Vote to renew Whitefish resort tax

Whitefish’s resort tax – a 3% sales tax on tourism-industry goods and services – is the tax every local should love. First of all, 25% of resort tax revenues are used to offset local property taxes, which, given the current real estate market, should excite property owners and renters alike.

Second, the tax allows the community to capture value from the tourism industry and keep it local. By targeting tourism industry sales such as hotels, the tax generates income from visitors – without it, infrastructure improvements currently funded by the resort tax would probably be financed by local taxpayers or not at all.

If we do not reinstate the resort tax, the relationship will effectively be reversed: taxes on Whitefish locals will be necessary to pay for visitors’ impacts on local infrastructure. Improving and investing in infrastructure including streets, bike paths, and trails with resort tax revenues is not only a matter of maintaining the infrastructure itself, it is also vital to maintaining our town’s tourism economy.

Well-kept local facilities keep visitors coming back and leave them with a positive impression of our town. While tourism comes with certain annoyances that we all know well, we can’t deny that incoming money from visitors is critical to Whitefish’s local economy. So let’s tax the tourists! Vote Nov. 2 to keep the resort tax.

Grete Gansauer, Whitefish