Check out of a hotel in some popular American destinations in 2026 and you may see a new charge on your bill. From Chicago to Hawaii and Colorado, visitor taxes on hotel rooms and vacation rentals are climbing so tourists, not only residents, help pay for crowded roads, strained services and, in some places, the climate damage tied to all that travel.
Chicago is the clearest example on the economic side. City leaders are moving to raise the tax on downtown hotel rooms from 17.5% to 19%, which would be the highest major-city hotel tax in the country and is expected to generate roughly $40 million a year. The money would more than double the marketing budget for Choose Chicago, the tourism agency, in what one alderperson has called an “arms race” with rival convention cities.
Those dollars are locked into marketing and bid fees, not parks or transit, so critics say higher taxes without clear environmental benefits simply push the city to chase more visitors while its infrastructure struggles to keep up.
Hawaii is reshaping its hotel tax with the environment at center stage. Under Act 96, signed in 2025, the state transient accommodations tax on hotels and vacation rentals rises by three quarters of a percentage point to 11% in 2026, and for the first time cruise ship cabins that spend nights in Hawaiian ports are charged at the same rate. Officials estimate that the new “Green Fee” will bring in about $100 million a year.
Here the destination for that money is unusually clear. The law directs the Green Fee to climate adaptation, natural resource stewardship and what the state calls sustainable tourism, including beach restoration, wildfire prevention and stronger infrastructure after disasters like the Maui fires. Governor Josh Green says Hawaii cannot wait for the next disaster and that visitors who enjoy the islands share some responsibility for that work. Cruise lines have pushed back, suing over the extension of the fee to ships and winning a temporary injunction on collecting it from cruises.
A quieter shift is under way elsewhere. In Colorado’s Eagle County, voters approved doubling the local lodging tax from 2% to 4% beginning in 2026. Saratoga County in New York plans to lift its hotel occupancy tax from 1% to 3%, while counties in California such as San Mateo and parts of San Diego are nudging up their transient occupancy taxes to help pay for infrastructure and homelessness services.
Michigan lawmakers are backing a proposal that would let cities and towns add up to 3% on top of existing lodging charges if local voters agree, saying short-term rental tourists bring “very real costs” for roads and emergency services. In Florida, debates over how counties may spend the long-standing tourist development tax pit tourism bureaus against legislators who want more money for housing, transportation and property tax relief.
For travelers, these moves show up as a slightly higher total at checkout, a few dollars more on a family beach trip or that long-postponed city break. The environmental effect is harder to see from the hotel lobby. In places like Hawaii, extra charges are meant to pay for dune restoration, wildfire prevention and shoreline protection that might otherwise fall on local taxpayers, while in mountain and lake regions higher lodging taxes can channel visitor money toward trails, buses and emergency response.
The catch is that not every new tourist tax is automatically green. Some are tightly earmarked for climate resilience and ecosystem care, while others mostly boost marketing budgets or plug general budget gaps, so it is worth asking, what is that line labeled “tax” really funding. The answer will decide whether this wave of tourism taxes becomes a genuine climate tool or simply one more quiet surcharge on the hotel bill.
The official press release was published by the Office of the Governor of Hawaiʻi.
