Coeur d’Alene, Hayden, Post Falls, and Rathdrum Chambers of Commerce
Thursday, January 11, 2024, 11:00 a.m.
Call to Order and Introductions
Present: Christa Hazel, Dean Haagenson, Luke Russel, Kiki Miller, Mike Bullard, Lauren Benedict, Katie Rose Hargreaves, Christina Petite. Present by Zoom: Doug Elliot, Nick Swayne, Nikki Swanye, Marc Kilmer, Caleb Davis, Caiti Bobbitt, Griffen Dietrich, Sandy Patano, Ashley Cameron, Damon Darakjy, Doug, Nicki Swayne, Mark Kilmer.
Federal Update: given by Mark Kilmer from Senator Risch’s office, national issues.
Local Update: Kiki Miller from CdA City Council reported on impact fees being raised, housing efforts, growth issues, and Housing Solution Partnership.
Report on State of the State:
Christa Hazel of North Idaho Republicans reported on the Governor’s State of the State address, mentioning positive initiatives she believes are important for business including Idaho Launch and response to the Fentanyl crisis. Christa Hazel emphasized new rules for the Republican Caucus on March 2: Registered Republicans must have their individual mailed postcards and must be physically present to participate. Venue to be announced. Watch the website. Sandy Patano mentioned the Capital Letters Newsletter with Highlights, Published for free by Idaho Statesman at:
Another useful resource is the free newsletter by Idaho Capital Sun.
Other items:
We agreed to host a State of the County event on May 10. Kristina will take the lead on the venue and details. Legislative priorities of the chamber will be sent out before the next meeting so we can prepare questions for County leaders.
We hope to reestablish bimonthly calls with our legislators during upcoming meetings.
The CdA Chamber reported that, as part of its revitalization, it is going to set up its own Public Policy Committee which will liaise with the Joint Public Policy Committee and work together on most things.
The League of Women Voters is hosting a free public educational event on open primaries/alternative voting methods, to be held at two locations on Sunday, February 18. One will be at the Post Falls Library from noon to 2 PM and at the CdA Library from 3 to 5 PM. Speakers will include Luke Mayfield from Reclaim Idaho. The League will provide a digital flier and other info so the Chamber can help publicize.
2024 Planned Chamber Events:
January 16th Connect luncheon Glen Miles KNPO. Sign up online
February 1 Governor Little luncheon address and Q&A.
Adjourn 12:00 p.m.
The public is invited. Tables can be sponsored by members for $1000 hosted.
The primary mission of the Coeur d’Alene, Post Falls, Hayden, and Rathdrum Chambers of Commerce is to advocate for an environment that ensures the health and prosperity of our communities through strong and healthy businesses. Together, we advocate for tax policies and a regulatory environment that supports opportunities for growth, job creation, and profitability which strengthens the economic vitality of our communities and our region.
In addition, our Members were united in their concern that our Legislators work together to eliminate policies that unnecessarily restrict the free flow of commerce and industry which is vital to the creation and retention of jobs, ensuring continuing economic prosperity. Our joint Chambers advocate for the elimination of restrictions on the ability of employers and businesses to manage and regulate their businesses and their employees. The government should neither restrict nor mandate how business owners in Idaho operate their businesses.
We have established the following priorities for the 2023 Legislative Session and look forward to working with you on these issues.
Education and Workforce Development:
The Chambers fully support the recommendations of the Governor’s Taskforce on Higher Education that address the need to reduce costs & improve all educational pathways toward a meaningful career, from industry-based certifications to advanced degrees.
The Chambers continue to strongly support coordinated and focused efforts to better prepare our citizens for the State’s growing business workforce needs. These programs need to be oriented toward providing traditional students with career and technical education to prepare them for the workforce and also providing results-oriented pathways for more mature members of our workforce to upgrade their skills and stay current on the changing needs of employers. In addition to the four-year plus degrees provided by our universities, the Chambers fully support the continued funding and expansion of workforce development programs and continued increased emphasis on career and technical education, and skills certification within our schools and Community Colleges. We also support the expansion of apprenticeship programs. The Chambers support continued efforts regarding Reading Readiness initiatives and encourage pre-K funding exploration. We continue to support public schools, STEM education, mentorship initiatives, and career advisory programs.
