TDC to pick up tab for signs

PANAMA CITY BEACH, FL - The Bay County Tourist Development Council has agreed to fund a recent Beach city council requirement that all short-term rental units must post interior signs detailing the beach flag warning system and dangers of rip currents.
   
Councilmembers on April 23 voted unanimously to pass the ordinance as a method of increasing beach safety by making tourists more aware of potential hazards, officials said. Eleven people drowned along Bay County beaches in 2008.
   
TDC Executive Director Dan Rowe said Thursday about 20,000 of the 8-by-10-inch signs have been printed, along with about 20,000 decals that can be applied to mirrors or other glass surfaces.
   
The cost to the TDC amounts to about $4,000, Rowe said, part of a $68,000 beach safety awareness campaign that includes billboards, warning signs at beach access points and a flying sign that will be towed behind a prop plane along the shore beginning in two weeks.
   
The in-room signs will be available for all short-term rental units in the TDC's taxing district, although they will be required only within the Panama City Beach city limits, Rowe said. The year's peak traveling season and the TDC's peak tax-collection months occur during the summer.
   
Rowe, who said he is hoping the room signs will increase safety awareness among Beach visitors this year, estimates there are about 21,000 short-term rental units, although only about 13,000 of these are registered collectors of the TDC's 5 percent tourism tax,
   
The signs and decals are now available at the Visitor Information Center, at the intersection of Back Beach Road and State 79, from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Sunday.