KEWAUNEE, WI (WTAQ) – People in Kewaunee County will soon be paying a bit more on purchases.
The county board voted Tuesday night to add a half-percent sales tax starting in April.
Here’s county board chair Robert Weidner….
“In view of most of the board members it’s a fair tax, it’s a tax on consuming, the more you consume the higher the tax is. Not all taxes are fair, but this is the fairest we could think of”
The tax was proposed because the county said since the Dominion Power Plant shut down in 2013, the county has lost about seven percent of its annual budget.
But some board members, like Chris Rasmussen, say more could have been done before adding this sales tax.
“I just don’t think people know what’s really going on and I think the best way to have done it would have been through a referendum and if we had that good of a case, we could make a case to the public, but unfortunately the board felt otherwise”
The half-percent sales tax will go into effect in April and is due to sunset by the end of December 2021.
The county expects it to bring in more than $750,000 each year.
With the added half-percent, sales tax in Kewaunee County will be 5.5 percent.
Currently 62 of the state’s 72 counties have a sales tax. Sheboygan County added the tax, effective Jan. 1, making it 63. Kewaunee County will make it 64.
