A state review board says Walker County’s handling of hotel-motel tax funds connected to the McLemore golf resort shows gaps in transparency and documentation—though investigators found no direct violations of Georgia law.
The Georgia Hotel-Motel Tax Performance Review Board released a preliminary report Thursday outlining an investigation into complaints that county officials used tourism tax revenue to benefit the private resort on Lookout Mountain.
According to the Georgia Department of Community Affairs, which prepared the report, Walker County and the Walker County Chamber of Commerce generally followed the state’s hotel-motel tax framework. However, investigators said the county failed to provide enough detail to verify that restricted funds were spent solely on tourism-related purposes.
One payment, an $18,967 “administrative fee” made to McLemore in October 2024, was not reported as either a tourism or development expense in the county’s annual filings. The report also cited invoices that lacked itemized descriptions, making it unclear whether reimbursements met the legal definition of “tourism product development.”
Investigators questioned whether McLemore’s facilities meet public access requirements for tourism-funded projects, noting that the golf course and resort amenities appear to be limited mainly to overnight guests and members, with only restricted public access.
While the report said Walker County properly adopted its hotel-motel tax ordinance and budget plans, it urged the county and the chamber to improve recordkeeping and provide more detailed reporting on how tax dollars are used. It also noted that the chamber has not conducted independent audits of hotel-motel tax spending over the past three fiscal years.
State staff further concluded that some restricted funds appear to have been used to reimburse McLemore for routine operating costs, rather than for eligible tourism development or marketing activities. Investigators said they found no statutory basis for using tax proceeds in that manner.
The preliminary findings will be reviewed by the Hotel-Motel Tax Performance Review Board before a final report is issued.
(Story first reported by WTVC-TV.)