Bar Harbor's hope for 'local options' sales tax fails in Maine legislature again
BAR HARBOR, June 22, 2025 - The latest bid for a “local options” tax so that tourist towns may exact a small percentage of the Goliathan sales tax revenue they send to the state appears to have failed again.
That would make it the 85th time in Maine such a tax has been rejected, according to information provided by former state rep Jill Goldthwait at a public meeting last year.
This time, a bill sponsored by newly elected State Rep. Gary Friedmann, “An Act to Authorize a Local Option Sales Tax on Short-term Lodging to Fund Municipalities and Affordable Housing,” was voted down by both the Maine House and Senate this week, according to the state legislature website.
On Tuesday, a state rep from Lewiston, Kristin Cloutier, was rejected when she moved that the bill LD746 “Ought to Pass as Amended.” That was followed by a House vote where it was rejected 77-70.
In the Senate on Wednesday, Ellsworth Senator Nicole Grohoski also attempted a
Motion to accept the “Ought to Pass as Amended Report” which also failed. The Senate then voted 26-7 against the bill, rendering it dead.
Friedmann’s plan called for a 2 percent tax on short-term lodgings. He proposed that 90 percent would go back to the city or town where it was collected and 10 percent would go to the state’s Maine Housing Authority “for sole use of the rural affordable rental housing program; and the lesser of the actual cost to the assessor of administering this section.”
He received widespread local support for his bill, but citizen petitioner Charles Sidman, who has been battling the town over a number of issues, chided supporters as being naive and not addressing the town’s overspending as the real problem.
“I do NOT oppose Gary Friedmann’s bill for a local option lodging tax, having written earlier that it ‘would be great’ and clearly to Bar Harbor’s benefit if Augusta were willing to enact it,” Sidman wrote in a letter in the Islander on April 7.
“However, I also cannot support the effort, considering it naïve, presumptuous, inequitable and a continuing distraction and excuse for not addressing our fundamental problems of uncontrolled municipal spending and living beyond our means. So go for it, Gary, but please let’s be real, folks!”
Friedmann, asked for his comment, stated in an email: “No bill becomes law without a team effort. It must gain the support of the committee of jurisdiction, then be shepherded by leadership through the House and Senate, with the blessing of the Governor.
“I am encouraged that the local option lodging tax is gaining support. I have learned a lot over the last six months -- enough to know how to work with legislators on both sides of the aisle to make it across the finish line in the next Biennium.”
Friedmann did not come away empty handed in the 132nd Maine Legislature. A bill he sponsored, LD633, “An Act Concerning the Restoration of Electricity During Emergencies for Certain Medically Vulnerable Individuals Who Rely on Electronic Medical Apparatuses," was signed into law by Gov. Janet Mills on April 22.
That’s a big achievement for a freshman legislator.