Virginia retailers are not happy with Gov. Terry McAuliffe's plans to juice state revenues next year by rolling back rollbacks on an unpopular sales tax collection plan.
The current Accelerated Sales Tax program goes back to 2010, and the state has used it ever since to varying degrees to balance the budget. It requires retailers to pay sales tax to the state a month earlier than usual, but only in June, the last month of the fiscal year.
That gives the state a last-minute revenue jolt, but by relying on revenue hat would otherwise get collected the following budget year. Even McAuliffe has called the maneuver "a lot of hocus pocus," and he pushed in his budget last year to roll back usage significantly, affecting fewer businesses.
