It is no secret that the economy in the United States has not been doing the best in recent years. People are out of work; with less disposable income comes a lot less spending. Something you don’t hear every day though is that with fewer people making an income and hence spending a lot less than they once did the government is not able to collect taxes like they did before the economy went south.

People do tend to take what the government does for granted at times. We have grown so accustomed to it and the services it provides being there no matter what that we forget that everything that the government does takes money; no taxes means no money.

The state of Illinois had a couple of different ways in which it was considering making up for its budget shortcomings. One way involved service oriented businesses like the self storage industry was going to get hit with a service tax. Of course a service tax would mean self storage owners would be forced to raise prices or take a hit to their profit margin.

The Illinois Self Storage Association of course lobbied against the proposed bill along with the  national Self Storage Association and lobby firm Cook-Witter. Luckily for the self storage industry and the 44 other service industries that would have been affected, the 96^th Illinois General Assembly decided against approving a service tax. Instead it opted to pass Senate Bill 2505 which increased corporate and income tax by 66 percent.

It was language within the proposed amendment to House Bill 1665 that concerned self storage owners the most. ISSA wanted to make certain that the lawmakers understood that there is a distinction between warehousing and storage and self storage. Had the bill passed the language did indicate that warehouses and storage facilities would be included as one of the industries that would be facing an additional tax.

The fight is not completely over for self storage owners though. When the state legislature returns for the 97^th General Assembly there is a strong likelihood that taxation issues will come up yet again. The ISSA is ready for this and will be taking an aggressive approach in its lobbying efforts.

ISSA is currently working on an amendment to the Self Storage Act that will clear up some language in areas like lien notifications, late fees, validation limits, and vehicle removal. The bill is being worked on at the Legislative Reference Bureau, but once it is done ISSA will be stepping up its efforts to find a sponsor for the bill.

Sources Used:

“Illinois Self-Storage Operators Officially Celebrate: No Service Tax.” Inside Self Storage; 13 January 2011.

“Illinois Self-Storage Operators May Have Dodged Service-Tax Bullet ... Again.” Inside Self Storage; 07 January 2011.

“Questions Persisting as Illinois Raises Taxes.” New York Times; 12 January 2011.