Podcast: RGV outpacing State of Texas for sales tax revenue collections

MCALLEN, RGV - Matt Ruszczak, executive director of Rio South Texas Economic Council, fears he is beginning to sound like a broken record because the sales tax revenue reports he has given for the past few months all sound the same.The good thing, though, is that the message he is delivering is always positive - the Rio Grande Valley is outperforming the state of Texas as a whole when it comes to economic activity.“I am in danger of sounding like a broken record, which is a good problem to have because the report is once again positive. We are once again beating the performance of the state in our region,” Ruszczak told the Rio Grande Guardian.Ruszczak gets his numbers from the Texas Comptroller’s Office. All sales tax revenues must be reported to Comptroller Glenn Hegar in Austin and his office in turn distributes some of the collections back to municipalities.For the October report, which reflected sales tax activity in August, 2019, the State of Texas was up 3.89 percent over the same month in 2018. Ruszczak described this as “steady strong growth.”However, this figure was lower than that achieved by three of the four counties in the Rio Grande Valley. Cameron County was up 8.40 percent. Hidalgo County was up 5.84 percent. And Starr County was up 8.54 percent. The above podcast has more information about the sales tax revenues for the Rio Grande Valley, including a comparison with the counties of Webb and Nueces. For more information, click here.Go to www.riograndeguardian.com to read the latest border news stories and watch the latest news videos.