Infrastructure: Roads, Bridges, Sewer, Water and Broadband:
We firmly believe that the State must explore and implement funding solutions that adequately address the pressing backlog of maintenance issues facing our State’s infrastructure. At the same time, we believe we must begin to fund new projects that are urgently required to address the continued growth that we are experiencing. In doing so we understand increased user fees as well as other new revenues must be addressed. We simply must invest more now or limit our ability to grow and negatively impact our State’s future prosperity.
Affordable Housing:
Communities throughout Idaho are experiencing a dramatic increase in rental rates and housing prices. This is impacting our ability to attract and retain employees, and is a growing concern for our businesses and directly impacts our efforts to foster economic development and job growth. Addressing this problem as demand for housing in our communities is impacted by growth and in-migration of those attracted by our State’s quality of life and personal freedoms is difficult. The existing programs operated by the Idaho Housing Finance Agency which provide below-market financing to first-time homebuyers should be expanded. Additionally, those IHFA and HUD programs that encourage and support the development of affordable multifamily rental housing should be fully funded and fully utilized. Additional programs that encourage partnerships with local non-profit housing providers and Community organizations to address the need for affordable housing should also be developed.
Tax Issues:
The Chambers continue to support a reduction in the tax burden on businesses in Idaho when fiscally responsible. Gradually lowering income tax rates and simplifying and reducing business personal property taxes will assist in the retention and expansion of existing businesses, as well as in the recruitment of new businesses.
Residential property taxes have skyrocketed and the property tax burden on residential properties has dramatically expanded, with roughly 70% of property tax collections now being paid by residential properties. Among the solutions the Legislature should consider are the following:
Replacing the current cap on the homeowner’s exemption with a formula that considers inflation.
Require those leasing public property to pay a lessee’s tax equal to the assessed property tax on the leased property.
Replace local property tax school “maintenance and operations” override levies with increased funding from state revenues.
Distribute internet sales taxes now held in a “Tax Relief Fund” to local governments and the State General Fund.
Reform Idaho’s impact fee law to make it truly fund the cost of growth including the cost of new schools, increased governmental operations including fire and police, and regional transportation improvements.
Remove the artificial property tax caps imposed by the passage of HB 389. This directly impacts our City’s ability to maintain infrastructure.
Our Chambers continue to support the passage of legislation granting local units of government authority to adopt local option taxes that are voter-approved for specifically defined local public improvement projects, with cost estimates, timelines, and sunset clauses. The ability to address local needs with local voter-approved tax revenues is critical to the continued growth and economic viability of our growing communities. The Chambers continue to support the use of the state’s Urban Renewal Law as an effective and flexible economic development tool that has proven essential in the expansion and improvement of public infrastructure, economic diversification, and the expansion of employment.
Healthcare:
As our state continues to see rapid population growth, access to health care remains a growing priority for Idahoans of all ages. The population boom of Kootenai County, combined with the labor shortage, is pushing the healthcare industry to quickly adapt to meet the needs of the community. We ask the state legislature to work with our healthcare communities to find solutions.
Telehealth is a mechanism to help the labor shortage and broaden access to care. The use of telehealth, specifically clinic-to-clinic telehealth, provides patients with access, convenience, and urgency to care. It also helps with the retention and recruitment of providers because it eases the workload and reduces burnout by lessening frequent travel to rural communities. As healthcare organizations look to expand their telehealth programs, they are running into barriers because the state has been slow to make necessary adaptions. We support the implementation of a state workgroup with qualified stakeholders from across the state to help grow and support these services.
Expand Nurse Education Funding and Continue to Support Graduate Medical Education (GME) Funding. The need for nurses and providers is ever-growing. One of the biggest barriers to expanding nursing school programs is not having enough faculty members to teach the students. More funding is needed to support these programs and increase faculty members’ wages to incentivize qualified and experienced nurses to become instructors.
Continue to support GME funding. The Kootenai Health Family Medicine program is proof that physicians practice where they are trained, with 25 of 36 of the program’s graduates now practicing in Idaho. Supporting and growing these programs throughout the state is essential to the future of health care in Idaho.
Behavioral Health resources of all ages are limited in northern Idaho. We ask for continued support and increased funding of the state’s Crisis Centers and explore ways to expand these centers to support our state’s youth. The need and demand for these services are only increasing year over year.
In 2018 Idaho voters approved Medicaid Expansion. With inflation and cost of living increases, we ask you to continue to support the will of the voters by providing affordable access to care for Idahoans.
Natural Resources:
Our Chambers continue to support policies that responsibly protect our environment and quality of life while supporting a business climate that nourishes economic growth. Sustainable management of our natural resources benefits both industry and the health of our public lands.
