Sales tax option alive in Appleton
As they continue to wrestle with a possible half-cent county property tax, Outagamie County supervisors have rejected a proposed five-year moratorium if the tax is enacted.
Outagamie County is one of 11 of Wisconsin’s 72 counties without its own 0.5% sales tax, but supervisors are considering it because the $18 million it would raise annually would help maintain public services.
Details are in the Appleton Post-Crescent.
More counties looking at sales tax option
Wisconsin gives counties the option of a 0.5% local sales tax, but 11 of the state’s 72 counties haven’t yet exercised the option, many of them in the Fox River Valley.
But budget crises are causing some rethinking. Outagamie County Board Chairman Cliff Sanderfoot, previously against a county sales tax, says he’s softened his position. The County simply can’t afford to provide the help it once did, for programs such as the Community Options Program.
"There are some people in the county who are probably hurting because they need help," Sanderfoot told the Appleton Post-Crescent.. "This (the sales tax) is something that's out there."
For details, see story in the Post-Crescent.
Xerox loses tax dispute with state
Wisconsin exempts computers from the property tax that businesses pay on the property they own. And the definition of a computer has been taken quite broadly, to include ATM machines and modern cash registers.
What about combination printer/copier/scanner/fax machine? Is it a tax-exempt computer? Or is it a taxable piece of equipment?
Taxable, ruled the state’s 4th District Court of Appeals. The case involved Xerox’s appeal of $26 million worth of equipment leased to the cities of Milwaukee and LaCrosse.
For details, see this story in the Madison Capital Times.
Also see the court’s formal opinion.