OPINION: New State Park Sales Tax Will Be Problematic

Visitors of Hammonasset in Madison, Rocky Neck in East Lyme, and Sherwood Island State Park in Westport could soon be visiting parks that will be incurring additional expenses, stressed out staff, long lines, and irate customers as the result of a new 6.35% sales tax being added to parking fees.

The Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP) stated the new tax begins Jul. 18 for those parks while 22 other Connecticut State Parks will begin collecting taxes in the future.

According to a press release, DEEP “encourages park goers to have exact change if possible at the ticket booths, and to be patient as the staff work to educate visitors about the added sales tax.”

It is the first time a sales tax has been added to those fees.

Surprise

Rather than bringing the provision up for public hearings or soliciting input from state agencies, the new tax was added to the state budget at the last minute. The Connecticut Forest and Park Association (CFPA) said that “many legislators were likely unaware of this new provision in the budget and our friends at CT DEEP were certainly not aware of this new law that they are now scrambling to comply with.”

On the CFPA Facebook page, a representative of the association called the tax was called an “ill-conceived idea that was hidden in the budget.” While some commenters questioned the tax’s legality, CFPA stated that “it is legal because it was part of the state budget that the legislature passed and the governor signed.”

Paying More

Shoreline and inland parks as well as yearly state park and forest passes will be affected, according to the CFPA.

The new tax would mean CT residents visiting shoreline parks on weekdays would now 57 cents, bringing up the total to $9.57, and non-residents will be charged another 95 cents, bringing the total up to $15.95.

On weekends, CT residents visiting shoreline parks would pay another 83 cents, forcing them to pay $13.83. Non-residents would have to pay another $1.40, bringing the total up to $23.40.

While there still will be no charge on weekdays at select inland parks, on weekends CT residents would pay 57 cents more a visit, bringing the total up to $9.57, while non-residents would be charged 95 cents more for a total of $15.95.

Annual passes for residents would rise by $4.25 for a total of $71.25 and non-residents would be shelling out another $7.75, bringing the fee up to $129.75.

Hurting Park Users

Friends of Connecticut State Parks (FCSP) President Pamela Adams stated in a letter that implementation of the new tax will cause “public safety problems” as lines on summer weekends will become even bigger as it will take longer to process transactions involving change than it did with whole-dollar amounts. She explained that seasonal staff will bear the brunt of complaints from the public for these delays and price increases.

The new sales tax will “require vast quantities of change to be available at all times” and that “thousands of dollars of coins will have to be at the ready in the ticket booths for large shoreline parks.”

This could force parks to purchase new registers as the current ones “are not big enough to accommodate the volume of change that will be needed.”

While the state’s largest shoreline parks can accept credit cards, most customers pay with cash.

CFPA said that the new tax will force short-staffed parks to take time away from park maintenance so they can shuttle change to banks. A CFPA representation said that it’s possible that “Brinks trucks full of change will start camping at state parks.”

The CFPA called the new tax “a byproduct of bad government. Too few eyes were analyzing the budget, negotiations were squeezed into too small of a time window, and “mistakes” like this are the unfortunate result.”

“We ask the Governor to find a “fix” for this situation before too many residents and visitors get frustrated with long lines and inadequate services at the state parks, or they simply stop coming altogether. There are approximately 8 million people who visit Connecticut’s State Parks every year. If people stopped visiting the parks (camping and parking fees have generated revenues close to $6 million/year over the past few years), that would ultimately cost the state much more revenue than this new CT sales tax will ever raise.”

While the CFPA stated the new tax is estimated to provide about $210,000 more to the state in annual revenues, they explain that “this sales tax adds insult to injury since the revenue raised from admissions/parking fees already does not go to support the state parks; it goes directly to the CT General Fund. So, now you will pay more money to get in, and the money still won’t benefit the parks directly.”

Adams noted that “in 2010, FCSP fought off a legislatively proposed doubling of fees through our “Ease the Fees” campaign. At that time, the legislature settled upon a 35 percent increase which was onerous enough. Now we see an effective increase of another 6.35 percent. What have the state parks received in return for these increases? A substantial budget cut to parks this year and the next…and the likelihood that positions for coming retirees will likely not be back filled.”

Future Legislation

Adams promised that this would be a “priority issue for the next legislative session” for FSCP.

Affected Parks

The 25 parks affected by the new tax are expected to include:

1. Bigelow Hollow in Union*

2. Black Rock in Watertown

3. Burr Pond in Torrington

4. Chatfield Hollow in Killingworth

5. Gay City in Hebron*

6. Hammonasset in Madison

7. Harkness Memorial in Waterford

8. Hopeville Pond in Griswold*

9. Indian Well in Shelton

10. Kent Falls in Kent*

11. Kettletown in Southbury*

12. Lake Waramaug in Kent*

13. Mashamoquet Brook in Pomfret*

14. Mount Tom in Litchfield

15. Quaddick in Thompson*

16. Rocky Neck in East Lyme

17. Sherwood Island in Westport

18. Sleeping Giant in Hamden*

19. Squantz Pond in New Fairfield

20. Stratton Brook in Simsbury*

21. Wadsworth Falls in Middlefield and Middletown*

22. Wharton Brook in Wallingford*

23. Cockaponset in Chester and Haddam*

24. Pachaug Green Falls in Voluntown*

25. People’s in Barkhamsted*

*=fees only charged on weekends/holidays only