GULF SHORES, Ala. – The city is considering changes to a business license ordinance in hopes of getting better reporting on vacation rentals and lodging taxes.

“It is important to understand who’s paying lodging taxes and who’s not and that everyone is paying their fair share,” Mayor Robert Craft said. “It’s got to be equitable. As a city, to provide the services we provide, that’s the reason the taxes are there. We’ve got to have some way to account for what we’re collecting on an individual business license basis.”

At a Monday council work session, City Administrator Steve Griffin outlined the changes to allow the city to get rental companies and individual owners to provide better accounting for rental units.

The discussion was an effort to get the ordinance language before the public and the industry. It will be brought up again for more discussion at the next work session on Aug. 5. The new ordinance also requires, as provision for obtaining a license, that companies and individuals provide a local emergency contact.

“We know this will have impact with the industry to the point where we want it to as least introduce you to it tonight and get your comments and suggestions and direction,” Griffin said. “And reach out to the industry, the convention and visitors bureau and bring back whatever comments we have at the next meeting, not the regular city council meeting.”

Griffin said getting a better accounting of Internet “Vacation Rental By Owner,” or VRBO, units in town, played a small part in the additions to the ordinance.

“That’s part of it, yes, verification of that as well, but that’s not the sole reason,” he said. “We just want to get a better accounting of each and every unit in Gulf Shores, including VRBOs.”

Currently, larger condo complexes provide just one monthly report for the entire building. The ordinance would require a report for each unit in each building as well as individual rental houses in the city.

“With units, oftentimes a company managing several hundred will provide a report of gross receipts of the 50 or 100 units as opposed to lift out the individual units and have those reported on individually,” Griffin said.

Craft said getting the ordinance before the management companies, owners and public will give the companies an opportunity to study and offer suggestions on making it work for them as well as the city.

“We need to let the world know we are doing this,” he said. “We need to send out the information to all the management companies and let them know this is coming up so we can work through this in an appropriate manner.”

Griffin said he believes the companies already gather this information anyway.

“We can’t imagine that the company doesn’t already get that when they get ready to turn in their gross receipts,” he said. “That’s a report we’d like to see as well.”

Just as important to the city, Griffin said, is the designation of an emergency contact for rental units that is also part of the ordinance changes.

"The more immediate focus is we want to get each unit and each licensee to name their emergency contact,” he said. “There’s been a concern by our police, fire and our code people when things are getting out of hand at a rental unit that there’s no emergency contact number. This ordinance requires that with their application for a business license that emergency contact be appointed.”

And the ordinance requires that contact be accessible quickly.

“We also have language in there that if they’re out of town that they can designate somebody to do that,” he said. “There needs to be an emergency contact that can respond within two hours to answer a policeman’s or fireman’s call.”

In 2012 the city collected $6 million in lodging taxes on a rate of 11 percent. Five percent of that goes to the city, four to the state and two to Orange Beach and Gulf Shores Tourism.

According to the city budget, that is almost 25 percent of Gulf Shores' yearly budget.