About Home Rule

Opt for State Collection of Sales Tax

With the recent changes (Dec 2018) in the sales tax laws in the wake of the Supreme Court's Wayfair decision, the status quo between State administered and City administered sales tax collection has swung wildly in favor of State collection. We can still elect to be a home rule city but we should continue to elect for State collection of our sales taxes. The changes relate to sales tax sourcing and collection rules, and the result is that State will now enforce the collection of local taxes for state collected jurisdictions (e.g. our City) even if the seller doesn't have a physical presence in the City. This means that going forward the state would collect taxes from remote sellers including out-of-state sellers (e.g. internet vendors) and Colorado sellers with no physical presence in Castle Pines. If we elect City administration we would have to enforce those collections ourselves which seems burdensome and unlikely that a small city like ours would be able to contact out of state vendors who make sales into our city and try to enforce them to pay. The Wayfair decision only applies to States. FYI - There is much misinformation out there regarding the pros and cons of State versus City managed tax collection but please know that since 2011 when the State implemented it's new tax system, when the State collects sales taxes that include state collected local taxes, the local taxes get paid first. At that time they also opened access to return information and auditing/review capability for locals including cities, counties and special districts.