Motorcycle rally tax revenue down slightly from '06 - Rapid City Journal

Spending at the 2007 Sturgis bike mass meeting was much better than earlier describes indicated, with less than a 1 percentage driblet in gross sales and touristry taxation grosses from the twelvemonth before, a concluding state study shows.

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Sales-tax gross also were down for the Central States Carnival but up significantly at the South Dakota State Fair.For the rally, a preliminary study in late August from the state Department of Gross and Regulation indicated gross sales and touristry taxation gross from impermanent sellers had dropped 15 percentage during this year's Sturgis mass meeting from the 2006 rally.But the department's concluding study Thursday showed less than a 1 percentage driblet in overall mass meeting taxation revenues, with a 21 percentage addition in the Southern Hills nearly offsetting a 4 percentage driblet in Sturgis and elsewhere in the Northern Hills.The Gross Department doesn't screen out sales-tax gross from constituted concerns during the rally.In the Northern Hills (which includes Sturgis and all other communities within James Edward Meade and Lawrence counties), taxation aggregations totaled $1,007,154.50, down from $1,047,041.01 in 2006. Of the amount collected this year, $592,666.40 was state gross gross sales tax, $256,967.28 was municipal sales tax, $9,636.07 was municipal gross gross tax, and $147,884.76 was state touristry tax. Gross seller gross sales in the Northern Hills country for the 2007 Rally totaled $14,814,278.94.The Southern Hills (including Rapid City, Custer, Hill City, Keystone and Pennington County) posted seller sales-tax grosses totaling $202,391.75. Of that amount, $116,244.10 was state gross gross sales tax, $56,039.62 was municipal sales tax, $1,155.01 was municipal gross gross tax, and $28,953.02 was state touristry tax. Gross seller gross sales in the Southern Hills from the 2007 Sturgis bike Rally totaled $2,906,102.46.Rally have spreadPepper Massey, manager of the Sturgis metropolis mass meeting department, said the sales-tax gross Numbers bespeak how the mass meeting have shifted, spreading to other parts of the Black Hills.She said the figs also demo the mass meeting did relatively well, considering economical factors. "With what's going on in the state with the economic system and the warfare and housing, it's pretty astonishing that we did so well," Massey said Friday.Massey said the mass meeting is estimating a crowd of 500,000, up from the 2006 estimation of 457,000 but still down from the 60th day of remembrance in 2000, with an estimated 633,000, and the 65th mass meeting in 2005, with an estimated 525,000.Those estimations are based on sales-tax revenue, state traffic counts, Saddle Horse Mount Rushmore National Memorial counts, seller licences and garbage, Massey said.The state Department of Transportation's pneumatic traffic counters at all of the chief roadstead into Sturgis showed a 2.7 percentage addition in traffic over 2006.Garbage hauled in Sturgis was also up, 615.9 dozens this year, compared with 584 dozens in 2006. During the 65th mass meeting in 2005, rallygoers created 795 dozens of garbage.Visitation Numbers from Saddle Horse Mount Rushmore were not available.The state-supported issues impermanent vendors' licences during the mass meeting to any concern that sets up away from its lasting location, according to January Talley, manager of the department's Business Tax Division. So, if a Rapid City concern sets up at Black Hills Harley-Davidson, for example, it must have got a impermanent seller license, she said.Black Hills Harley, for the first time, posted people to physically number visitants at its entranceway for three of the busiest years of the rally, according to Aluminum Rieman, managing spouse of the franchise off Interstate 90's Exit 55. Using that caput count, along with gross sales sums for those three days, Black Hills Harley estimations that more than than 107,000 people stopped at the franchise during this year's rally, Rieman said. That is a bigger crowd than most Sturgis bike mass meeting attending figs from the late 1980s.Another major event in the Black Hills, the Central States Carnival in Rapid City, showed a driblet in sales-tax grosses of 1.69 percentage from 2006, according to the Gross Department report. Sum taxation of $38,412 was collected from impermanent sellers during the Central States Fair.Final taxation grosses from the South Dakota State Carnival in Lake Huron totaled $75,391, up 33.3 percentage from 2006.At the Siouan Empire Carnival in Siouan Falls, the $27,199 in taxation gross was down 22.2 percentage from 2006.Contact Steve Glenn Miller at 394-8417 or steve.miller@rapidcityjournal.com

Alma tourism committee tables proposed lodging tax

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A proposed 5 percent lodging tax on bed and breakfast and motel rooms in Alma was tabled after business owners opposed it.But the Alma Parks and Recreation Committee said the business community needed to work together with the city council to help the city attract tourists.A room tax was viewed as a method of raising revenue from tourists to help pay for upkeep of parks and public recreation services.The city council says it is spending too much compared to other small cities. Most of the money comes from property taxes.Peggy Jost, owner of the Hillcrest Motel in Alma, said she received a “mixed response” from business owners she approached about giving donations to the city as an alternative to the tax.Jost said a room tax would drive away visitors. She said guests would look for lodging elsewhere.She said several people told her it is the city’s obligation to have money set aside for maintenance of parks and recreation.Some suggested Alma charge a citywide sales tax, but City Administrator Linda Torgerson said Wisconsin law doesn’t allow a small city to impose a municipal sales tax.The only alternative tax available to the city for raising revenue to help support tourism is a room tax.The law provides that a majority of room tax revenue must be used for tourism-related promotions, Torgerson said.Alma Mayor Lois Balk and city Alderman Larry Farl, a local business owner, said a change in mindset would be necessary if the city and businesses were going to do a better job of working together to solve funding problems.Farl said the Alma Chamber of Commerce and businesses might have to do more to improve fundraising activities in cooperation with the city to help fund local tourism.Balk recommended the community talk about tourism and come up with new ideas for raising revenue.
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