Jonesboro, Craighead County smash all-time January sales tax collection numbers
by February 12, 2020 9:22 am 718 views
During the last five years, Craighead County and its seat, Jonesboro, have broken sales and use tax collections each year. A new decade has dawned and nothing has changed. And the record setting pace may have even accelerated this January.
Jonesboro reported sales and use tax receipts of $1.691 million during the first month of 2020, an 8% ($125,233) increase from the same month in 2019, according to the city. It’s the most ever collected in the month by the city. It is also a 6.3% ($99,961) uptick when compared to the budget numbers.
Craighead County tallied similar collections. For the month, it collected $1.887 million, a 6.4% ($114,450) increase as compared to the same month in 2019, and it’s the most ever collected by the county to start the year, according to the Craighead County Treasurer’s Office.
Numbers released reflect sales and use tax collections during the month of October. Sales and use tax receipts take 60 days to tabulate.
Craighead County ended 2019 with $21.281 million in sales and use tax receipts, an all-time record, according to the Treasurer’s Office.
The total was a more than 5% increase from 2018 when the previous record was set and the county collected more than a million dollars over last year, the first time the county has topped a previous year by a million dollars or more.
Jonesboro showed an identical growth pattern.
Northeast Arkansas’s hub city tallied $19.063 million in city sales and use taxes, a 4.84% ($879,470) increase as compared to 2018, the previous record year for the city. The $879,470 is the largest one year increase ever in Jonesboro, according to figures released by the city. Jonesboro beat its projected budget by 4.75%.
The explosive sales tax growth isn’t limited to just money being placed in the city and county coffers. Last year, Craighead County collected $963,950 in the state’s, half-cent four-lane sales tax. In January, it collected $85,450, the second most ever collected for that tax in any single month since the tax began in 2013.