Advisory committee debates business tax-receipt program

A tax that has frustrated business owners on Longboat Key for years might be abolished in the future.

The business tax-receipt program, formerly called the occupational license program, is required for all Key business owners and must be renewed annually Oct. 1.

Since 2008, Key resorts, boat-slip owners and real-estate agents have questioned the tax and complained when they were incorporated into the tax program.

In summer 2008, the Town Clerk’s office sent business tax applications and collection forms to each individual unit owner of Casa del Mar and the Colony Beach & Tennis Resort, which has since closed. It was the first time in more than 15 years the town’s tax was levied against the two resorts.

Owners of both complexes received a bill for a daily rental business tax of $86.10. In the past, the resort managers said only their realty offices and any respective businesses on the property paid the tax; individual unit owners did not.

Unit owners at both resorts flooded Town Hall with letters and phone calls because they didn’t believe they should be levied the tax because they didn’t operate a business.

In October 2009, 194 boat-slip owners at the Boathouse Marina, 408 Gulf of Mexico Drive, and the 270 boat-slip owners of Longboat Key Club Moorings Marina, 2800 Harbourside Drive, received letters and invoices informing them their slips would be assessed a $103.95 charge annually if they rented their boat slips.

Boat owners appealed the tax, and the town reduced it to $33.60 per year.

Although the controversy concerning the tax has died down in recent years, the town’s Investment Advisory Committee discussed at its Sept. 6 meeting the possibility of abolishing the program.

The tax-receipt program could also be eliminated statewide, with the Legislature set to discuss abolishing such business taxes at its next session this spring in Tallahassee.

“Everything seems to suggest that after this year, Tallahassee might abolish the tax,” Vice Mayor David Brenner said. “We just have to wait and see.”

For now, the committee agreed to leave the tax in place and monitor what happens at the state level this spring.

If the town’s business tax-receipt program is eliminated, it would create an approximately $165,000 tax revenue loss in future budgets.

Also at its investment meeting, Brenner and Commissioners Lynn Larson and Jack Duncan:

• Discussed the possibility of commissioners approving the future use of outside attorneys;

• Discussed opportunities to lock in lower interest rates in the debt market for current town loans;

• Postponed a decision on a future town reserve fund policy for a future meeting.