changes recently to the food and beverage policy at the Humboldt Uniplex that’s been of some concern to the Humboldt & District Chamber of Commerce and stakeholders (i.e., caterers). Aside from the forms caterers now have to fill out, they may also be expected to give the City 15 per cent commission.
“The City has been reviewing how we provide food and beverages. We’re looking at what we’re doing and how we’re doing it,” said Darrell Lessmeister, director of community and leisure services for the City of Humboldt. “We want caterers to provide food, but we want them to give us a percentage to provide that service.”
According to Lessmeister, the main purpose of this fee is to get better recovery rates. As it stands, the City is currently getting back approximately 30-40 per cent of revenues while taxpayers are subsidizing the remaining 60-70 per cent. By incorporating this landmark fee, Lessmeister says they’re hoping to get to the point where they’re recovering 40-50 per cent.
“We want to put less burden on the taxpayers and find ways of getting in more revenues so that we’re more dependent on recovery rates and less dependent on taxation,” he said. “Caterers don’t pay us anything at this point.”
The problem is, the City didn’t warn any of the stakeholders before they made this proposal, so it left some businesses concerned. Once the stakeholders and the chamber of commerce were informed, the chamber immediately sent a letter to the City requesting to meet with them to discuss the proposal. They’ve since had one meeting and are hoping to have another that includes the stakeholders.
“We have been getting responses enquiring what the reason is for the increase,” said Andre Kruger, president of the chamber of commerce. “On behalf of the businesses, we met with the city council’s committee involved with this and explained that we want more of an understanding as to why this has come about. We want to know more of the reasoning.”
The policy was introduced in December of last year and was approved by the community and leisure services committee and city council. Once they heard about the concerns, they met with the chamber of commerce. It was after this meeting that another was agreed upon that would include caterers.
“At this time there has been no recommendations from the Community and Leisure Services Department to make changes to the policy,” said Lessmeister. “There was an area in the policy they asked for a clarification.”
Kruger said they understand that it takes money to operate a facility like that and it’s not that businesses are against it. They just want to meet with the City and see if common ground can be reached as to they type of costs, where the money is going, and how they’re going to get there.
“We’re not against the City imposing this, we just want more transparency – for lack of a better word – on why this is needed and why it’s so high,” he said. “It’s just a proposal for right now as far as we can understand. We want to make sure everyone can have some input as to how this goes about.”
The other part of the new policy involves mandating that caterers fill out a form that shows that the food is being prepared in a licensed facility and that proper provincial food handling regulations are being followed. Up until now, the City couldn’t be sure of how or where it was being prepared. Once the form is filled out and approved, that caterer will be put on a list to show that they’ve been approved to cater at the Uniplex. If a renter decides to bring in his or her own catering service, that caterer will have to go through the same approval process.
“Prior to this, we didn’t know what food service was coming in,” said Lessmeister. “They could have been bringing in people that didn’t have a license or didn’t meet provincial regulations. We want to make sure we’re providing due diligence so that the public feels confident that it’s being served according to provincial regulations.”
The new policy won’t apply to any bookings that were made within the next 12 months.
