PEORIA, Ill. – The city of Peoria has joined other communities across central Illinois in implementing a new grocery tax.
City council unanimously approved a local 1% tax at its Tuesday night meeting. It’s set to replace a similar state tax, when it expires at the end of the year. Peoria joins Washington, East Peoria, and Pekin in implementing the tax.
Other solutions to the grocery tax included increasing the city’s sales tax by .25% to .50%, which would have raised somewhere between an additional $4.3 million to $8.6 million. Finance did not suggest those options to the council because of a desire to keep sales tax rates competitive with surrounding communities.
Finance Director Kyle Cratty told council that the city could lose $5 million in revenues without the grocery tax. If it wasn’t approved, the city would have to consider cuts to services in the city. Those proposed in council documents include eliminating Rescue #1 in the Fire Department, which provides emergency medical responses; as well as eliminating the Traffic Division in the Police Department and the Public Works’ Preventative Maintenance Program.
At-Large Councilwoman Bernice Gordon-Young says the city could not afford to sacrifice those services for something that is already in existence.
“We cannot save money at the risk of losing lives, and also losing jobs and livelihood,” Gordon-Young said.
Mayor Rita Ali says the idea to eliminate a grocery tax was conceptually good, but was done without any consideration to impacts on local municipalities.
Even though he voted to approve the tax, At-Large Councilman Zach Oyler was not in favor of how the process played out. He raised concerns about voting on the tax without full budget projections for revenues and expenses from the city, calling it “half-baked.”
“In effect, this is purely politically motivated that we’re sitting here having this discussion tonight and taking this vote, without the information that we need to make this decision, as well as without the people who will be responsible for making this decision,” Oyler said.
Oyler also criticized the timing of the vote, in terms of not waiting for the new council to be seated before taking such action.
Corporation Counsel Michael Hayes says the reasoning for the vote is to have it on file with the state before an October 1st deadline.
After the meeting had completed, Oyler made a formal request to reconsider the vote at the May 13th city council meeting. Oyler had stated his intentions to do so before the vote took place.
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