MOBILE, Ala. (WPMI) Mayor Sam Jones is responding a day after Local 15 News reported the city's financial woes.
The recently passed penny sales tax was supposed to help bring in more revenue. But it hasn't lived up to some lawmakers' or business owners' expectations.
Despite the fact that the sales tax revenue for November was down half a million dollars from last year and the general fund is down nearly $6 million from this time last year, according to Mayor Jones, it's not as dire of a situation as it sounds.
"It's more of a sampling than it is accurate because we just started collecting in November and there are so many variables in that. We collected all of the sales tax in November because some people were just transitioning back to the one cent and they had to get their computers in order," Jones said.
Internet sales across the country are at record highs. The mayor said tax revenues are plummeting throughout the nation because folks are buying more and more things on the Internet. Jones supports a bill that's about to be introduced to the Senate that deals with the issue.
"Right now the supreme court has ruled. You can't require a vendor in New York to collect your sales tax in Alabama, and the legislation would require them to collect that sales tax and remit it to the state in which the purchase was made," Jones added.
