Chicago Trying To Raise Hotel Tax To Highest In America To Boost Tourism

If you had to read that headline 5 times, same.

Specifics in city/state governments can get confusing but nope not this situation in Chicago. This is as counter-intuitive as it gets.

According to the Chicago Sun-Times, the city of Chicago is considering raising their hotel tax to 19% from it's current 17.5%.

A 19% hotel tax would put Chicago at the highest hotel tax in the nation. And why, you ask?

It would generate $40 million in new revenue that would be used to attract conventions, doubling the marketing budget for Choose Chicago, the convention and tourism agency.

As far as money goes for convention operating budgets across major U.S. cities, Chicago's is dead last at $33 million a year (compare that to the $457 million Las Vegas has).

Choose Chicago President and CEO Kristen Reynolds said secondary markets, like New Orleans and Nashville, are building bigger and better convention centers and are using incentives to portray Chicago as unsafe:

They're saying, 'Chicago [has] got problems. Don't go there.' They're sponsoring transportation. We don't have those dollars. This would really allow us to compete.

If you're confused by this whole situation, let me spell it out:

Chicago wants to raise their hotel tax (meaning raising the cost for conventions using hotels with 100 or more rooms) in an attempt to attract conventions and tourism. So for hotel taxes, it would actually cost conventions more to host an event in Chicago than anywhere else in the country.

The hotels impacted would include ones within the Greater Central Business District.

The public hearing on the tax must precede a Council vote on it. If it's approved, it could be in place as soon as late spring.