January figures released by the Texas Comptroller Office show a 9.5 % increase over the same month last year for the City of Kennedale. Kennedale received a payment in January of $98,375.83 as compared to $89,830.24 last year. {{more}}
The sales tax figures represent November sales reported by monthly tax filers. The revenue is collected and counted in December and distributed in January.
For city coffers, this reflects a trend started last year after sales tax revenue bottomed out in 2013. Last year only three months showed decreases from the previous month, May had a 2.2% decrease, September had a 14.9% decrease and December a 15% decrease. In 2013, eleven months showed decreases with only December up.
For the year of 2014 there was an overall 5% increase from 2013 with total sales tax revenue at $1,281,292.35 compared to 2013 revenue of $1,217,421.20.
?Any increase is positive for us?, said Bob Hart, Kennedale City Manager. ?As small as we are and as low as the amount is, it only takes one store opening or closing to move that [figure] by a pretty good percent. So when we project, we project in a range of flat [0] to 5%, so this is within the range of what we were expecting.?
Looking at the historical data when 2010 was a peak year with revenue of $1,822,786.09, Hart cited the movement in the last few years of significant taxpayers.
?We had several closures. The sex-oriented businesses would have closed. Nu Engery needed to expand and moved. Majestic Liquor closed. Suplus Warehouse moved, so we had that going on.“On the plus side, QT opened and we started recovering some. Nancy;s Liquor expanded and now Popeye?s and Burger King have opened. Of course, there is a gap between closing and openings.”“We are so small it does not take much movement to show up big here [Kennedale] compare to Arlington or Fort Worth. Here, one small fast food place can make a 5% difference. Burger King opened Saturday, Popeye?s open in mid-December and those reports will not show up to January ? February ?March reports.”
Hart finished by saying, ?My expectations is that we are going to continue to trend up a little bit.?
