WASHINGTON: Nothing has changed much with the county’s monthly tax allocations from the office of Texas Comptroller Glenn Hegar as of late. The state’s decline in the energy sector continues to be felt here on the local level.
Gonzales County has seen sales tax revenues decrease 35.41 percent from this time last year. Purchases made at county businesses in January totaled $206,185.94. The beginning of 2015 saw a total of $319,225.35. So far for the year the county is down 35.08 percent from 2015 totals.
In Gonzales, the numbers were down 35.34 percent from January 2015. The city brought in $171,057.75 as compared to last January’s $264,565.72. The city is already down 25.22 on returns on tax dollars as compared to last year.
Nixon is also down about the same rate. Tax numbers fell 35.15 percent from last year to $28,870.67. That brings a whopping 66.01 percent decline from last year’s totals for this same period, a clear sign of the rollback of oilfield related activities in the southern part of the county.
Smiley was down 55.13 percent with just $2,779.73 coming from the comptroller’s office. They have brought just $6,205.33 for 2016, down 57.04 percent. The city of Waelder hasn’t seen such of a dive. Down just 11.76 percent to $3,477.79, they are actually up 2.82 percent from the current period last year.
“Energy-centric cities, such as Odessa, Midland, Corpus Christi and Houston, continued to see decreases in sales tax allocations,” Hegar said. “Other areas of the state helped to somewhat offset those losses, as cities such as Austin and Dallas saw moderate increases in allocations.”
