Written by bob blake
LIMA — After months of speculation and debate, Allen County commissioners on Thursday approved raising the county sales and use tax to the state maximum for three years.
The 0.5 percentage point increase was approved by Commissioners Dan Reiff and Sam Bassitt. Commissioner Greg Sneary cast the lone dissenting vote on raising the sales tax to 7 percent. The measure means consumers will pay 7.69 percent more for taxable items.
“This is a temporary tax. No matter what anybody thinks you actually can put a tax on and put it for a period of time and the politicians can’t do a damn thing about it,” Reiff said. “It will automatically go off, you have to go through this process again to put it back on. It’s not something the public’s going to get stuck with. Hell, I don’t trust politicians. I think the public should have a voice in this and they should determine whether or not they are taxed.”
The vote came a day later than originally expected after Sneary introduced a proposal to free up as much as $3.9 million without increasing the sales tax.
“What I’m more afraid of than anything if we get more money right now all the discussions about savings in the future are out the window. This is the last chance we’ve got to raise any funds,” Sneary said. “At this point, if this goes forward we have exhausted every last remedy. From here on out when that day of reckoning does come, and it will eventually, don’t know when that’s going to be, at that point it has to be faced.”
According to Administrator Becky Saine, the sales tax will be effective Oct. 1, assuming there is no referendum. The county would see the additional revenue beginning Jan. 1, she said.
“I think this will give us the opportunity over a three-year span to take a very close look at how the spending occurs,” Bassitt said. “We would hope the economy turns around in three years and that we will be a robust, economically thriving community such that the initiative will no longer be needed.”
Keith Cunningham, director of the Allen County Board of Elections, said anyone wishing to force a referendum on the issue in November would need to submit petitions with signatures by Aug. 9.
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