Myrtle Beach dwellers to see fees rise

Myrtle Beach residents will begin paying more for stormwater and solid waste services July 1, a provision of the 2010-2011 budget passed Tuesday by the City Council, but some will also see a bigger property tax credit starting this fall.

The monthly solid waste fee for a household with one or two "pelicans," or large blue garbage containers, is $19.50, and will go up to $20.50. The charge for additional pelicans will go to $8.50 from $8 a month. The service includes garbage collection, recycling and bulky junk and yard-waste pickup, said city spokesman Mark Kruea.

"It's one of the few remaining bargains out there," he said. "It takes money to provide service."

The stormwater management bills come as part of the city utility bill, as do the garbage fees. For a single-family home, the stormwater fee is $4.25 per equivalent residential unit. One ERU equals 5,000 square feet of impervious surface, such as roof and driveway area. All single-family homes and duplexes are charged for one ERU.

On commercial property, the impervious space is fully calculated, so businesses are charged by exactly how much they have.

The fee for an ERU is going up to $5 - the first increase since the fee was implemented about 10 years ago, Kruea said. The money is used to maintain the city's stormwater system - ditches, lakes, ponds - and to buy more rights of way for more drainage, Kruea said.

The fees haven't always covered the cost of providing the service, Kruea said, and "this is an attempt to have the service pay for itself."

City leaders will also make the promised property tax credit available for resident property owners beginning this fall.

The tax credit comes as part of the implementation of the 1 percent sales tax within city limits to pay for tourism promotion.

The Myrtle Beach Area Chamber of Commerce gets most of that tax revenue, which comes in quarterly payments and had, as of March, generated $9,333,337 since the tax went into effect Aug. 1.

"We are a little ahead of projections," Kruea said, "which indicates the economy is doing better than people expected. And we haven't collected for the busiest three months yet."

The next quarterly payment is expected in late July and will cover April, May and June, and the July-August-September check will come in October.

The law that allows cities to impose the extra sales tax also says that resident property owners will get some tax relief. The law originally said that after the second year of sales tax collections, the city would get 20 percent of the tax revenue and could only use it for two purposes: a tax credit for resident property owners and to pay for tourism-related projects.

The city petitioned the legislature to change the law and allow the city to give the tax credit after the first year of collections, and the law was changed.

City leaders elected to give an 88.5 percent property tax credit to resident property owners.

But they didn't originally explain that, because the tax went into effect two-thirds of the way through the calendar year, which is also Horry County's tax year, the tax credit would be pro-rated for the first year.

The city anticipates allocating $2.3 million in credit so property owners will receive the full credit this year.

The city will likely have to borrow some money from the general fund now, because of the lag between collections and quarterly payments, said budget director Michael Shelton.

The city said it plans to send notice about the credit with the county's fall tax notices.

The city's property tax millage is 64.4 mills, 7.3 of which is used for debt service. That amount cannot be reduced because it pays down bond debt for projects the city has already built and other fiscal obligations.

But the rest of the millage is used for city operations, and can be credited.

The tax credit only applies to property tax paid to the city of Myrtle Beach, not to Horry County or Horry County Schools.

It's still unclear how the Horry County property reassessment is going to affect the city's millage rate, which fluctuates to maintain the amount of revenue generated without a tax increase.

Shelton said the latest word he has received on when the reassessment will be finished is "later this summer."

"The millage is likely to change because of the reassessment," Kruea said, "but the benefit to homeowners will remain the same."