Published: December 20, 2005 12:30 am            

Sane proposes business licenses

When a person doesn’t pay his taxes, it increases the burden on all those who do, says Whitfield County tax commissioner Danny Sane.

Sane asked the members of the Board of Commissioners on Monday to consider requiring a license for all businesses operating in the county. To get or renew a license, a business would have to show that it is up to date on its property tax payments.

“This would give us one more tool in our efforts to collect taxes,” Sane told board members at their work session.

Sane said the fee for the license should be set low, perhaps $5 or $10.

“The purpose of the license isn’t to raise new revenue,” he said.

But he said the penalty for operating a business without a license should be stiff.

Sane couldn’t say how much the county loses each year from delinquent taxes from businesses. But he said his overall collection rate is over 90 percent.

“We are losing a lot of little accounts,” he said.

Sane noted that the penalty for not paying taxes is 1 percent of the bill a month, with a 10 percent penalty after three months.

Commissioners said the idea deserves study and asked Sane and county attorney Robert Smalley for information on business license laws in other counties.

“We need to give you all the tools we can,” said commissioner Leo Whaley.

Sane also asked board members to consider a two-tier payment system for property taxes that would allow taxpayers to pay part of their bill in June. Sane noted that the system would be voluntary and those who wished to pay all of their taxes in December could, but any interest earned by early payments would be applied against any tax increases, giving taxpayers an incentive to pay early.

Technology department director Tim Miller presented board members with a request from users to lower the fees for use of the county’s geographic information system (GIS), which allows realtors, surveyors and others to access information about property in the county online. The current fees for those services are $25 a month and $200 a year.

“I’m not prepared to make a move on that without more information,” said board chairman Brian Anderson.

Commissioners said they might consider lowering the yearly subscription fee to encourage more subscribers, but they were wary of having taxpayers pick up the cost of a service used primarily by commercial firms.

In a special called meeting before the board’s work session, commissioners voted 4-0 to:

� Renew a contract with the North Georgia Regional Development Center for planning and development staff work. The county will pay the NGRDC $60 an hour for that work.

� Renew a contract with North Georgia Community Action to operate the county’s rural transit system.

� Appoint Joan Chapman and Brian Suits to the board of the Dalton-Whitfield Library.

� Declare a IBM Wheelwriter 1000 typewriter surplus property with no monetary value and allow retiring clerk of Superior Court Betty Nelson to keep it.

        

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