Sales Tax, Take Two

An earlier edition of this column focused on the allure of the sales tax for cash-strapped counties. More specifically it pointed to Erie County, where the county legislature had approved a penny hike in the sales tax and then got approval for the increase by the state.

Well then Erie County lawmakers took the unusual step of backing off. One of the legislators who approved the notion of sending the sales tax increase to the state legislature backed off giving final approval in order to get more concessions from the county administration on cutbacks.

But Erie County’s hesitancy doesn’t negate the obvious point – counties in need of revenue will go any place except the property tax to get it.

And the sales tax is the most palatable place to go.

And while Erie County’s schizophrenia with their sales tax hike is odd, there is no such problem in our area.
Monroe County has already paved the way for sales tax increases. While our neighbors to west wrestle with issues like sales tax sharing, Monroe County has the Morin-Ryan agreement from the 1980s and the Doyle-Johnson update from the 1990s that creates a plan for sharing the money among municipalities.

And former County Executive Bob King proved back in the early 1990s that a sales tax increase is a much easier sell to voters in an upstate community than a property tax hike.

So the only question is whether other counties in upstate New York are in the same boat as Erie.
Well maybe the Erie County vessel is taking on water at a greater rate.

But the crashing waves of ever-increasing Medicaid costs are flooding the boats of other counties.

Just look at Genesee County where the Buffalo News reported that legislators donned red baseball caps in an effort to plead for a cap on Medicaid costs being passed down from the state.

The sales tax is a last refuge for counties.