Route County commissioners on July 28 discussed whether to place a new county lodging tax on a future ballot to help fund public infrastructure, public safety and destination-management activities, while preserving a 10% carve-out for tourism-related programs. Commissioners and staff described the proposal as early-stage and agreed to keep options open while meeting statutory notice and ballot-language deadlines.

The conversation centered on how the tax could be used, revenue estimates and the process and timeline required to go to voters. County staff provided an estimate that a 1% county lodging tax would generate roughly $110,000 annually in unincorporated Route County and cited a lodging inventory of 39 facilities with about 245 units in unincorporated areas. The county noted that if a municipality within the county enacts its own lodging tax for its jurisdiction, the county could not simultaneously collect a lodging tax in that municipality’s boundaries.

Commissioners emphasized outreach before any ballot decision. Staff said the county must notify the state Department of Revenue this month to preserve the option of a November ballot and noted the final ballot language would need to be completed well before the county’s September 5 internal deadline for draft language (one commissioner noted a personal deadline of Sept. 2). The group also discussed statutory requirements: a special fund or restricted accounting for lodging-tax proceeds, publishing the proposal in the official newspaper, and that the election would be a TABOR vote (a voter-approval tax question) to be held at the next regular general election if pursued.

On permitted uses, staff explained current statute allows affordable housing and child care as prior uses and now explicitly lists public infrastructure maintenance or improvement, enhanced public-safety measures and other public-purpose items while preserving a 10% allocation for tourism advertising/marketing (which some county members described as potentially including destination management rather than only marketing). The county also discussed governance rules tied to the 10% tourism carve-out, including formation of a review panel (statute requires a panel that includes tourism-industry representatives and at least three citizens) and that the panel typically recommends how the tourism allocation is spent.

No formal motion was made at the July 28 meeting. Staff reported a placeholder notice had already been provided to county staff to keep the option open and recommended continued stakeholder outreach with lodging operators, municipalities and other partners before any formal ballot placement.

If the county advances a ballot proposal and voters approve it, county staff said the election costs would be reimbursed from the new lodging-tax fund; if not approved, the county would cover the election costs. Commissioners asked staff to compile comparative data from peer Colorado counties (for example, Eagle and Summit counties) and to coordinate outreach to local lodging operators and CAST (Colorado Association of Ski Towns) for benchmarking. The board agreed to keep the topic on future Monday agendas and to coordinate a targeted stakeholder invitation in roughly two weeks.

Ending: The commission left the option open and directed staff to preserve statutory deadlines and to begin targeted outreach; no final decision to place a lodging-tax measure before voters was made on July 28.