Pier South hotel in Imperial Beach (one-bedroom oceanfront suite, $359/night)

Fifteen years ago, officials in Imperial Beach proposed transforming the raunchy, funky Seacoast Inn — its redeeming feature being the location on the sand — into a resort and luring upscale tourists to the most southwesterly corner of the continental U.S.

By 2008, the Calfornia Coastal Commission had said okay, as long as the financing could be wrung from the sale of time shares and condos. But sluggish sales of resort-style condos and time shares amid the meltdown in the real estate industry tanked the financing mechanism.

In the meantime, as citations for code violations piled up, the Seacoast Inn closed for good. By late September 2010, a wrecking crew had laid to waste the crumbling beachfront structure.

What's a city to do? How about chipping in $7 million in redevelopment money if a developer would commit another $20 million? Pacifica Properties of San Diego stepped in. In January 2014, a Mediterranean-style, T-shaped, boutique resort hotel at 800 Seacoast Avenue named Pier South began accepting guests.

The city figured it would recoup the $7 million in 14 to 20 years through the hotel-room levy of 10 percent, the so-called transient occupancy tax. The most optimistic projection put returns at $500,000 a year over 14 years.

How are they doing so far, after one full year in business? Not as well as hoped for, according to tax records provided by the city clerk at the Reader's request.

They show that Pier South added $333,288 in revenue to the city via the room tax from January through December of 2014, the first full year of operation. At this rate, it would take not 14, but 21 years to get back the $7 million ante. Still, that amounted to 61 percent of every dollar from all room taxes anywhere in Imperial Beach. The revenue stream to the city from the tax more than doubled — from $209,172 to $542,460 — from 2013, the year before the new resort opened.