{"id":2637,"date":"2007-12-13T11:13:00","date_gmt":"2007-12-13T17:13:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2007\/12\/state-agrees-to-delay-collection-of-spaceport-tax\/"},"modified":"2007-12-13T11:13:00","modified_gmt":"2007-12-13T17:13:00","slug":"state-agrees-to-delay-collection-of-spaceport-tax","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2007\/12\/state-agrees-to-delay-collection-of-spaceport-tax\/","title":{"rendered":"State agrees to delay collection of spaceport tax"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>The state Taxation and Revenue Department has agreed to delay collection of the spaceport tax in Do\u00f1a Ana County<\/a> after the Attorney General\u2019s Office said doing so was appropriate. <\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The AG opinion, which you can read by clicking here<\/a>, concludes that the tax \u201cmay not be imposed, collected or enforced absent the formation of a regional spaceport district to which the proceeds of the tax can be allocated.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The Taxation and Revenue Department has agreed, because of that, to delay collection, the Las Cruces Sun-News<\/a> is reporting.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\u201cI believe our plan is to defer collection, as the attorney general said we could do,\u201d Carolyn Wolf, chief counsel for the Taxation and Revenue Department, told the newspaper.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Voters in Do\u00f1a Ana County narrowly approved earlier this year the 1\/4 percent increase in the gross receipts tax to help fund Spaceport America<\/a>, but later voted to delay collection, which had been scheduled to start on Jan. 1, until at least July because voters in Sierra and Otero counties haven\u2019t yet decided whether to implement the tax. State law doesn\u2019t allow the money to be spent unless at least two governments form a regional district, and commissioners said they didn\u2019t want to collect tax money that may never be spent for the purpose for which it was approved.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The decision to delay the tax halts the possibility of legal action. A delay was backed by the New Mexico Spaceport Authority<\/a>, but the Taxation and Revenue Department said previously that the county\u2019s vote to delay the tax wasn\u2019t valid because it could only be delayed by amending or repealing the ordinance that allowed the April tax election. There wasn\u2019t time to do that before the tax was to take effect, and commissioners had discussed the possibility of suing to delay collection.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The AG opinion, authored by Assistant Attorney General Elizabeth Glenn, was sought by state Rep. Joni Gutierrez<\/a>, D-Mesilla.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Glenn wrote that the county\u2019s interpretation of the tax-district law \u2013 that it could adopt the tax before a regional district was created \u2013 came from an ambiguity in state law but was not the intent of the Legislature. Glenn wrote that the Legislature intended for at least two local governments to form a tax district before any adopted a tax increase.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\u201cBecause the county enacted the tax prematurely under the law, we conclude that the Taxation and Revenue Department may properly defer enforcement of the tax until a district is created,\u201d Glenn wrote.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Wolf told the Sun-News that a letter will be sent to businesses in Do\u00f1a<\/st1:placename> Ana<\/st1:placename> County<\/st1:placename><\/st1:place> notifying them of the situation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The state Taxation and Revenue Department has agreed to delay collection of the spaceport tax in Do\u00f1a Ana County after the Attorney General\u2019s Office said doing so was appropriate. The AG opinion, which you can read by clicking here, concludes that the tax \u201cmay not be imposed, collected or enforced absent the formation of a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2637","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2637","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2637"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2637\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2637"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2637"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2637"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}