By almost a two to one margin, Horry County voters said yes to a one-cent increase in sales tax on Tuesday.
The tax will go to help with the ever-increasing capital needs of the Horry County School District and part of it will filter over to Coastal Carolina University and Horry-Georgetown Technical College.
School officials and business leaders expressed surprise Wednesday at the overwhelming approval of the tax. With the recent downturn in the economy, many feared that the word “tax” would be the death knell for any proposal.
A concerted effort touting the proposal to lower property tax over the next two years and replace the lost revenue with the new penny sales tax apparently was the winning strategy.
Eighty percent of the tax will go toward the ever-increasing need for capital projects in the school district. CCU will get 13.3 percent of the revenue and Horry-Georgetown Tech will get 6.7 percent.
School district spokesperson Teal Brittian said the tax will begin to be collected in March of 2009.
“It will be a year before the property tax rollback will show up on tax bills because of the way fiscal year billing is done.
Like a recent statewide sales tax addition, the new tax will cover all goods and services except gas, most food and prescriptions, Brittian said.
A one-cent sales tax was approved by county voters two years ago but was struck down by the state Supreme Court because of complaints that unfair campaign materials were distributed in the polling places.
