Eating out to become a bit cheaper

PROVO — Dining out in Utah County will be a tiny bit cheaper next year.

Utah County commissioners, by a 2-1 vote Tuesday, reduced the countywide tourism, recreation, cultural and convention tax on prepared food and beverages sold in restaurants by 0.05 percent for 2007.

The county's already-low TRCC tax, commonly called the restaurant tax, will drop from 0.7 percent to 0.65 percent. It's the third reduction in as many years for the county, which has collected the tax since 1992.

For restaurant diners, the tax cut equates to a discount of 5 cents on a $100 meal bill.

And that means instead of paying $31.10 for a tenderloin filet and shrimp dinner at the Chef's Table in Orem, diners will pay $31.08.

It may not sound like much, but the restaurant tax has created an annual surplus of millions of dollars for Utah County. Commissioners have lowered the rate in an effort to reduce that surplus.

For 2006, the county has about $6 million in surplus that will need to be appropriated. In 2005, the 0.9 percent restaurant tax resulted in an extra $7.1 million, and the 1 percent tax in '04 and '03 created surpluses of $5.7 million and $4.4 million, respectively.

Commission Chairman Larry Ellertson voted against lowering the tax rate, saying there are tourism and recreation projects being discussed for which the money could be used.

"I think there are some good, valid investments that could be made," Ellertson said. "Therefore, I was prepared and comfortable with leaving (the restaurant tax at 0.7 percent) so we can move forward on those projects."

Commissioners Steve White and Jerry Grover expressed reservation in collecting tax money for projects that haven't formerly been presented to the commission.

"Until (a project) comes before the commission in a budget proposal, we can't do anything with it," White said.

The commission's decision Tuesday doesn't prohibit the county from revisiting the issue in 2007, he said. If the county wants to contribute restaurant tax funds to a project and needs to increase the tax to do so, that can be done through a vote of commissioners.

At 0.7 percent, Utah County has the lowest rate of any of the 25 counties that collect the restaurant tax, according to the Utah State Tax Commission.

All of the other participating counties are taxing at the full 1 percent allowed.

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