JEFFERSON CITY – Gov. Jay Nixon today signed House Bill 2140, which provides a two-year extension for jurisdictions that do not have a use tax to hold a vote on the local sales tax for motor vehicles, trailers, boats and outboard motors purchased from private sellers or out-of-state dealers and then titled in Missouri.
A bill passed in 2013 re-instated the local sales tax that historically had been collected on such purchases and set a deadline of November 2016 for the issue to be on local ballots for voter approval. HB2140 extends the time for those jurisdictions to hold the vote until November 2018. Local jurisdictions must submit the sales tax for voter approval by that time or stop collecting the tax on March 1, 2019. If the voters reject the measure or the local jurisdiction fails to put the issue on the ballot by November 2018, HB2140 also the measure to be on the ballot in the future.
The General Assembly passed the 2013 bill as a remedy for lost sales and tax revenue that resulted from a 2012 Missouri Supreme Court decision in Street v. Department of Revenue. The court found that jurisdictions that did not have a use tax could not collect local sales taxes on out-of-state purchases of motor vehicles, trailers, boats and outboard motors that were titled in Missouri.
HB2140 also creates the “Missouri Task Force on Fair, Nondiscriminatory, Local Taxation Concerning Motor Vehicles, Trailers, Boats, and Outboard Motors” to review the topic and submit a report to the Governor and General Assembly by Dec. 31, 2017.
