Use tax not on Avon council’s next agenda
AVON — The Town Council will not take up the issue of use tax being imposed on builders at their next meeting.
Originally planned for Tuesday, the issue has been pushed back to Jan. 12, Town Manager Virginia Egger said Friday.
“It will be an important discussion,” she said.
NUMBER OF DELIVERIES PER YEAR
Use taxes have been banned in Avon since 2002, when the town held an election on the issue, but builders doing business in town have been charged a similar tax after receiving a letter that says “The town of Avon … does not exempt construction materials from sales tax. As a contractor pulling a permit, this means that you will need to pay sales tax to your vendors for all taxable materials.”
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Town Attorney Eric Heil said the Avon town code contains a provision that says delivery of materials to a construction site more than once per year means Avon considers that construction site to be the point of sale.
“That’s where we’re catching a lot of construction materials, because almost all of them are delivered more than once per year, and they deliver to a site, and we assess the sales tax on that and consider that to be the point of sale,” Heil said.
One-time purchase deliveries are not subject to Avon’s sales tax, Heil said.
“Avon does not consider the one-time delivery to be engaged in business in town,” he said.
NO KNOWN APPEALS
The code also allows for an appeals process where anyone who doesn’t agree with the taxes can have their case looked at on an individual basis.
“I don’t think I’ve ever had to look at one in the years I’ve been working for Avon, but there is a process where if someone disagrees with how it’s being applied then they can ask that to be reviewed,” Heil said.
Former councilman Dave Dantas said he was planning on speaking on the use tax issue at Tuesday’s meeting.
“It’s a use tax that has not gone to the voters, and (the Colorado Tax Payers Bill of Rights) protects against a tax that doesn’t go to the voters,” he said.
