All of Fayette’s Towns Setting Sales Tax Records

With a month yet to go, 2022 has been a banner year for Fayette County towns’ sales tax revenue. All seven towns in the county are up from any previous year.

November’s payment from State Comptroller Glenn Hegar meant La Grange has received over $2.2 million in city sales tax so far this year. That’s more than all the county’s other towns combined.

Schulenburg continued to top the area in percentage growth from last year. With $1.1 million so far, that’s up 34.3% from the same time last year.

Ellinger actually had the greatest increase, but that’s because as of this time last year, it had only received $9 from the state. November was the first payment it got last year after the newly formed city adopted a sales tax.

Besides cities, many counties also have a local sales tax. Fayette County has shown exceptional growth this year. With over $2.7 million so far, it is up 29.6% from last year.

Many consider sales tax collections to be a good indicator of an area’s overall economic health.

Two years ago at this time, Fayette County had received only $1.9 million in sales tax revenue. The current amount is up more than 42% from the 2020 level.

The added revenue should help officials with their 2023 budgets. Fayette County’s sales tax revenue is up more than $630,000 from last year and appears to be continuing to grow each month.

Fayette’s 29.6% growth compares to Bastrop County’s 21.1% growth and Washington County’s 20.6%. While cities get sales tax only from businesses within their city limits, counties get taxes on sales made anywhere in the county, inside a city or out.

Texas law does not allow the disclosure of individual taxpayers, so exactly why a particular town or county is up or down is hard to tell. Still, Fayette has the largest percentage growth of any of the nine area counties that levy a sales tax with the exception of much smaller Burleson County, which is up 39.0%.

Besides Schulenburg’s large growth, Round Top and Carmine also have double-digit growth this year. Round Top is up 15.4% year to date and Carmine up 17.3%. Both have benefitted from the increased Antiques Weeks activity this year.

Flatonia is up 9.2% on the year and Fayetteville up 4.2%.