Both Mark and Caleb discussed the issue of funding the government coming up in October. One thing that could affect our members is access to SBA and USDA funds. If the government stalls the process of funding these agencies, this could put businesses in our area in a tough spot waiting for financing. Even if they agree to a budget, the funding for these agencies could be different than planned.
Mark said Senator Risch is also a co-sponsor of the Helper Act, which would provide affordable mortgages for first responders and teachers who are first-time home buyers. This act will provide mortgages with zero down payment and no monthly mortgage insurance.
Local updates:
Christina shared with the group there would be an ITD I-90 Widening Project Open House: 4-7 p.m. Jacklin Arts and Cultural Center October 5th
Also, on October 9th, a Regional Legislative Meet and Greet – was put on by IACI, hosted by Idaho Forest Group, Athol Mill 5400 ID-54 Athol ID.
Presentation:
Rocky Owens, Senior Director – LSCS, presented a plan to host all Idaho legislators for a North Idaho Tour in November 2024. It will be a three-day event that will allow local businesses to showcase their businesses to the lawmakers. This event is scheduled every other year after the election of our legislators. In the past, this has been a very well-attended event, and Rocky asked for volunteers to work on the organizing committee.
He also shared that Tom Green had been named Interim Director of Government Affairs for North Idaho College.
Open Discussion:
We discussed the upcoming Legislator Breakfast. We have five legislators committed, and it will be held October 20, 7-9 a.m. at the CDA Inn. We will continue to reach out to the rest of the group since we only have one who has indicated they won’t be attending. Cost is $35/person.
Other Upcoming Events:
Forum for City Council, School Boards, and hopefully Mayors put on by CDAPRESS virtually, Dates TBD
September 19th Idaho Public Television Event, 5:30-7:30 DeArmand Building, NIC
October 19th Beyond the Ballet Event by Secretary of State, 11 am Hagadone Event Center, Ticket price TBD
Our discussion on local issues focused on two items, school levies, and NIC accreditation.
School Levies will be voted on in Post Falls, Coeur d’Alene, and Rathdrum on March 14th. This can have a large impact on our chamber members. We all feel a strong school system is extremely important to the business community in a number of ways.
It was decided the four chambers would pull together to buy an ad in the CDA Press in support of all the levies in Kootenai County. We are also working on social marketing and speaking opportunities for our districts to spread the word and encourage people to VOTE YES for our schools.
The accreditation issue at NIC was also discussed in length with the suggestion of another informational forum regarding the facts around accreditation. In the end, we decided that while a forum would be helpful to the public and our members, it would be ineffective without the support of the NIC board.
State Update
While things are just getting going in Boise, there was some discussion regarding Senate Joint Resolution (SJR) 101 which… Proposes a state constitutional amendment to require an initiative petition to be signed by at least 6% of legal voters at the last general election in each legislative district.
A similar resolution was passed by the legislature in the past but was overturned by the Idaho Supreme Court as unconstitutional. This legislation takes it a step further by suggesting a change to the state constitution.
It’s still early in Washington, DC as well. We did discuss the debt ceiling and the request from our congressional delegation to add another federal judge to Idaho. The workload created by the pandemic has created quite a backlog, and we are in need of another judge.
Next Meeting: Thursday, February 13th, 11 am, Post Fall Chamber Boardroom
Key accomplishments of the Joint Chamber Public Policy Committee this past year.
A. We advocated for a reduced corporate income tax rate. The Idaho Legislature agreed. Our Business members will now enjoy a simplified and flattened corporate income tax rate of less than 6%. This will assist ALL of our Business members, both large and small.
B. We advocated for increased State spending for Education and the Idaho Legislature agreed, providing 400 million additional dollars into the State education system for our K-12 schools, and additional funding for our workforce training programs and our junior Colleges and Universities to better equip young Idahoans to be the employees of Today and the business leaders and entrepreneurs of tomorrow.
C. We advocated for increased State spending on our critical infrastructure (roads, bridges, water, sewer, and broadband), which is the foundation of our Business and Industrial growth. The Idaho Legislature agreed and allocated more dollars, including ARPA funds, to improve infrastructure investment.
D. We advocated for assistance to help communities deal with rising housing costs, making it difficult for our Business members to attract and retain employees. The Idaho Legislature agreed and allocated a portion of the ARPA funds toward workforce housing programs to assist Idaho companies and Communities in addressing this critical issue.
