Ordinance 2582-02 - Laserfiche WebLink

a. r ORDINANCE NO. 2582-02 4•01.7 040040/ AN ORDINANCE of the City of Everett adopting Business and Occupation Tax provisions from the Association of Washington Cities' Model Business and Occupation Tax Code and superseding existing code provisions. WHEREAS one of the most important functions of a government, including municipal government, in setting and implementing tax policy is to strive for fairness, consistency, equity, and efficiency; and WHEREAS the City of Everett has had, and should retain, the flexibility to tailor city tax structures to meet unique local needs; WHEREAS the City of Everett's right to flexibility to determine its own tax structure must be balanced against a taxpayer's right to a tax system that provides uniformity, fairness, predictability, and ease of compliance; WHEREAS, in recognition of concerns over the local business and occupation(B&O) tax, and legislative debates over how cities might address the concerns of fairness, consistency, equity, efficiency, flexibility, ease of compliance and uniformity the Association of Washington Cities (AWC) and six cities, including the City of Everett, which impose gross receipts B & 0 taxes, formed a Task Force to analyze these issues and draft a Model Ordinance; and WHEREAS the Task Force, with the concurrence of the majority of other Washington cities imposing gross receipts B&O taxes, has developed a Model Ordinance that: • Creates greater uniformity and consistency among city gross receipts business and occupation taxes; • Includes universal apportionment and credit provisions to ensure against multiple taxation of the same gross receipts on businesses with activities in more than one B&O tax-imposing city; • Provides consistency among cities that makes city gross receipts business and occupation taxes simpler, more predictable, and easier to administer; • Provides a"bright line" test for determining"nexus," or whether a given business activity is subject to business and occupation tax; • Contains sufficient flexibility to provide local control over the city tax structure; and • Avoids major revenue losses; and WHEREAS adoption of provisions of the Model Ordinance will demonstrate to the Washington State Legislature that cities are sensitive to legitimate complaints over city gross receipts B & 0 taxes, and that the City of Everett is committed in efforts to make them fairer, uniform among the cities, predictable, have ease of compliance, are flexible to local needs and are efficiently administered; and 1