Sales tax revenues decline

August St. Mary Parish Sales and Use Tax collections mark the fourth straight month of declining collections compared to 2013, according to the parish’s latest report.
Parish 4 percent sales and use tax collections were down by 8.2 percent in August, excluding audits, from August 2013, the report stated.
Collections totaled $3,518,000 for August, excluding audits, compared to $3,832,000 for August 2013. The parish collected $39,000 in August for audits, an increase from the no money collected during the same month in 2013, the report stated. July sales tax collections had dropped 0.3 percent from July 2013 without audit collections.
As of the end of August, year-to-date collections totaled $30,401,000, down slightly from the $30,720,000 collected during the same period in 2013.
Jeffrey LaGrange, parish Sales and Use Tax Department director, said in an email, “I’m sort of puzzled by what the numbers show.” Due to the activity in the parish’s industrial sector, LaGrange is inclined to believe that the economy is in great shape, he said.
“However, lots of that activity is tax exempt as in new shipbuilders and goods shipped offshore,” LaGrange said. Although the support of that activity is taxable and reflected in the sales tax collection, the parish’s retail numbers remain flat across the board, he said. Those flat retail numbers tell LaGrange that the parish is not spending on big ticket items, but instead only keeping pace with inflation, he said.
Hotel-motel tax collections were up 6.9 percent compared to 2013. In August, the parish collected $66,478.49 for the hotel-motel tax, an increase over the $62,181.18 collected in August 2013, according to the report.
In July, hotel tax collections dropped 7.1 percent after having dipped by 15 percent in June.
Morgan City’s 0.3 percent road tax yielded $81,830.05 in August bringing the year-to-date total collected for road work to $697,003.12. Morgan City regular 0.3 percent sales tax came in at $81,877.46 for August with collections for the first eight months of the year totaling $692,422.03.
The following occupational license fees were collected in August: St. Mary Parish, $2,554; City of Morgan City $464.66, $292; Town of Berwick, $0; Town of Baldwin, $1,095; and City of Franklin, $209.