In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic that hampered businesses across the country, the City of Petal has received more good news on the sales tax front, with sales tax collections for the month of March reaching a record of $292,661 – up from the average of $177,000 approximately 11 years ago.
“It’s very good,” Mayor Hal Marx said. “We were obviously very hesitant and sort of fearful of what the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic was going to have on our city economically, and what we found is that over the last three months, starting in March, our sales tax collections were higher each one of those months.
“If you add it all up, we’re at a total of over $100,000 ahead of where we would have been last year. So not to say it’s been a good thing to have the pandemic, but it hasn’t had the negative economic impact we feared it would on our city.”
Marx attributes the increased numbers to several factors, including the fact that many people used their pandemic stimulus checks to purchase things they may normally not have. In addition, many people stocked up on grocery items and certain perishables when the pandemic first hit the area in March.
“So we had some extra shopping going on then,” Marx said. “But also, I think beyond that, as far as Petal goes, we continue to attract people from not only inside the Petal community, but from outside.
“We get people from other counties – Perry County, Greene County, Jones County, and even Hattiesburg and Forrest County – coming here. We continue to see those numbers to go up, which is a good sign for a long-term trend, and I hope that trend continues even after things get back to normal at some point after the pandemic ends.”
Sales tax numbers generally run two months behind, so June’s numbers should be available by the middle of August. Marx said because most businesses were back open by the end of May, the worst effect of the shutdown is reflected in the numbers for March, April and May.
“I think June should be more of a normal month when it comes to our sales,” he said. “We’ll see if that trend continues, if we still see a high number or if it kind of goes back to regular numbers now that people have spent their stimulus check and things like that.
“But we’re pleased that we came through the worst of it really better off; we definitely needed the extra tax revenue because of our tight budget, and knowing that we’ve got another tight budget we’re looking at this coming year. So we hope to see those numbers continue to be above what we average.”
Back in May, city officials were informed by the Mississippi Department of Revenue that March’s sales tax would be in the neighborhood of $260,000, which is up from last year’s figure of $240,000. That was in contrast to the City of Hattiesburg, which made workforce reductions after finding out that March’s sales tax was approximately $325,000 less than the same period last year.
“We were actually pleasantly surprised by (our March numbers),” Marx said in a previous story. “I think the reason why we may have seen the increase, and Hattiesburg has seen a decrease, is because they’re more affected by USM not being open – not having students being there and spending money – than we are.
“They also have much more retail than we have, so they have more things that were shut down as opposed to us. Our big draws here are obviously Walmart and Lowe’s, and they have not been shut down, although they have been limited on how many people can go in at one time. They’ve been busy, and you can drive by the parking lots and see they’re busy with a lot of people shopping.”
