Take a hike on sales tax increase, local officials tell Hartford

Though big city mayors in Connecticut are pushing lawmakers to give them the option of hiking sales taxes to cover rising municipal expenses, the idea doesn’t have much backing in Bristol.
State Sen. Tom Colapietro, a Bristol Democrat, called the idea “ridiculous,” but said he isn’t opposed to letting cities choose whether to add a penny to the sales tax rate.
However, Colapietro said, “I would definitely go to another town” to make purchases if Bristol opted to hike its sales tax rate to 7 percent. “I can't imagine a city wanting to do this,” he added.
Raising the 6 percent sales tax to 7 percent, with the extra money going to municipalities that choose to enact it, would bring in millions for many cities. Bristol would likely rake in more than $1 million in additional revenue annually, officials said.
But Mayor Art Ward said he is opposed to “this type of legislation” because it allows the state “to avoid their responsibility of addressing fiscal responsibility” and adds to the tax burden of hard-pressed city residents.
“If anything, it would create adverse competition amongst cities who choose to employ this method and those communities who opt not to follow this path thereby forcing shoppers to travel to the least expensive community for their goods and services, ultimately, short-changing their cities and towns,” Ward said.
State Rep. Frank Nicastro, a Bristol Democrat who represents the 79th District, said that if the bill comes out of committee, he will not vote for it.
“ People are leaving this great state, and for that matter our fine city, because they have had it up to here with taxes,” said Nicastro, who is also a city councilor and former mayor.
“ It's about time that government starting at the federal level and working its way down through the State to the municipalities did what they should be doing , simply providing tax relief,” Nicastro said.
“There are too many taxes in this state already and even a penny more is wrong,” he said.
City Councilor Craig Minor called the sales tax regressive – which means it hits lower income people harder than richer residents – “so I would be very reluctant to adopt one in Bristol.”
However, Minor said, another option in the bill before the finance committee does interest him: the possibility of enacting a local income tax.
“That would be worth having a community discussion over,” Minor said. “But let's wait and see if this bill even gets out of the finance committee before we get too excited about it.
Four mayors – from Stamford, New Haven, Bridgeport and New London - asked the General Assembly this week to give them the authority to raise local sales taxes in order to close looming budget deficits.
Bristol’s elected leaders said they’re more concerned with preserving the extra conveyance tax revenue, which is set to expire this year, than they are with adding new taxes.
Comptroller Glenn Klocko said that losing $430,000 or more in conveyance taxes when property is sold would be a big hit to the city’s bottom line as it begins a new budget year in July.
Legislators are weighing the impact of the tax and may decide to roll it back to traditional levels for the 18 cities that were given the chance to hike the tax five years ago. Bristol waited a year before adding the conveyance tax increase, but has come to rely on the revenues from it.

Update at 12:30 p.m., Wednesday --

State Rep. Bill Hamzy, a Plymouth Republican whose 78th District includes northwestern Bristol, weighed in with this:
"I'm not sure if these mayors realize this or not, but Connecticut already has the highest tax burden of any state in the country. People who live in our major cities already pay some of the highest property taxes in the country. How on earth could they think this will help those residents? If they put as much effort into focusing their attention on the expense side of their budget as opposed to the tax side, we could get a handle on this problem."

Update at 11:30 p.m, Wednesday --

State Rep. Ron Burns, a Bristol Republican whose 77th District includes northeastern Bristol, sent this along:

"I would not support this bill. As state legislators we should not abdicate the responsibility we have to the taxpayers of Bristol. Rather than allowing the city to add an additional penny to the sales tax to offset their expenditures, we should be taking a hard look at the mandates we, as state legislators, have placed on municipalities and take action to remove those that are unnecessary. We will only be chasing people out of town to purchase their goods. I highly doubt that our Mayor or city councilors and taxpayers would believe that by passing this bill we would be giving them a helping hand."

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Contact Steve Collins at scollins@bristolpress.com