At first glance, the lodging tax statement tucked into the county board packet didn’t look like it could be right for August. It looked like lodging was down for the month, but if you lived here, you would know that wasn’t possible unless visitors mostly decided to camp or find a cave to sleep in and not stay in hotels/motels, which were full the entire month.
So why did the numbers appear to be down?
Auditor/ Treasurer Braidy Powers explained, “They weren’t really down. In the apples-to-apples category, they were up. Not all of the businesses filed their reports on time. They might have been too busy. Some businesses pay annually, some quarterly and some monthly. When we look at straight cash, when we look at people who filed on time, instead of the Gunflint Trail being down, they were up .8 percent. Grand Marais lodging was up three percent, and the Lutsen Tofte Tourism Association was up 2.8 percent.”
So what is reported below is what was sent in, not the actual business that took place. As noted above, business was booming throughout the county all of August.
Lodging taxes paid through August 2017 for the Gunflint Trail are down 10.8 percent over last year, with 2017 collections of $21,282.67 less than the August 2016 collections of $28,155.36.
Taxes collected for Grand Marais were also down from $53,694.89 in 2016 versus $$44,842.52 received in 2017.
The Lutsen/Tofte Tourism Association was also down year-to-date, with August proceeds of $114,701.53 versus 2016 August collections of $118,631.11.
Through the first eight months of the year, the county had taken in $775,225.58, which is up 2.5 percent over last year for the same period. Remember, some business owners were too busy to file their reports on time, which was reflected in the lodging tax report.
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