AN ACT Relating to revenue and taxation; amending RCW 82.16.020; adding a new chapter to Title 82 RCW; and prescribing penalties.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON:

NEW SECTION. Sec. 1. The legislature finds that in recent years a deteriorating infrastructure, environmental problems, the need for safe and efficient transportation, and other concerns have placed increasing demands on local government treasuries. While responsibility for some of these concerns has heretofore been delegated to local governments, the legislature declares that these concerns, coupled with the financial strain on local treasuries, have reached such a magnitude that they now and for the foreseeable future will significantly affect the general welfare of this state and its citizens. Therefore, in response to requests by local governments for a device through which they may collect and share revenues through a general fund, the legislature adopts this chapter.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 2. For purposes of this chapter:

(1) "Refuse collection business" means every person who receives waste for transfer, storage, or disposal including but not limited to all collection services, public or private dumps, transfer stations, and similar operations.

(2) "Person" shall have the meaning given in RCW 82.04.030 or any later, superseding section.

(3) "Waste" means garbage, trash, rubbish, or other material discarded as worthless or not economically viable for further use. The term does not include hazardous or toxic waste nor does it include material collected primarily for recycling or salvage.

(4) "Taxpayer" means that person upon whom the refuse collection tax is imposed.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 3. There is imposed on each person using the services of a refuse collection business a refuse collection tax equal to three and seventy-nine one-hundredths percent of the consideration charged for the services.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 4. The tax imposed in section 3 of this act shall be collected by the person who collects the consideration charged for using the refuse collection business. If any person charged with collecting the tax fails to bill the taxpayer for the tax or having collected the tax, fails to pay it to the department in the manner prescribed by this chapter, whether such failure is the result of the person's own acts or the result of acts or conditions beyond the person's control, he or she shall, nevertheless, be personally liable to the state for the amount of the tax.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 5. Taxes collected under this chapter shall be held in trust until paid to the state. Taxes so received by the state shall be deposited in the public works assistance account created in RCW 43.155.050. Any person collecting the tax who appropriates or converts the tax collected shall be guilty of a gross misdemeanor if the money required to be collected is not available for payment on the date payment is due. If a taxpayer fails to pay the tax imposed by this chapter to the person charged with collection of the tax and the person charged with collection fails to pay the tax to the department, the department may, in its discretion, proceed directly against the taxpayer for collection of the tax, in which case a penalty of ten percent may be added to the amount of the tax for failure of the taxpayer to pay the same to the person charged with collection, regardless of when the tax may be collected by the department. All of the provisions of chapter 82.32 RCW, including those relative to interest and penalties, shall apply in addition to the provisions of this section.

The tax shall be due from the taxpayer within twenty-five days from the date the taxpayer is billed by the person collecting the tax.

The tax shall be due from the person collecting the tax at the end of the tax period in which the tax is received from the taxpayer. If the taxpayer remits only a portion of the total amount billed for taxes, consideration, and related charges, the amount remitted shall be applied first to payment of the refuse collection tax and this tax shall have priority over all other claims to the amount remitted.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 6. For every refuse collection business there shall be a refund for any amount paid, under protest, for taxes due in 1985, 1986, and 1987 under the tax on refuse collection businesses imposed by chapter 82.16 RCW, but the person claiming the refund shall be liable for any tax under chapter 82.04 RCW which would have applied in those years but for the tax imposed by chapter 82.16 RCW.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 7. The refuse collection tax shall not apply to any agency, division, or branch of the federal government or to services rendered under a contract therewith.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 8. To prevent pyramiding and multiple taxation of a single transaction, this tax shall not apply to any refuse collection business using the services of another refuse collection business for the transfer, storage, or disposal of the waste collected during the transaction.

To be eligible for this exemption, a person first must be certified by the department of revenue as a refuse collection business.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 9. The department of revenue shall have the power to enforce the tax imposed in this chapter through appropriate rules.

Sec. 10. Section 82.16.020, chapter 15, Laws of 1961 as last amended by section 10, chapter 471, Laws of 1985 and RCW 82.16.020 are each amended to read as follows:

(1) There is levied and there shall be collected from every person a tax for the act or privilege of engaging within this state in any one or more of the businesses herein mentioned. The tax shall be equal to the gross income of the business, multiplied by the rate set out after the business, as follows:

(a) Railroad, express, railroad car, sewerage collection, light and power, and telegraph businesses: Three and six-tenths percent;

(b) Gas distribution business: Three and six-tenths percent;

(d) Vessels under sixty-five feet in length, except tugboats, operating upon the waters within the state: Six-tenths of one percent;

(e) Motor transportation and tugboat businesses, and all public service businesses other than ones mentioned above: One and eight-tenths of one percent;

(f) Water distribution ((~~and refuse collection~~)) business((es)): Four and seven-tenths percent.

(2) An additional tax is imposed equal to the rate specified in RCW 82.02.030 multiplied by the tax payable under subsection (1) of this section.

(3) Twenty percent of the moneys collected under subsection (1) of this section on water distribution businesses((~~, seventy percent of the moneys collected under subsection (1) of this section on refuse collection businesses,~~)) and sixty percent of the moneys collected under subsection (1) of this section on sewerage collection businesses shall be deposited in the public works assistance account created in RCW 43.155.050.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 11. Sections 1 through 9 of this act shall constitute a new chapter in Title 82 RCW.