For the most part, hotels are complying with the collection of the Erie County bed tax.

According to an audit released Wednesday by Comptroller Mark Poloncarz most hotels are collecting and returning the bed tax to the county coffers, as mandated by law.

Hotels with more than 30 rooms are required to collect the bed tax. Bed tax receipts total more than $6 million, with a portion going to underwrite the operations of the Buffalo Niagara Convention & Visitors Bureau and the Buffalo Niagara Convention Center. When the tax was enacted, it was designed to have all the proceeds go directly to the CVB and convention center.

"In general, except for minor adjustments, hotels examined in this audit have accurately reported taxable revenues to the county and no material violations were found," Poloncarz said.

Richard Geiger, CVB president and CEO, said he was pleased with the audit.

"The bed tax is really like a sales tax," he said. "It has to be collected and returned to the county."

However, Poloncarz did criticize the Real Property Tax Services in the county's Division of Budget, Management and Finance. The comptroller said the division "was not exercising due diligence in ensuring timely receipt of tax revenues to the county."

The audit found 24 delinquent bed tax returns that should have produced $19,898 in penalties. The penalties, however, were waived by the Real Property Tax Services unit.

Poloncarz also found two hotel operators who each owed $50,000 in bed tax dollars. Only recently did the county begin legal action to collect the money against one business while the second hotel operator failed to comply with three separate payment agreements -- some of which date back to 1993.

Many of the same issues were identified in a 2002 audit, but Poloncarz said little was done to correct the measures.

"Despite past assurances from the Giambra administration to correct the problem, they failed to do so," the comptroller said.

Poloncarz said he will do everything possible to make sure any and all uncollected bed tax dollars will be returned to the county.