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Contractor Registration Bill makes its way to Legislature

CAROLYN BOSTICK | Hagadone News Network | UPDATED 3 weeks, 3 days AGO
by CAROLYN BOSTICK
Carolyn Bostick has worked for the Coeur d’Alene Press since June 2023. She covers Shoshone County and Coeur d'Alene. Carolyn previously worked in Utica, New York at the Observer-Dispatch for almost seven years before briefly working at The Inquirer and Mirror in Nantucket, Massachusetts. Since she moved to the Pacific Northwest from upstate New York in 2021, she's performed with the Spokane Shakespeare Society for three summers. | March 4, 2026 1:00 AM

At least $5 million in losses were reported to the Division of Occupational and Professional Licenses in calendar year 2025, according to DOPL records, with consumers filing complaints against contractors. 

Ken Burgess, lobbyist for the Idaho Home Builders Association, said the new Contractor Registration Bill is going before the House Business Committee, chaired by Rep. Jordan Redman, R-Coeur d’Alene.   

“Our main goal is to provide for the contractor registration board some authority to be able to deal effectively with ‘bad actors,’ those folks who are going around, ripping people off, taking big chunks of money that they’re never returning,” Burgess said. 

Burgess is hoping this batch of legislation is more successful than previous attempts.

“The contractor registration board is kind of at their wits’ end in their ability to be able to do anything to those people,” Burgess said.  

The Idaho Home Builders Association is attempting to require additional information on Idaho’s Contractor registration application, so the Contractor Board can more easily track contractors with complaints against them.

The changes stem from the need for consumer protection against an increasingly common problem, and they will allow the Home Builder Associations to police individuals who take advantage of Idaho’s system and give contractors a bad name.

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