Reducing business tax up to South Tahoe voters in November
By Kathryn Reed
Taxes, if voters think it’s a good idea, will go down next year for most businesses in South Lake Tahoe.
The City Council on Tuesday unanimously agreed to put on the Nov. 2 ballot the proposal to reduce the business license fee by 10 percent and raise the cap to $10,000. This means 3,417 businesses will see their annual fee go down and 50 are expected to pay more.
Because it’s a tax issue the people must vote on it. It will take 50 percent plus one vote to be approved.
Equitability is the reason the council wants to do this. As is stands, some small and large businesses are paying about the same with the cap at $3,000. That threshold is below what many cities charge.
Plus, a 10 percent cut could be significant for businesses that are barely paying rent, let alone annual bills. Business licenses are due every summer and are based on the gross income of a business. The rates cannot increase more than 3 percent a year based on the Consumer Price Index. That is a current criteria and one that will remain in the ballot language.
Councilman Bill Crawford said when he was on the board the first time there was a push to do much the same thing but the council never brought it to voters. That was back when the city had four times as many car dealerships. They were rather vocal opponents to raising the cap.
The city expects to collect an additional $101,593 per year with the scenario that will be before voters.
It will most likely cost between $12,000 and $17,000 for the city to place it on the ballot.
Meyers resident Kenny Curtzwiler was the only person to speak during the public comment period. He brought up the issue of Heavenly Mountain Resort not paying taxes on its lift tickets from the gondola or scenic rides.
It’s a service and not a product is why sales tax is not collected. The city doesn’t have an amusement tax, which those sales could fall under.
Still, the council seemed a bit baffled as to why the resort doesn’t have a business license to operate the gondola.
The city’s Redevelopment Agency and Heavenly have an agreement dating to before construction started at Heavenly Village in the mid-1990s that prohibits the city from assessing certain fees or taxes on lift tickets until the city’s Redevelopment Agency pays off its $112 million debt it incurred to build Heavenly Village, where the gondola terminal is. That debt is scheduled to be repaid in 2039.
Heavenly does have a business license for the California Lodge as well as its separate retail shops in town. Why the Saddle Road operation has a business license is unknown because it is in El Dorado County and not in the city limits. The maintenance yard is in the lower lot, which is in the city limits.
“When they report revenue we have no way to know where it comes from,” said Christi Bozes, South Lake Tahoe accounting technician. This means a business like Heavenly with more than one outlet can combine the revenues into one pot so ticket sales at one location are not isolated. So, even though the gondola does not have a business license, this does not mean Heavenly is not paying its share of taxes from revenue generated at that location.
Heavenly spokesman Russ Pecoraro was not in his office when reached after 5pm Tuesday and therefore didn’t have all the facts at his finger tips.
Pecoraro and city councilmembers said more details about Heavenly and what it pays to the city will be forthcoming this week.
In other action the council:
• Listened to a presentation by Lake Tahoe Visitors Authority Executive Director Carol Chaplin about the Amgen Tour of California starting in South Lake Tahoe in 2011. The council unanimously supports the effort to make this a reality.
• Approved the Ski Run BID to carry on for another year. It was a 4-0 vote, with Councilman Bill Crawford explaining how a May 25 meeting between him and the BID board resolved most of the issues that precluded him from voting yes last month. Councilman Hal Cole no longer owns property in the area so he could vote.
• The taxi ordinance is going to be reworked by staff based on comments from three people in the industry who basically said the same thing at previous meetings. Those remarks were not incorporated into the final document. This will cost the city, aka taxpayers, staff time as well as a couple hundred dollars to post the necessary documents to notify people about the next hearing.
Only sneaky, conniving politicians could attempt to call something a tax decrease, when in fact $101,593 more in taxes will actually be collected.
Don’t be fooled.
Steve you are such a sad person all you do is pass negative energy out, seems to me once you said that if the city wanted to help small business lower the costs to small business, whick this does. The city is not hiding the fact that there will be more money collected due to the fact that bigger businesses will pay more, please try doing something positive in this town.
ME ,What’s the difference ,tax goes down for business, taxes go up for the common resident!
The city doesn’t have an amusement tax, which those sales could fall under.
If you take the time to look at this tax it would mean a lot vendors would have to pay taxes on any machine,selling of things at craft fairs,music concerts,boat rentals,water craft, a lot things other people do,but aren’t a corporation like Heavenly.
My owe personal view, Heavenly has too many shops around town and should pay through the nose.They get write offs a lot other small business don’t.
They try to monopolizes the town.They should pay more.
There was a huge misconception as to why HV does not have to pay any tax on their ticket sales and I am getting the actual Memo that states why they are allowed to forgo tax on tickets and will post it when I get it from the city. Basically it’s ties the citys hands as long as there is debt on the parking garage. I also ran into Blaise and he had some rather eplitive comments towards me with concerns to taxes and annexation. Why should they pay their fair share when we pay it for them? There are also misconceptions on how to annex HV into the city and they don’t have to agree to it. All it takes is a little homework and it can be done but the powers to be do not want to rock the boat when it comes to HV.
Lets rock the boat sink the sob’s cash flow, build the city a few nice roads,bus stops,parks.
Whose really going to wait till 2039,by then the warmer climate will have sunk their boat anyway.
Actual wording. Got to wonder if they pay any tax to El Dorado County.
10.10 The Agency acknowledges that Heavenly Ski Resort’s historic lift ticket sales occur beyond the City limits. Lift tiket sales have not been subject to tax within the jurisdictions where the sale of Heavenly lift tickets occurs. In consideration of offering lift tickets within the City limits, the Agency and the City covenant and agree that the sale of lift tickets within the Redevelopment Project Area shall not be subject to any City imposed tax or assessment for so long as the Agency has long-term debt related to the Project outstanding without the consent of Heavenly Valley, which may be withheld for any reason whatsoever. Upon repayment of any long-term debt associated with the Development, the Angency and the City may,subject to compliance with normal procedures for imposing taxes, impose a lift ticket tax without Heavenly Valley’s consent.
