TAX NEWS - JUNE 2010

North Carolina Tax: County commissioners to take up 2010-11 budget, tax increase referendum

Discussions on taxes and budgets will probably take center stage at Monday night's meeting of the Alamance County Board of Commissioners.

The meeting begins at 7 p.m. at the commissioners' chambers on the second floor of the County Office Building in downtown Graham.

Although a number of items are on the budget, the public hearing for the 2010-11 budget and a resolution from Commissioner Vice Chairman Eddie Boswell for a referendum to let county voters decide on a quarter-cent sales tax increase should grab the lion's share of the proceedings.

Declining revenues and rising costs have prompted County Manager Craig Honeycutt to craft a draft budget that calls for employee furloughs, two rounds of voluntary departmental cuts, and reducing the county's contributions to its self-funded employee health plan, among other things. Department managers responded to the tough economic conditions by submitting budgets that were below spending levels in the current budget and making additional cuts.

The commissioners acknowledge the challenges facing the upcoming budget, but have disagreed along partisan lines at times about how to conquer them.

Boswell and fellow Democrats Linda Massey and Ann Vaughan have said they favor letting voters decide on a sales tax increase that would raise about $2.2 million for county coffers. GOP board members Bill Lashley and Tim Sutton said they oppose a sales tax referendum and any other efforts that might raise taxes.

Sutton has said he would vote in favor of a referendum if the board would agree to a cut in the property tax equal to the amount of any sales tax gain.

That would negate the point of the sales tax referendum, Boswell has said.

Both issues are likely to be settled Monday night. Over at least the last few years, the board has voted in favor of annual budgets with few changes from the manager's draft.