Winter Park, the only home rule town in Grand County, will ask voters to continue its 1 percent sales and lodging tax today.

Fifty percent of the money generated by the tax, originally adopted in 1991, is devoted to marketing; the remaining 50 percent is used for capital improvement projects.

Polls are open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. at the Town of Winter Park conference room, 50 Vasquez.

This will be the fourth time the sales tax has been up for re-election. It was originally voted approved in 1991 and went into effect in 1992. Its renewal is put to voters every four years.

The tax generated $681,000 in 2007 and is projected to bring in $685,000 this year.

“It’s been a major benefit to have those funds for the community,” Mayor Nick Teverbaugh said. “It’s created a lot of community projects, capital projects and it provides the bulk of the money for the Chamber’s marketing council to promote the area.

“People recognize that it has provided a lot of benefit to the community,” he said. “It’s appropriate that the guests help pay for it.”

The majority of the town supports the levy, he said.

“It has not been a real close vote,” he said. “After people saw what we were able to do with the money they were even more in favor of continuing it.”

Statutory communities don’t have this option, he said.

“We’re the only (town) in the county that could have voted to add another penny of sales tax because we our governed by a home rules charter,” Teverbaugh said.

Council seats

Council members Jim Myers, Chris Seemann, Mike Periolat, and Rusty Thompson have terms expiring this month. Three of the seats are four-year terms, and the remaining seat is a two-year term.

Since no challengers came forward for the election, the council members will remain on council. They will decide who will fill which terms on April 18.

“I think they got together and decided that Mike (Periolat) would take the two-year term,” Teverbaugh said.

Council members also choose the mayor and mayor pro-tem for two-year terms from among themselves. Teverbaugh, whose term is not up until 2010, will resign from his mayor’s post April 16, though he will remain on council until he actually moves.

The remaining six council members will then interview community members to find someone to fill his council spot until the next elections.

He told the council members his plan about a year ago.

“I said I would stay on council and work with the new mayor for about three month before I move,” he told members.

He will then move to Stagecoach Reservoir, 15 miles south of Steamboat Springs, to join his wife he married last July.

Teverbaugh has served on the council for 26 years; he has lived in the county for 31 years.