City Council Minutes 2005 07 19 - Laserfiche WebLink

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City Council Meeting Minutes July 19, 2005 Page 5 of 9 Finance Director Patty Leslie explained Ordinance No. 1474, Series 2005 would set a ballot question to increase the tax base of the City to include a 3.375% use tax that is currently collected upon nonresidential building materials and vehicles, but would extend to the use, storage, distribution or consumption of any article of tangible personal property or taxable services purchase, leased or rented from sources inside or outside the City on which the City sales tax has not been paid. The Finance Department prepared a Use Tax Business Plan to provide Council and the citizens of the City with a summary of the purpose and vision for the adoption of a tax and how it impacts the major stakeholder of the City; the business consumer, the resident citizen consumer and the City of Louisville. Staff requested Council direction to make the necessary changes to the Ordinance between the 1 st and 2nd reading time frame for items such as: o Revising definitions in the General Provision section of the Sales Tax Ordinance #1375 that do not further increase the tax base of the City of Louisville but simply clarify existing definitions in the Ordinance. o Revisions to the Ordinance that will address the licensing as it will apply to Sales and Use Tax for businesses in the City of Louisville. o Additions to the Ordinance that will address the computation of use tax on construction equipment used inside the City of Louisville. Staff discussed the temporary 3/8 percent use tax imposed for a ten-year period on the privilege of using or consuming within the city, construction and building materials purchased at retail for use in connection with commercial construction and whether that should be applied to the use tax on tangible personal property and where those funds should be spent. There was discussion relative to adding exclusion for individual residents from the use tax and what would be the resulting implications. The second reading of this ordinance is scheduled for the August 2,2005 Council meeting and the ballot content must be certified to the Boulder County Clerk no later than September 2, 2005. Adopting the ordinance by August will allow time before the 30 day period for a referendum to pass before the ballot content is certified. City Attorney Light reviewed the options available to Council. He explained Council can refer the Tabor Ballot Questions without having an ordinance. The tax question could be referred to the voters by resolution and the ordinance can be drafted at another date. Another option would be a single ordinance adopting the tax measure. The ordinance would set the ballot title and refer the measure to the voters. A third option would be to go forward with Ordinance No. 1473, Series 2005, and merely split the question in two parts. Mayor Sisk stressed the importance of the ballot language and stated it should give as much information to the voter as possible.