Although local voters shot down a proposed sales tax hike, they overwhelmingly decided to continue assessing a 4% tax on lodging in Park County.

Out of nearly 16,800 votes cast, 11,560 area residents, or nearly 72% of the electorate, voted to re-up the county’s tax for another four years; only 28.1% of voters said no.

A small portion of the proceeds from the tax, $1 out of every $10, goes to support local governments, but the rest goes toward promoting the area as a tourist destination, funding the Park County Travel Council.

The council’s executive director, Claudia Wade, described herself as “thrilled” with the results.

“I think it shows that our Park County voters are in tune and recognize the importance of tourism in Park County and the role it plays in our economy,” Wade said on Wednesday.

Had the tax failed, the travel council’s funding would have been halved, dropping to 2%.

“I think it would have been devastating,” Wade said. “As we try to recover from this pandemic, and people start moving around the country, if we did not have dollars out there promoting Park County, and [the] Yellowstone area, the competition’s going to be pretty stiff. So now we’ll be able to compete.”

The lodging tax has historically proven popular — it picked up nearly 81% of the vote in 2016 — but there was a new wrinkle this year. That’s because lawmakers decided earlier this year that they would begin assessing a 5% tax on all lodging across the state, with 3% going to fund the Wyoming Office of Tourism and 2% going to local organizations like the Park County Travel Council. With their vote on Tuesday, local voters effectively decided to impose another 2% tax on top of the state’s 5%, bringing the total lodging tax on county hotels, motels and short-term rentals to 7%. That’s assessed on top of sales tax, for a total tax rate of 11%.

In the fiscal year that ran from July 2019 to June 2020, Park County’s 4% lodging tax brought in more than $3.05 million, with $305,500 sent to local governments and $2.75 million going to the travel council.

Wade said she expects the local tourism industry to be in “recovery mode” in 2021, after COVID-19 battered what was expected to be a strong year.

While visits to Yellowstone National Park rebounded to high levels after a delayed opening, stays at local hotels and motels and visits to local attractions like the Buffalo Bill Center of the West sagged over the summer. Through August, the county’s lodging tax collections were about half of what they were through the same point in 2019 ($776,000 versus $1.45 million). Similarly, visits to the Center of the West in the first eight months of the year were down by more than 43% (from 119,649 admissions to 67,576).

Wade said many people came in campers and RVs and opted to buy their own groceries and cook on their own.

“I think they were still spending money, but many of them were not eating in restaurants,” she said.

Almost no tour buses visited Yellowstone amid the COVID-19 pandemic and whether they return in 2021 will have a big impact on Park County; Wade said the motorcoaches play “a critical role” in driving business to local restaurants, lodging properties and attractions.

In its recent annual report, the travel council called the outlook “positive” for 2021 and beyond.

“If 2020 was the year potential travelers dreamed of coming to Cody Yellowstone,” the council wrote, “2021 will hopefully be the year those dreams come true.”