Sales tax hike benefits spelled out

Some local residents who are helping to educate the public on the request for a sales tax increase for county schools were themselves educated last week.
About 25 people were present for that meeting, during which Dr. Jennifer Garrison, superintendent of the Vandalia School District, talked about the use of additional sales tax revenue and the benefit to residents to approve the tax hike.
In April, county residents will decide whether to add 1 percent to the local sales tax in each of their communities, with the revenue to go to school districts in the county.
Throughout the meeting, a couple of points came up several times:
• The additional sales tax revenue can be used to abate taxes. In fact, as a good faith effort, the Vandalia School Board approved a lower levy this year, to show that the district is serious about lowering property taxes.
• People from outside Fayette County and its communities will helping to generate the additional sales tax revenue.
“With the revenue we generate, 50 percent of the revenue from the sales tax would go toward (paying off) existing bonds,” Garrison said.
In the next decade, she said, the district has about $1.5 million in bond payments.
“The common question I get is, the bus wreck; the bus wreck. We are no longer paying on the bus wreck,” Garrison said.
The bonds have accumulated in the past 10 years “due to the state budget crisis,” she said. “The crisis lasted about eight years, and schools were cut up to 11 percent of General State Aid.
“A lot of that was basic operational money,” Garrison said, adding that some of the bond revenue has been used for capitol development projects, such as the heating and air-conditioning project at the high school.
“This money can be used to abate taxes and for capital improvement projects. It cannot be used for salaries and pensions,” Garrison said.
“That’s probably the most common question I’m getting,” she said. “This revenue cannot go to salaries.”
Garrison said that if the sales tax increase is approved, the district will abate taxes to the tune of $135 for a $150,000 home having an assessed valuation of $50,000.
For the $135 in property taxes that that homeowner would not be paying, “You would need to spend $13,500 on taxable items,” Garrison said.
Joe Lawson, a member of the Vandalia School Board, asked Garrison to list the things that are not taxed.
They include:
• Autos, trucks, all-terrain vehicles.
• Boats and recreational vehicles.
• Mobile homes.
• Unprepared food.
• Drugs, including over-the-counter items and vitamins.
• Farm equipment and parts.
• Farm inputs.
Also, services are not taxed.
One of the issues that the community will need to be educated on is the wording that will appear on the ballot.
That wording is, “Shall a retailer’s occupation tax and a service occupation tax (commonly referred to as a “Sales Tax’) be imposed in Fayette County at a rate of 1 percent to be used exclusively for school facility purposes?”
“The word service is on the ballot, but services are not taxed,” Garrison said.
She gave an example on what is being taxed and what is not.
“If you buy a rotisserie chicken (prepared at a local business), that’s taxed,” Garrison said. “If you go buy a fresh chicken and cook it yourself, it’s not taxed.”
She said that whether anyone here notices it, they are paying that sales tax amount in other towns when, for example, they go to a fast food restaurant.
“In Greenville, you’re paying a penny on that drink, you’re paying it in Pana,” Garrison said.
The sales tax increase, Doug Knebel said, “will give us property tax relief, and this is going to be funded by people outside our districts.
“That’s going to benefit Ramsey, Brownstown, St. Elmo in a way that our property taxes don’t,” he said.
Lorin Kirk put that in simpler terms – “We can either get help paying for it or we can pay for it ourselves.”
Garrison said, “The voters truly have a choice (in helping to fund their schools) – property tax versus sales tax.”
Matt Hall, president of the school board, noted that throughout the year, Vandalia hosts a lot of sporting events, such as the Vandalia Holiday Tournament and summer camps, that bring in a lot of people from outside of Fayette County “who will help support this, while the community is getting a discount on their property taxes.”