Sales tax receipts for April were up 22.8 percent following a slight decrease the previous month, Chief Financial Officer/City Clerk Jason Muninger said Monday.
For the first time in 12 months, sales tax collections for March had taken a slight dip compared to the same period last year, with receipts down $1,503 compared to 2021. The City had been riding a wave that had revenue from the tax well over 12 percent for the year.
Muninger said Monday the April report shows the City collected $1,902,412 in sales tax revenue, which is about $350,000, or 22.8 percent, over the amount collected during the same period last year. The month brings the year-to-date totals to $18,644,227, or 13.34 percent, over Fiscal Year 2021-22 and 13.7 percent over budget expectations.
“It looks larger because April of last year was a little lower than what we had been experiencing,” Muninger said. “So although it was actually more typical for us during ‘normal’ times,’ it was still in the $50,000 range above the year before.”
Muninger said while the higher-than-anticipated returns could be “the new normal,” it’s more likely collections will return to previous levels. He said finance staff is preparing the 2022-23 Fiscal Year budget with this in mind.
“We know this growth can’t last forever, so we’re moving forward in the budget process for Fiscal Year 2022-23 with that in mind,” Muninger said. “As we prepare the proposed budget for the upcoming fiscal year, we continue to plan conservatively to account for decreases that are likely coming. We could be surprised, of course, but we expect we will return to previous levels of ‘reasonable growth’ at some point in the future.”
City staff is working on the proposed budget, which will be presented to the City Council for consideration of adoption in the upcoming weeks. The new fiscal year begins July 1.