Coeur d'Alene seeks state law change to tap visitor tax revenue
Coeur d'Alene wants a law change so visitors, not property owners, help cover tourism costs as Kootenai County weighs budget pressure.
Coeur d'Alene's 10,000-resident cutoff still blocks the city from asking voters for a local visitor tax, even as tourism generated $11 million in Kootenai County tax revenue in 2024. City leaders want Idaho lawmakers to change Sections 50-1044 and 50-1046 so the lakefront city can tap the same resort-city tax tools already available to smaller communities.
Idaho's travel and convention tax already reaches occupants of hotel and motel rooms for stays of 30 days or less, vacation-home rentals and overnight stays at private campgrounds. The resort-city option goes further, allowing qualifying cities to ask voters for local-option nonproperty taxes on lodging, alcohol sold by the drink and some transactions already subject to state sales tax. Coeur d'Alene cannot use that tool because the law limits the option to cities with fewer than 10,000 residents.
Coeur d'Alene has been considering a property-tax increase to cover a budget shortfall, and its current property-tax rate is $2.57 per $1,000 of taxable assessed value, generating nearly $27.32 million in revenue. If state lawmakers open the resort-city statute, the burden would shift at least in part from local property owners to the visitors filling downtown hotels, vacation rentals and campgrounds.
Coeur d'Alene's summer 2025 tourism surge was record-setting and put strain on streets, parking, public safety and other city services. Kootenai County's property-tax rates have stayed below those of other large Idaho counties in recent years.
In 1995, the Association of Idaho Cities planned to ask the Legislature to expand the law allowing resort cities to impose local-option taxes to offset tourism impacts. Four years later, the Coeur d'Alene-Post Falls Visitor and Convention Bureau was weighing a 1% hotel-motel tax increase that could have brought in more than $200,000 a year for tourism promotion in Kootenai County.
Senate Bill 1403 took effect July 1, 2024 and revised Idaho Code 67-6526 on areas of impact.
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