April 30, 2008

Letter to the Editor:

Our city continues to have financial difficulties. Our schools face financial difficulties and layoffs. There are several ways to address this problem – increase property taxes, increase licensing and other fees, or increase the sales tax rate. We still believe that the solution is to increase sales tax revenue by increasing the volume of sales rather than the sales tax rate. We believe that allowing the legal sales of alcohol would accomplish this goal.

Those who currently purchase alcohol in other cities would be able to support Arab with their purchases. We would draw customers from the surrounding area as well. The economic impact study that we commissioned in 2006 indicated that by allowing legal sales of alcohol we would attract restaurants and other retail businesses to our city and that over a ten year period we could see sales tax revenue increase by over a million dollars a year. That projection is based strictly on sales tax and does not include the additional alcohol taxes.

Let me make clear that there are two sources of revenue involved. The one that people think of first is the alcohol tax. When you buy a bottle of beer or a glass of wine, the alcohol tax is already included in the price, and is turned in to the state, which distributes it back to the cities and counties. In addition to that, there is sales tax on the alcohol and on any meal that is served with it, or on the groceries that are purchased with it. The sales tax revenue is thus increased not just by the alcohol purchase, but also by the other items that are purchased with it. Too much of Arab’s money is currently being spent in other cities.

Given the current economic slowdown it may take a bit longer to see the full revenue results, but it would put Arab on a more level playing field for competing with other cities in the area for new businesses. Our existing restaurants, groceries and convenience stores would have the option of selling beer and wine and the people of Arab could make their purchases here rather than driving into Guntersville or Huntsville to spend their money.

We lost the 2006 referendum by 18 votes. Since then we have heard again and again that “I wish I had voted”. We have also had many new people moving into Arab from other parts of the country who indicate that they would support us in a new election. We believe that with your help, we can win a sales referendum in 2008.

Citizens For Arab’s Future will have a booth at the Arab Poke Salat Festival on Friday and Saturday, 2-3 May 2008. We invite all registered voters in Arab to come by and sign our petition. We will also be registering voters, so if you will be 18 before the next election (the state and county primary on 3 June) please come by and register to vote now.

Petitions and voter registration information is also available on our website at www.citizensforarabsfuture.org.

Thank you.

Linda Morris
Citizens For Arab’s Future
P.O. Box 786
Arab, AL 35016