Section 47 Special Statutes and Specific Taxes

• Library: Tax Law 2009

In 1971, the legislature adopted The Municipal Land Reutilization Law, §§ 92.700–92.920, RSMo 2000 and Supp. 2007, which applies to the City of St. Louis. Essentially, The Municipal Land Reutilization Law provides an expeditious and simplified procedure under which the city may move against large tracts of land for back taxes to make the land available for urban renewal, development, and growth.

Under the City Sales Tax Act, §§ 94.500–94.550, RSMo 2000, any incorporated city, town, or village in Missouri, by majority vote of its governing body and the voters voting on the question, may impose a city sales tax. The imposition of the tax collected shall be in accordance with the ranges or brackets identified in § 94.510, RSMo 2000.

Fairly recently, the ability of a municipality to impose a gross receipts business license tax on providers of wireless telephone service has been at issue. Many cities that had for years imposed such a tax on providers of telephone and telephone service sought to enforce the application of the tax to the wireless telephone providers, most of whom were supplying both wireless and landline services. The wireless providers refused to pay the tax, arguing that wireless service was not “telephone service.” Several municipalities filed a class action suit against the wireless providers. In 2005, during the course of the litigation, the legislature enacted House Bill 209, known as the “Municipal Telecommunications Business License Tax Simplification Act,” codified as §§...