Anaheim Councilmember Natalie Rubalcava wants to start talks on an idea that’s sure to set off furious debate: a new tax on tickets and parking at the city’s entertainment destinations.
Rubalcava on Tuesday proposed that the City Council discuss an entertainment tax at a future meeting. She wants money from a tax on ticket and parking sales in the city to bolster Anaheim’s general fund that she says is in need of new revenue.
The city’s budget is largely driven by a tax on hotel stays from the tens of millions of visitors that travel to the Disneyland Resort and nearby attractions.
“We cannot continue to just depend on (the city’s hotel tax),” Rubalcava said. “I think it’s kind of time at this point for us as a elected body to review this.”
Rubalcava did not offer exact details for what an entertainement tax would look like beyond just affecting tickets and parking. She wants the City Council to place an initiative on the November 2026 ballot to get residents to decide if they should tax the city’s entertainment.
She asked staff to come back with a plan at the Sept. 23 City Council for the council to debate a ballot measure.
“It would have to go to our residents,” Rubalcava said. “I hope that this council is open to allowing our residents to weigh in on this really important ballot initiative.”
Rubalcava said she has been working with the city manager and city attorney on the idea.
City spokesperson Mike Lyster in a text after the meeting said there aren’t exact details yet. The Angels, he said, have a parking rebate provision in their agreement with the city and OCVibe, the housing and entertainment district under develpment around the Honda Center, is not planning to charge directly for its parking garage.
Disneyland officials did not immediately respond to a late-night request for comment.
Anaheim has a recent history of flirting with a gate tax.
The council in 2022 voted down a proposal to ask voters if they’d support a 2% gate tax on the city’s largest attractions like Disneyland, Angel Stadium and the Honda Center. Projections then said a gate tax could bring in $55 million to $80 million annually.
The City Council in 2015 had extended a 30-year ban on a gate tax that began in the 1990s. That was later revoked in 2018 at Disney’s request, calling the agreements then “a flash point for controversy and dissension in our community.”
One-day tickets to Disneyland start at $104 and, at the busiest times, can be more than $200. Estimates put the number of annual visitors to both Disneyland and Disney California Adventure at around 27 million.
The city is already set to free up more than $120 million annually in its budget starting in 2027 when it pays off bonds it took out to expand the resort area back in the 1990s before Disney California Adventure opened. There have been no decisions how to use that money in the future, but the city has other debts and officials have pointed to refilling Anaheim’s reserves.
Rubalcava has received support in the past from a political action committee backed by Disney money. She was elected to the City Council in 2022 and beat a recall election in 2024 that was brought by a local hotel worker union.
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