The Creve Coeur City Council has adopted a resolution encouraging the Missouri General Assembly to pass the Wayfair internet sales tax legislation. Passed during the City Council meeting on April 27, 2020, Resolution No. 1484 encourages the Missouri House and Senate to immediately pass the Wayfair Tax Legislation without counterproductive revenue neutral provisions.

The proposed legislation, including SB529 and SB648, would update the existing use tax laws in Missouri to ensure that all retailers with an economic nexus in the state will be required to remit use tax, placing these retailers on equal footing with retailers with physical stores in the state. 

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, Creve Coeur and other Missouri cities were already seeing a decline in revenues due to consumers’ shift away from local retail and instead toward online purchases without sales tax collection. The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated the challenge of lost local sales tax revenue collections as consumers are purchasing more online, further shifting buying habits.

The 2018 ruling in the U.S. Supreme Court case South Dakota vs. Wayfair has led to 43 of 45 states with statewide sales tax to adopt legislation to begin collecting sales tax revenue for online vendors that do not have a physical presence in their state. Missouri is one of two remaining states that have not passed an e-commerce use tax.

If legislation is adopted by the General Assembly, cities seeking to implement a local use tax would require majority approval by voters in a future election.