Centennial Citizens,

In a recent letter to the editorand posting on a political website,our Centennial Treasurer offered her "misconceptions" about the sales tax benefits of Home Rule for Centennial. Well, of course, there is more to the issue and you deserve "the rest of the story".

The assertion that Centennial is not doing all it can to collect our rightly due sales tax and that the state has done more audits than the city is telling us about, is simply misleading. The state may well have done 88 audits on Centennial businesses - but those are not the audits the city is referring to when the city points to the 74 requested and the 3 completed audits. The Centennial Treasurer seems to be referring to a state-provided list of audits done and money owed (much of which were zeros), which includes audits chosen by the state that happen to be in Centennial, not the suspected non- or mis-filers. Also, the state did set up a program for statutory cities to do audits, but the cities cannot perform those audits independent of the state. The program allows a state trained and certified company or auditor to perform audits within state laws and state processing rules, and with the state as the collection agent (meaning the state gets to determine the amount of any "settlement"). Our own City Manager was the first in the state certified to audit on behalf of statutory cities. However, the program is so expensive and difficult to participate in, that few, if any, statutory cities use it. You have to ask "why wouldn't Centennial would use it now if it worked"? It is important for every voter to realize that a home rule city does not have to collect and audit their own sales taxes but most have switched to self-collection and none of those has returned to state collection. State collection just doesn't make financial sense to most Home Rule cities.

The self-collected amount of increased revenue is also under fire by those opposing Home Rule. They are skeptical that Centennial will see an increase in revenue of up to 25%. But does it really matter if it is 1%, 5%, 10%, or 25% more money for our city to use for your services? Our city manager, with years of expertise in this field, estimates at least a 25% increase, but regardless of the estimate, it's MORE money. And the staff necessary to get that money can be contracted (as was the promise of our "virtual city") to keep our return beneficial.

Sheridan and Broomfield had similar issues with sales tax collection and, once home rule, have seen increased sales tax dollars. The City of Centennial will approach sales tax with care and caution. It is not in the city's best interest to "punish" our businesses - we want them to flourish for the ongoing revenue they will generate. It's all about fairness. All businesses, inside and outside of Centennial, should operate on the same playing field and consumers charged correctly.

Does it matter how quickly the city receives the sales tax remitted by business? Even home rule opponents say that the money would reach us 10 days earlier under Home Rule. Multiply those days by 12 and that equals ¼ of a year of increased interest on the $18 million dollars in sales tax paid to Centennial. More money available without raising your taxes.

The Commission wrote into the Charter a provision requiring a vote of the people for any new tax or increase in taxes, even it TABOR is ever repealed or modified. The people are protected, they have a voice, and they also have the option of adopting some of the very same taxes that Home Rule cities around Colorado have chosen because they made sense for their local community.

Home Rule simply puts those choices in the hands of the people living in the Centennial, rather than in the hands of the state legislators in Denver. Frankly, when it comes to taxes I trust my neighbors in Centennial more than I trust the state legislature.

Sincerely,

Cathy Noon

Chair, Centennial Home Rule Charter Commission