Finally got an answer from the State as to the status of the City Of South Lake Tahoe Corporation. This is what they were trying to accomplish and what their primary purpose was. First Page
First: The Name of this Corporation shall be:
CITY OF SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, CALIFORNIA, MUNICIPAL FACILITIES CORPORATION
Second: The pupose for which this Corporation is formed are:
(a) The specific and primary purposes are:
To render financial assistance to the City of South Lake Tahoe, California (hereinafter called city), a political subdivision of the state of California, by financing and constructing in or near the City a corporation and city corporation yard, and one or more buildings usable for governmental, civic or other purposes.
Looks like they formed a corp to build the city structures and they were:
Linne E. Nelson / Roger L. Scott / Dennis D Maas
The City will do anything to not confront its bloated bureaucracy! There’s too much staff (we currently have more than we’ve ever had) and in recent years they’ve had raises that we can’t afford! And then there’s those that have recently retired with 100% of their salary!!
This is not a revenue neutral proposal and unfortunately will just lead to more vacant space in our town and higher unemployment!!
Before asking for more money from the private sector our City government needs to what every household needs to do-live within a budget and not keep ‘kicking the can’ of the hard decisions down the road!!!
Skibum there’s always been ways for corporation to escape TARIFF. Customs, duties, toll. or tribute payable upon merchandise to the general government is called tariff; the rate of customs, &c. also bears this name and the list of articles liable to duties is also called the tariff
This gets me to thinking!
“which may be withheld for any reason whatsoever”.
(What mob wrote that in the contract)?
“We need BETTER REPRESENTATION”!
Good luck with the representation part. Cole and Grego have two and a half years to go, Lovell will run for re-election and win for the same reason Cole got so many votes two Novembers ago…. voters here are uninvolved and will vote for familiar names. The same three voting in a block will march on through 2012. By the way, its mid-June, has anyone announced candidacy? The answer is no. The chamber tried to run seminars on how to run, why to run, etc. Anyone come out of that? Just like Santiago ran unopposed, Lovell will run virtually unopposed. Good candidates will not run when the job does not pay and they will have to deal with a block of three council members who will control every vote.
Dissolve the city.
As long as there are people like you out there painting such a terrible picture of what serving as a city council member is like, you might be right SB.
Public Office is not for the faint of heart, nor weak or weak minded. No amount of money would be worth the constant pointing fingers blame-game for the position. Most cities in the country don’t pay local city council, town council folks. It was never intended to be a job. Only those who truly love their city and believe their thousand thankless hours will be worth the effort will dare to serve. Yes, they have to have the time as well. You’re wrong about the voting block, Serving is far more than votes cast, and instead of throwing up our hands we need to get people into office who know how to work together.
Few people run for council in most cities, we’re not unique. It’s not because of the money or lack of money, its the tremendous number of hours and the courage to stand in front of an entire city having every single decision scrutinized, every word analyzed and challenged. Someone is always questioning another’s ethics. Stepping up into the public arena to take the hits, few have the stomach for it.
If it was paid, then you’d have people running to get a job, that’s never been what being elected is about and if that was in the mix, every town would have the problems of federal and state politics. Even if one was wealth and didn’t need a job they’d be questioned for why they’d run (aka: meg whitman); money has never made politics better.
Elected office is not for the weak, like them or not they all have the guts to speak in public, and cast their opinion and vote in the light for all to see, and question.
Any takers?
JL, I don’t think I was painting a bleak picture of what it takes to be a member of the council. I was just getting back to a question I was asked about the dissolved corporation of the city. You are right about it being bleak though, public service is not for everyone.
John Lee,Skibum,Kae,WOODS………In every town there is a “Mayor that doesn’t mean s-it to any of the community, that will ramble, rant, and rave over a multitude of issues and we have our share of these characters. Their ramblings are listened to in amusement, shock, and annoyance depending upon a person’s point and in no way do these individuals represent the citizens of the town South Lake Tahoe as a whole. In fact no person on the city council members meeting showed support for our needs or interest during Council meeting. They don’t allow the individual to have some credence to their arguments. Instead, either he should be confronted with the impropriety of his words or be ignored in order to not encourage such behavior.
The lack of people getting involved in our city well being is in such a disgraced and shows the current council non-creditability to move forward much of anything that the residents find important is very much a laughing joke among the community.
The current council is nothing short of alienate its purpose to provide good choices to the remaining few residents that live and work here year round.
Their mission is so far stretched out in projects that are unproven in importance and lack of good data to bring more financial downfall to the ones that lay in limbo.
It’s not been the people imagination that we go through city managers like old books because the next chapters in our cities personilty don’t match the ideas of the failed current council members in both minds, Body, financial needs.
Their solution are our pollution to a good sound city government that works for all us and not just a few self interest groups with agendas that have no creditability to the current voters turn outs .
One writes they got Guts, no it’s not guts they have, its unguided, unthought-of out due process of city government ,with lame brain personalities, serves none of us the worthy time to register to vote on such failed bunch of human being.
It’s just plan disgusting bunch of losers to waste our time on. They are not leaders; they are puppets of the city attorney that tells them the next course of action in a useless airport no one wants or needs with useless urgent we the public demand.
They can stand before us while we continue to protest their slimy ideas and their never ending foolish wastes of city funds of fun fair parks to nowhere.
The freedom of the press and speech should have a never ending whipping post to these icons to nowhere and may they hear all of our true words, discussing of their blinded guidance.