The Joplin City Council held an informal meeting on January 21, 2025, to receive updates on sales and use tax revenues, the general fund's revenue and expenditure status, and the finance department's operations. Discussions centered on declining sales tax, use tax allocation, financial sustainability, and delays in implementing a time-and-attendance payroll system.
Sales and Use Tax Update (Presented by Leslie):
General Fund Revenue and Expenditure Report (Presented by Leslie):
Finance Department Update (Presented by Leslie):
Good evening, everyone, and welcome to the Joplin City Council informal meeting. Let's kick this meeting off tonight with the sales and use tax update, please. Good evening, Mayor. Council. Hi, Leslie. You look at January of this year compared to January of last year, we are down 6.65%. So for uh the first three months of the year, we're down 0.45%, essentially flat. Um we will see how Christmas sales come in next month. Uh when we when we get later to our quarterly um graphs, it'll give you some insight um as to what businesses are what areas are being uh are down. Um use tax. So for January, um we're up six point four percent. So for the year we're up 4.2 percent. I do think that um we won't see the magnitude of increases that we've seen in the past for a couple of reasons. You know, wayfare has been in place now for a while, and I think most businesses are remitting that at this point, and then it's it's not so new uh for us anymore. So those businesses that should be collecting it are collecting it, and so now I think it will just be regular growth. And then marijuana tax. Um recall, and and as you can see, last month was down, so I think while we're up a hundred, almost 118% for the month. I think it was timing between um somebody who remitted um in December and January. Um, as far as how much we're up for the year, um in comparison last year, this was our first two months, so um it's hard still to compare month to month, uh year to date. Um I think we're pretty stable there as we saw at the end of 24. And then we have the quarterly comparison. So as a reminder, this is just our top 100 businesses, it's not all of the businesses, um, but this does capture the majority of our businesses. Um and this represents November November through January. 24 is in the pink, uh 25 is in blue. So you can see uh the mall, restaurant up just a little bit, discount stores up, um, hotel motels up, North Park Crossing, 1717 are up, uh, and then other, but then we have a lot of categories that are down, a lot of our normally uh normal categories that are up. So restaurants down significantly, construction and home improvement, motor vehicles, um, convenience stores, and general retail, all those down for the first quarter, and so that helps helps understand why our sales tax is down. Any questions on sales tax sales, use tax, marijuana tax? Council, Mr. Jackson. Uh Leslie, I was wondering of the year. Of course, now I know it's currently on hold for the county, but the county was able to look at how they were implementing the incoming use tax along with the marijuana tax to do more countywide in terms of just you know employee pay and changing that structure. I know that we have been using the marijuana tax to kind of fill the void of losing sales tax off machinery from industries, but obviously the county would have had that same hole. So are what are they doing differently than we are that's allowing them to have that flexibility from that tax revenue uh from marijuana tax? Correct. Um because obviously they would have lost the same revenue we did. Yes, so I think the county is on hold on their marijuana tax because right now they're they're being challenged on whether they can even collect that tax. Correct, correct. But what I'm saying is hypothetically they were looking at how that could you know infuse more capital into their operating budget to do you know pay increases and such. So if they were looking at that and they had the same revenue loss that we did from machinery for industries, I'm just curious what what are they looking at differently when it comes to that revenue than we are? I think they're just saying it differently. So marijuana tax goes into the general fund, and essentially that's what we're using it for. Okay. Pay increases, capital replacement, um essentially the same things that that they are. Okay. They're just they're just I I would have to look back to see how long it's been since they've given raises. Um it may be that they weren't able to give raises, and now because of that revenue source, they may be able to. I I'm I'm not sure I would I would have to look into that. Okay. And like I said, I do know the whole legal challenge is kind of put on hold, but that was the original anticipation, and I was just we do get a lot of questions about that, you know, tax revenue, and I know we often explain that, but yeah, but I mean when I look at that, they would have lost that same revenue we lost. Right.