Residents gather at bar to protest BPOL tax

By Uriah A. Kiser

Published: July 31, 2008

STAFFORD — A group of disgruntled business owners and politicians met at a North Stafford bar on Tuesday night with one goal - oust the Democrats.

What was billed as a grassroots meeting to overturn Stafford’s new Business and Professional Licensing tax, or BPOL, was held Monday night at Main Street Bar and Grill. And what is usually a bar filled with people looking to relax became an establishment filled with business owners looking to vent on why they think this tax stinks.

“We are a small business and will have to pass the tax along to our customers…the county is pricing is out of the market,“ said Ben Halloway, co-owner of a Stafford-based heating and air conditioning service.

The first-year business owner said he learned about the new tax after it was too late.

He and his partner Shane Koenig came to the meeting to talk with other owners about the tax, and because Koenig is neighbors with the event’s organizer and bar owner, Chrissy Sharon.

Sharon has owned the bar since January 2006, and learned of the tax through an e-mail sent by Stafford Supervisor Paul Milde, R-Aquia, before it passed. The e-mail was an effort to rally people to speak against the measure at a board of supervisors’ meeting, where it passed, on July 1. She went to the meeting and pleaded with the board members not to pass the tax, she said. BPOL was voted in 4-3, with Milde, Mark Dudenhefer, R-Garrisonville and Cord Sterling, R-Rock Hill, voting against.

“What kind of businesswoman would I be to sit in front of these men and cry, I mean with tears down my face, like a big baby, wrote Sharon in an e-mail to the Stafford County Sun. “At first I was mad at the four members of the board that voted for the BPOL. But I realize that I should also be mad at myself for not paying attention to what was going on in our county.“

BPOL is a tax that is collected on businesses gross receipts, not net profits like conventional commercial taxes. Under Stafford County’s BPOL tax policy, receipts under $200,000 would be exempt from the tax. Businesses with receipts less than the threshold will pay a $50 licensing fee to the county. The county will only charge half of the maximum rate allowed by the state and cap the total amount collected from a business to $150,000. The tax will be collected in 2010.

Stafford was one of the last jurisdictions in the Commonwealth to enact a BPOL tax.

The large area insurance provider, Geico, is exempt from the BPOL tax, as they pay a similar tax directly to the Commonwealth, according to Scott Mayausky, Stafford’s commissioner of the revenue.

“The first thing that I will attempt to do is repeal BPOL at the first meeting after the 2009 election,“ said Milde.

Some area business owners and Republicans in attendance said they were pinning their hopes on the November 2009 election, hoping to replace the sitting Democrats, Chairman George Schwartz, D- Falmouth, Harry Crisp, D-Ferry Farm and Bob Woodson, D-Griffis-Widewater. They also targeted the board’s only independent, Joe Brito from Hartwood, together calling them the “four horsemen.“

The seats of Schwartz, Brito, Milde and Dudenhefer will all be up for election next year.

With a Republican majority GOP board members say they can repeal the tax.

“I know what the loopholes are in this ordinance that will make this easy to overturn, but we can’t file a lawsuit right now. It’s too early,“ said Richard Nageotte, a Stafford attorney who fought the tax. “If we file one now that will give the four horsemen enough time to fix the loopholes.“

Nageotte told the crowd that he needed financial support from local business owners to begin the litigation process to over turn the tax. Milde said they would need to start building a constituency to vote out the Democrats next year, and asked for potential GOP candidates to come forward. Milde said the average
campaign for supervisor now costs more than $80,000.

“During the last elections the [Fredericksburg Regional Chamber of Commerce] didn’t want to get involved because they didn’t want to upset anybody,“ said Wendy Surman, with Stafford’s Economic Development Authority. “These Democrats ran on the promise of passing BPOL, and now they have given you what
they have promised.“