Red Bank Joins Revolt Against County Sharing Sales Tax

Chattanooga, Tn (WDEF-TV) – Municipalities in Hamilton county are lining up to fight Mayor Jim Coppinger’s idea of sharing in the re-distribution of state sales tax funds.
Red Bank commissioners made it formal last night.

Hamilton county commissioners have pledged "no tax increase", but the county may find a way to bring in more revenue.
Mayor Jim Coppinger is pushing his idea of sharing in sales taxes collected in Hamilton county.

MAYOR JIM COPPINGER, HAMILTON COUNTY, AUGUST 5, 2015 "The portion I’m talking about is what they state sends back to Hamilton county …but it only goes to the municipalities. So they’re now…this is not money that’s even guaranteed here..this is money that comes back. "

But 10 cities in the county point out that they would then have less money to operate.

RANDALL SMITH, RED BANK CITY MANAGER "That would certainly impact our residents because to just make up the difference we would have to increase our property tax by 16.7 cents…just to the break-even point"

The Red Bank commission Tuesday night passed a resolution opposing the idea. Smith was instructed to pursue that issue.

RANDALL SMITH "About how much money are we actually talking about? I think 273-thousand dollars..and a little bit more than that. That’s a round number."

MAYOR JIM COPPINGER "We’re just asking that Hamilton county be considered like the rest of the municipalities."

The city of Collegedale was one of the first to oppose the idea. The city manager says it’s a matter of raising taxes or cutting services because of a loss in revenue.

TED ROGERS, COLLEGEDALE CITY MANAGER "You’ve got 95 counties in Tennessee …and approximately 340 cities and I can’t imagine the cities and the counties across the state would agree on that."

The county says it will ask the local legislative delegation to support the plan in the next General Assembly.

A spokesman for mayor Coppinger points-out that the state doesn’t even have to return those tax dollars to local communities, and in fact, failed to do so on one occasion.
He said the municipalities just found another way to maintain services.