Churchill County’s taxable sales flat for February

Taxable sales increased 5.1 percent in February compared to the same month of 2015.

The total was just more than $4 billion for the month.

Churchill County’s numbers were essentially flat at $19.87 million. For the year, the numbers are up 3.7 percent over February 2015 to $185.8 million. While Food Services and Drinking Places saw a 132 percent increase to $2.86 million, and Building Material sales rose 18.5 percent to $1.5 million, auto sales wiped out most of those gains with a 19.1 percent decrease to $3.59 million.

Technically, Churchill finished the month with a decrease in total taxable sales of two-tenths of a percent.

Comptroller Alan Kalt said he will further check into the numbers for Food Services and Drinking Places because of the unusual spike in taxable sales.

Because 2016 is a leap year, there was one additional day for retail in February.

He pointed to Merchant Wholesalers, Durable Goods which increased 15 percent to $1.1 million. General Merchandise Stores, such as Walmart, increased 4.8 percent, but clothing dropped 48 percent. Sporting goods rose 20 percent to $195,781.

According to the monthly report, Kalt said a correction of an error occurred in Heavy and Civil Engineering Construction, which was corrected to a loss of $802,007.

“It appears there were various audit correction posted in the moth of February as noted by the negative numbers,” he said.

Lyon County was down 3.2 percent to just more than $27 million. Auto sales dipped 12 percent to $3.35 million there, neatly offset by the 9 percent increase in General Merchandise Store sales at $3 million.

Carson City did better for the month, recording a 9.3 percent increase to $71.7 million led by auto sales, traditionally the capital’s largest sales tax generator. That category accounted for $21.1 million of the total, a 15.1 percent increase.

General Merchandise Stores, the capital’s second largest generator, reported a 3.8 percent increase to just more than $11 million. Food Services and Drinking Places reported $8.3 million in taxable sales, an 11.3 percent increase, and Wholesaler’s of Durable Goods a 38 percent increase to a bit more than $5 million.

Those same categories were key to the statewide increase as well with auto sales up 10 percent, and Food Services and Drinking Places up 6.3 percent. Wholesale Durable Goods reported a 6.8 percent rise statewide.

But statewide, construction industry categories were down for the first time in a number of months — by 8.5 percent in February. Carson did better there with Building Material sales up to $6.98 million — albeit just a 2 percent gain.

Like Carson City, Douglas County had an excellent February, gaining 10.6 percent to $47.48 million.

The key there was Food Services and Drinking Places — primarily the casinos at south Lake Tahoe, which is Douglas’s largest tax generator. Those resorts logged $12.7 million in sales, a 24.8 percent increase over the same month of 2015.

But auto sales also were up sharply — 47.1 percent to $2.7 million — and General Merchandise Stores increased 6 percent to $6.9 million.

Those gains were, however, offset by an 18.2 percent decrease in Building Material Sales.

In addition, Esmeralda, Eureka, Humboldt, Lander, Mineral, Pershing and White Pine counties all recorded decreases.

“The rural and mining counties continue to see negative numbers that reflect the reduction in the price of gold,” Kalt said.

While Clark County gained 3.7 percent to a bit more than $3 billion in total sales, Washoe County boosted the statewide total significantly with a 20.5 percent increase to $589.6 million in February. A significant part of that increase was in taxable sales by hospitals which rose from $683,497 a year ago to $20.1 million.

In addition, auto sales were up 18.6 percent to $86.7 million in Washoe.

Despite a solid February, Taxation officials say the General Fund portion of the sales tax is still 1.4 percent or $10 million below the Economic Forum forecast used to build the state budget.