San Angelo is Booming: City Sales Tax Revenues Approach 5-Year Record

SAN ANGELO, TX — The fiscal year 2018 sales tax revenue is rising to the top of the charts. That’s what City Finance Director Tina Dierschke is prepared to brief the members of the San Angelo City Council Tuesday.

In briefing slides for that presentation, the numbers show the City of San Angelo general revenue fund is overflowing with sales tax money—exactly $1,048,124 over the projected revenue that sales tax collections were anticipated to bring in by the May 2018 payment from the State.

In San Angelo, the sales tax rate is 8.25 percent. Of that, the State pockets 6.25 percent, Tom Green County pockets 0.5 percent, and the City of San Angelo gets the rest, 1.5 percent. Of the 1.5 percent the City gets, 0.5 percent is sent to the economic development arm, the City of San Angelo Development Corporation, or COSA-DC, and not counted in the general revenue.

In May, which accounts for sales tax dollars collected a month prior, the City raked in $1,744,518 in general revenue. Over the past five years, only May 2015, during the declining days of the 2014-15 oil boom, did revenues top that figure, if barely, at $1,779,019. Year-over-year compared to 2017, sales tax revenue is up 13.24 percent, Dierschke’s presentation notes state.

May’s numbers put all this fiscal year’s sales tax revenue collected at 8.89 percent over projections in the FY 2018 budget that was enacted to begin Oct. 1, 2017. May is the eighth budget month in FY2018, and every month, sales tax revenue has bested the projected numbers by an average of over $125,000. The worst month, December 2017, was $48,359 over budget. The best, February 2018 was $263,415 over budget. Table, total sales tax collections by month, 2017 compared to 2018:

While to-date collections are 8.89 percent over their projections, FY 2018 collections are even better, at 13.24 percent over FY 2017’s collections to day.

FY 2015 was the record year, which began recording sales tax collections for October 2014. That fiscal year, the City collected $18,916,368 in revenue. This fiscal year to date, eight months into FY 2018, the City has collected $12,411,667. If retail sales continue at this pace, the City can expect to collect an additional $6 million to $7 million this fiscal year. If the remaining months’ collections are close to $7 million, 2018 will be a better year than the oil boom of 2014-2015 as recorded in FY 2015’s sales tax numbers.