County is forced to be frugal

While some children are holding out for their two front teeth, all that many Columbia County officials want for Christmas is a robust holiday shopping season to bolster sagging sales tax revenues.

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The most recent check the county received from sales taxes in the county was $4.1 million, which is an accumulated total from multiple months. That's 5.06 percent less than the same time last year, county Finance Director Leanne DeLoach said.

"At one time, back in June, we were as much as 7.84 percent in decline, so at least it's getting somewhat better," DeLoach said. "But this whole year we've been experiencing a decline. Every month has been a negative."

Though retail sales are down, commission Chairman Ron Cross said it could be worse.

"A study we did a good while back showed about 50 percent of our (sales tax) money was going to other counties," he said. "Now, with the Target, Home Depot and Lowe's, and some of the others, about 63 percent stays here, but we're still working to get to the state average of 72 (percent)."

Officials are hoping for a spending spike similar to Christmas 2008 to improve tax collections.

"Last December, our check was almost $1.7 million, which was a 40 percent jump from November," DeLoach said. "The year before, in 2007, the December check was only 9 percent greater than in November."

Of course, a sales tax boom would require more area residents to patronize Columbia County stores.

"We encourage people to shop in the county, but the main thing we have to do is offer more opportunities so they don't have to go somewhere else," Cross said. "The economic downturn has hurt that. We had all kinds of prospects coming in here, but they died and nobody is really expanding."

Luckily, bids for many Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax projects have been coming in under budget, so less funding for capital improvements hasn't been so devastating, DeLoach said.

"It's more challenging in dealing with the general fund, where you're dealing with set operational costs," she said. "On the capital projects side, you can always defer a project if you need to. They're not necessities."

While sales tax revenues help fund such capital projects as the Columbia County Library and Blanchard Woods Park, they also provide a significant revenue stream for county services.

About $15.5 million of the county's $56.5 million general fund is expected to come from the Local Option Sales Tax, which is a penny tax on the purchase of goods in Columbia County.

"Losing the penny that goes in the general fund hurts us because we set our budget based on a certain amount from our history," said DeLoach. "When those monies don't come in, we don't have a lot of give."

The options available to commissioners to make up lost sales tax funding include raising property taxes, cutting services, deferring purchases and cutting personnel.

"We have really been frugal on the expense side," DeLoach said. "Any vacancies we have we're not filling right away. We're deferring (purchases of) certain capital items in the general fund like computers and vehicles.

"That's basically all we can really do without decreasing services, raising taxes or laying someone off."