The Whitefish Sustainable Tourism Management Plan committee hosted a town hall on tourism and the local economy last week. About 25 members of the public attended. 

Committee Chair Matt Gebo said the Sustainable Tourism Management Plan is built around three key pillars: community character, livability and community engagement.  

The city initiated the plan in 2018 to find ways to manage growth and tourism in the area. Gebo said the timing allowed Whitefish to be “ahead of the curve” in finding solutions for managing tourism. 

“We do our best to manage it in smart and very thoughtful ways,” Gebo said. “We don’t have a budget; we don’t have a council member who sits on our committee. This is 100% citizen-run.” 

Explore Whitefish Executive Director Zak Anderson spoke about recent tourism trends, data and economic insights from the summer season. He said visitor spending in the Flathead remains strong. Although Canadian and international visitors stayed home, domestic travel contributed to a net increase in visitor spending. 

Anderson said in 2024, 3.2 million visitors spent an estimated $458 million in local gateway communities. He said a majority of Whitefish’s summer travelers came to see Glacier Park.  

Visits to Glacier National Park are up, with 2.4 million visitors as of August. 

Lodging occupancy - what Anderson called “the heartbeat for visitation in town” - is below the national average, or about 65%, for eight months each year. 

“On average, 58 cents of every dollar spent in Whitefish is spent by a visitor,” Anderson said. “So that means it’s about 60% of all spending.” 

Visitors spend money on food, beverage, lodging, transportation, guide services and retail. Anderson estimated that $4 million of the resort tax collections came from visitors.  

“Preliminary travel and lodging data suggests a softening of the market, influenced by the government shutdown and inflationary pressures,” he said. “As unique as we are, we are not the only mountain town and we are in competition with other communities, especially for those visitor dollars in the off seasons.” 

He said it was too early to make a prediction about the winter season. 

Gebo, the director of sales and marketing for Whitefish Mountain Resort, noted that the dramatic growth in Whitefish, about 19% from 2020-2024, can make locals wary of crowdedness and increased traffic. 

He reviewed the wet summer on the mountain. Mountain biking and zip lining were great, and the alpine slide was closed for about 20 days due to the rain. Lodging on the hill was stronger than last summer. Gebo said they are trying to offer more activities for families. 

“We have actually seen some really strong season pass sales this year,” he said, transitioning to winter data. “We have seen a 6% uptick in season pass sales so far.” 

He said there are encouraging staffing levels at the resort for the winter.  

“We filled a lot of roles with folks from the local community,” Gebo said. “We have raised our wages across the resort.” 

He said wages were raised across the entire company because “it has become more challenging, economically, for people to live in this community” and to afford the basic necessities. 

Daniel Sidder, executive director of Housing Whitefish, said the Whitefish workforce rental assistance program was launched in March 2024 and it has served 89 households, or 164 individuals, to date. 

“I think we’re actually serving close to around 20% of all households that would be eligible for our program,” Sidder said. 

To be eligible, an applicant must earn less than 100% median income, which is $67,000, pay more than 30% of their income on rent, work full time, 32 hours/week, and live in the 59937 zip code. 

“Whitefish is the least affordable community in the fastest growing county in the least affordable state in the country,” Sidder said. “That’s not my data; that’s the Association of Realtors and Census data.” 

He added that rents across the country peaked in 2023 and have started to stabilize. 

Whitefish’s short-term rental specialist Codi Evenson reported there are about 400 licensed units in town. She said they have met all the requirements, and she is looking for other units that are not licensed. 

“We are now almost approaching 90% compliance within the city limits of Whitefish,” Evenson said. “I think that’s a huge feat.” 

She said about a quarter of short-term rental owners are locals. She added that owners of non-compliant units are not trying to be underhanded; they just need education on the regulations.