Sales tax request delayed as revenues fall

The city of Springfield continues to face painful decisions following the failed Feb. 3 pension sales tax proposal, and the situation is worsened by shrinking overall sales tax revenues.

City Manager Greg Burris told Springfield City Council Monday night that city staff is working on revisions to the proposed 1-cent sales tax to fund the nearly $200 million shortfall in the Police and Fire Pension Plan, though citizens will not be asked to vote on it again in June as Burris had previously stated.

"Following the defeat of the sales tax referendum ... I said we would bring the tax back to the citizens in June or August ... but I'm not going to recommend that we come back in June," Burris told council. "The reason is that in order to come back in June, we would have to have an alternate proposal to you in March, and that's not enough time for us to collect public feedback and public input, which we're very sincere in wanting to do."

He said city staff is considering both formal and informal methods of collecting citizen feedback, ranging from a citizen committee or focus group to a possible citizen survey.

To add to the dour news, Burris presented the latest sales tax figures. After receiving its February sales tax check, which gives the city eight months of data for fiscal year 2009, the city is 1.87 percent behind its fiscal 2008 revenue total. While the current year's budget was based on projected sales tax growth of 3 percent, Burris said hiring freezes implemented in July and again in January put the city in a position to handle the shortage.

"We're holding the line on spending. Couple that with the fact that some of our other revenue sources are holding stable, and we feel we're positioned to address the current year's budget at this point," Burris said, adding that March's sales tax check will be more significant because it includes the end of the holiday season as well as businesses that pay sales tax quarterly.[[In-content Ad]]