Sales tax revenues have rebounded slightly in Gilbert, providing city officials with a renewed sense of optimism.
Assistant town manager Marc Skocypec told councilors last week that sales tax revenue began posting year-to-year increases in February. April revenue totaled $4.4 million, up from $3.9 million in April 2009.
Skocypec said sales tax revenue was up about 10% in the first four months of 2010.
“There is a little bit of an uptick, and I’m trying to be excited about the littlest things out there,” Skocypec said in his monthly fiscal report to the City Council.
Collections from the retail sales tax in the Phoenix suburb are up 3.6% from the same period of fiscal 2009, he said.
Gilbert operates on a fiscal year that begins July 1.
Revenue from the beginning of fiscal 2010 through April totaled slightly more than $39 million, Skocypec said, down about $2 million from the same period in fiscal 2009.
The city’s sales tax revenue peaked in fiscal 2008, generating almost $60 million.
Gilbert’s construction sales tax had been expected to bring in $2 million through May, but actual collections were almost $5 million. Skocypec attributed the increase in residential construction to the federal tax credit for first-time homebuyers.
Gilbert’s municipal debt is rated AA by Fitch, Aa3 by Moody’s Investors Service, and AA-plus by Standard & Poor’s. The Maricopa County city has a population of about 210,000.
