Carbon County is looking to make slight changes to its hotel room rental excise tax ordinance to follow a new state law.

Last week, the commissioners voted 2-0 to advertise the proposed ordinance.Commissioner William O'Gurek abstained from the vote due to his employment with the Times News.County solicitor Daniel Miscavige said that the purpose of the new ordinance is to be consistent with Act 18 that was recently adopted in the state.The act gives counties the authority to raise the hotel tax from 3 to 5 percent, but Carbon County has opted to retain the 3 percent tax.It also makes changes to administrative fees, penalties for late filings, definitions and other minor details related to the excise tax.Carbon County has been collecting the hotel room excise tax since February 2007.The tax is on every hotel room rented in the county, including motels, bed-and-breakfasts and resorts.But as the years went by and the Internet gained popularity, additional types of vacation accommodations have sprung up, including homeowners privately renting out second homes and Airbnb.Last year, Carbon and the Pocono Mountain Visitors Bureau identified over 300 additional properties that were not registered but met the criteria for the 3 percent tax.County Treasurer Ron Sheehan said that at that time, they registered about 130 additional properties, which increased the hotel tax revenue by about $120,000."We know there are more out there and we're are trying to locate them," he said, adding that Airbnb is slowly coming around after a number of counties, namely Butler, has been in negotiations with them on collecting the tax.The money collected from the hotel excise tax is split among Carbon County for improvements to Mauch Chunk Lake Park, Pocono Mountain Visitors Bureau for administration fees and nonprofit organizations in the county through the hotel tax grant.To date, Carbon County has distributed approximately $823,000 to nonprofits for promoting tourism from the tax collected on visitor stays in the county.