County Receives Over $25 Million in Sales Tax Revenue Towns to Enjoy Slight Increase in First Quarter
KINGSTON, NY (May 25, 2016) – Sales tax collection is complete for the first three months of 2016 with close to $26 million received and Ulster County prepared to make a quarterly distribution to the twenty towns and two villages that enjoy 3% of the proceeds.
Recent numbers submitted by the County’s Commissioner of Finance to the Office of the Ulster County Comptroller indicate that 2016 totals for January, February and March of this year are slightly ahead of the same period for the prior year. By extrapolating the numbers, the first quarter collections appear to have inched up nearly 5% reflecting an increase of slightly over $1.2 million after the most recent transfer was received from the Office of the State Comptroller and journaled by the County on May 13, 2016.
The twenty towns and the Villages of Saugerties and Ellenville allocation for the quarter will be 5% greater than this period last year, going from $737,506 to $774,102. The City of Kingston, to date, has received close to $3 million for the same quarter.
The Ulster County sales tax rate is 8% for general sales and compensation use tax. Of the total collected by the State of New York, 4 % is retained as State revenue and 4% is returned to the County. In Ulster, the county tax base rate is 3%; however, the County receives authorization to levy an additional 1%.
Currently 85.5% of the sales tax received is kept by the County while the City of Kingston receives 11.5% of the revenue with the remaining 3% split among the twenty-two municipalities based on their equalized value.