Commissioners put permanent sales tax on ballot

YOUNGSTOWN — Mahoning County commissioners voted unanimously this afternoon to place a permanent half-percent sales tax on the May 8 ballot. Commissioners took their action today, a day before Thursday's 4 p.m. filing deadline at the county board of elections.

If the tax fails, Anthony T. Traficanti, chairman of the county commissioners, said after the meeting that the county would probably go into fiscal emergency. “The jail would be closed,” he added.

If the commissioners were facing closing of the jail, Traficanti said he believes they would impose the tax. “We would have no choice,’’ he said. About 70 percent of the county’s general fund goes to judicial and law enforcement spending.

Each of the county’s two half-percent sales taxes generates about $14 million a year for the county’s general fund, which is its main operating fund, for a total of about $28 million. The two taxes combined constitute more than 57 percent of the county’s $49.6 million general fund budget for 2007. One of the taxes expires at the end of this year and the other in two years.