Sales Tax Collections Down for 2016

BY MELANIE BUCK –

Sales tax collections for 2016 are down more than $23,000 for the year compared to the same period from the previous year. In 2016, $1,456,749.76 was collected, down $23,480.79 from 2015, causing a 1.6% decrease in collections. The same numbers apply to the Road Improvement Sales Tax collections as well, with each being a 1-cent tax.

The first quarter of 2016 showed promising increases over 2015, however, six of the last eight months of the year had deficits, causing the decrease. February showed the largest amount of collections for the year with $132,108.05 being collected for both Sales Tax General and Road Improvement Tax. April showed the largest increase from the prior year at $129,904.98, $7,440.44 more than April 2015. March had the lowest collections of the year at $109,964.76 and June showed the largest decrease at $111,252.22, $13,933.67 less than June 2015.

This is the first decrease in collections following a four to five year trend of slight growth. County Judge Brandon Ellison explained that in 2010, 2011, 2012, and 2013, all saw slight decreases from the year before, with the increases coming back in 2014. Each year, whether an increase or decrease, has been less than a 2% difference, and none have been catastrophic to the county’s budget. Nonetheless, collections seem to remain “flat,” as Ellison put it. “I think internet sales have something to do with it. It hurts local businesses and rural counties because we don’t have the services that are available online. Delivery trucks and 18-wheeler traffic bringing things in have tripled in the last few years. It’s a little discouraging that our taxes aren’t growing like they should, especially with the increased traffic.”

Ellison is hopeful that new legislation will help balance sales tax decreases in the future. “There is legislation sitting at the federal level waiting for a marketplace fairness act that will basically make internet sales pay sales taxes to the states. It has to be done at the federal level; it can’t be done at the state level. That would be one thing that I’m hopeful for, that they would start looking at a sales tax to be remitted to local governments through internet sales.”

Ellison also explained that of the one-cent Sales Tax General and one-cent Road Improvement Tax, the county only gets 57% of the collections. The rest is distributed to towns and cities throughout the county. “It’s a county/city tax. The county is the only one limited to what we can spend the funds on. The county’s portion of the Road Improvement Tax can only be spent on roads. The rest is for general purposes,” said Ellison. Each city and town receiving the tax can use any of it for general purposes.

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Jeri Pearson

Jeri is the News Director for Pulse Multi-Media and Editor of The Polk County Pulse. She has 10 years of experience in community focused journalism and has won multiple press association awards.

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