Otter gets $54K to live at home

Idaho is one of just six states with no governor’s mansion, and a state committee decided Monday to continue paying a $4,500-a-month housing stipend to the governor until that changes.

Idaho’s last experience with a governor’s mansion was a roller-coaster ride of unfulfilled hopes and ballooning expenses. The family of the late J.R. Simplot donated his landmark hilltop mansion to the state for use as a new governor’s mansion in 2004. But no governor ever moved in. First, it needed extensive renovations; then, once it was ready, current Gov. Butch Otter, who is Simplot’s ex-son-in-law, declined to live there, staying instead at his ranch in Star.

Eventually, with maintenance costs for the vast lawns of the hilltop home rapidly depleting the state’s mansion fund, the donated home was returned to the Simplot family in 2013. It was demolished in January/ Betsy Russell , SR. More here .