The sales tax in Murphysboro is going up.
The Murphysboro City Council voted last Thursday evening to raise the City Home Rule Sales Tax a full percentage point from 7.25% to 8.25%.
Murphysboro Mayor Ron Williams said the move had to be made.
"We've stayed at 7.25% long past everybody else,'' Williams said. "The other major communities are at 8.50%. I'm not proud of the move, but it's what we have to do. We can no longer continue to go in the hole, which we have done the past three years."
Williams said that the budget has gone in the hole the last couple of years in excess of $350,000. He went on to say that the raise in the sales tax could mean $600,000 to $700,000 in additional revenue for the city.
"It's a necessity,'' Williams said. "I don't know that everyone is going to be happy. But it's certainly better than putting it on real estate taxes and property taxes.
"In a way, it's for discretionary spending. Some things people have to have, like food and basic stuff, aren't taxed at that full rate. I don't want to cause businesses to go out of Murphysboro. But sales tax is the gentlest way to raise revenue."
While the raise in sales tax was the big item on the meeting agenda. There were others.
One of the items dealt with false alarms.
The City Council voted to add to the ordinance a service fee for the third false alarm call, and everyone thereafter, involving the Fire Department or Police Department.
The service for the police department will be $100, and for the fire department it will be $350.
Williams said that anytime the city has to roll a fire engine out for a call that it was not only that engine and crew going out, but they also have to tone out and bring crews in to cover the station in case of another fire.
"At that point, we're creating overtime for everyone that comes in,'' Williams said. "By contractual agreement, they get paid two hours of overtime just for showing up at the station. The cost is just huge."
Williams went on to say that the city is not seeing nearly as many false alarms calls as it use to get.
"People have taken care of their alarms, trained their personnel, and gotten their folks to understand that you don't want to have false alarms,'' Williams said. "The intent is not to collect money. The intent is to have alarms properly serviced and functioning properly, and people who control the alarms setting them up and turning them off the right way."
Another item on the agenda dealt with having the Police Department handle code enforcement issues. That item also passed.
"It will save us having to hire another code enforcement person,'' Williams said. "We have four quadrants in town. We will have a police officer that will look through that area.
"I think that having a uniformed police officer out there asking people first to clean up or deal with an issue they may have, be it trash, limbs, or whatever, and understanding from the police officer that we are going to come back and if it's not taken care of then a police officer is going to write a summons for it.
"It is going to work well for us. At this point in time, they're (police department) satisfied that it's the right thing to do."
During the meeting, Mayor Williams also spoke to the City Council about the return of Cruise Night.
The first Cruise Night is scheduled for April 1, and the mayor cannot wait.
"We've have a good time with it in the past,'' Williams said. "The folks putting it together are excited. They are car people.
"I think this is going to turn out beautifully. We've visited other communities, like Herrin and Cobden, that have them, and we hope we can rise to that level. We don't want to compete with them, though, and we're very careful about the nights that we hold them."