Land Board freezes cottage site rents

Idaho’s top elected officials have agreed to freeze the rents they charge cabin owners on state lands for the next year. The narrow, 3-2 vote brought sighs of relief from cabin owners who crowded into the old courtroom where the state Land Board meets, some of whom had traveled from Spokane. The vote averts a 15 percent rent hike that the board had tentatively approved in June for 2009. The Land Board also voted to set a June 15 deadline to come up with a new system for setting rents for state-owned cottage sites at Priest Lake and Payette Lake, with members agreeing with leaseholders that the current system isn’t working. “It is a disaster in North Idaho - the real estate market has crumbled,” Chuck Lempesis, attorney for the Priest Lake State Lessee Association. You can read my full story here at spokesman.com.