Sales-tax revenue at metro Denver’s Scientific and Cultural Facilities District in April jumped 11 percent from the same time last year, marking the sixth consecutive month of growth.
The taxing district collected $3.2 million in sales and use taxes, up from $2.9 million in April 2009, the district reported Friday.
The district collected $12 million in the first four months of the year, a 6 percent increase from the same period of 2009.
The additional revenue was welcome news to the SCFD, which experienced unprecedented drops in sales and use taxes from the fourth quarter of 2008 through 2009.
“We are cautiously optimistic that an economic recovery is truly underway in the seven-county district,” said executive director Peg Long.
The results come the same week that it was announced that the unemployment rate in the Denver-Aurora-Broomfield metro area fell to 7.8 percent in April from 8.5 percent in March.
The result was viewed as coming at least partly from unemployed people moving off the lists of active job seekers rather than job creation.
The SCFD, created by voters in 1988 to financially support scientific and cultural organizations, distributes money to more than 300 non profit groups in the seven-county metro area.
The funding, resulting from a 0.1 percent tax, accounts for 15 percent to 20 percent of the budgets of those institutions, whose focuses include art, music, theater, dance, zoology, botany, natural and cultural history.
Karen Crummy: 303-954-1594 or kcrummy@denverpost.com
So far, so good
Scientific and Cultural Facilities Distric sales-tax revenue
April 2009: $2.9 million
April 2010: $3.2 million
Increase: 11 percent
2010 year-to-date: $12 million
2009 year-to-date: $11.4 million
Increase: 6 percent
