You should vote “Yes”……to change your mailing address to “ Henrico, VA”

      “Important Survey About Possible Postal Change”

 

        If you live in Henrico and you have ever paid for anything on line, from a catalog, or from a Shopping Channel on television, the sales taxes you paid could have been paid to the City of Richmond, since your mailing address says "Richmond, VA". Many taxes are paid according to the “mailing” address. This amounts to millions of dollars a year in lost revenue for Henrico County.

 

        Around May 1, 2008, a post card from the U.S. Postal Service will arrive at more than 84,600 county addresses in eleven Zip Codes in Henrico County. The Zip Codes that will receive the survey are: 23075, 23228, 23229, 23231, 23233, 23238, 23242, 23250, 23255, 23288, 23294.

 

        Residences in other localities will not receive a post card. 

 

        The "problem" is NOT with the City of Richmond.

 

        Here is an example of how this occurs. When you purchase a computer on-line, airline tickets or hotel reservations (example: from Priceline.com  or any of the on-line ticket services), or if you purchase clothing from any catalog company (example: L.L. Bean), your mailing address says "Richmond, VA."    The on-line service or the catalog service collects your sales tax and marks the box of "Richmond, VA" on a self-reporting sales tax form, from the Department of Taxation. The State of Virginia then distributes the funds to localities based on the mailing address marked on the form.

 

        The state receives one check from a national corporation, or Priceline, or Dell, or L.L. Bean -- or any on-line company or catalog company -- for ONE amount for all sales made in the state that month. The state cannot get a break-down of the individual customers, since that is privately kept by the companies.

          This is only one example of many, that this miscoding occurs.

          This year’s tax loss to Henrico is about $5 Million.

 

     I MUST be in favor of the change. It is a matter of accuracy and fairness.

 

        Please be an informed voter.

 

To learn more, go to Henrico’s web site:  www.co.henrico.va.us