CITY HASN'T BILLED SOME FOR RESTAURANT TAX, RECORDS SHOW

The St. Louis Bread Company, Ruby Tuesday, Lacey's on the Hill, Whitfield's and Peppy's Sports Bar should be collecting the 1 percent restaurant tax from customers and sending it to the city of Cape Girardeau, according to city records.

But the city hasn't been billing them, the records show.

Last week, a subcommittee of the Cape Girardeau Convention and Visitors Bureau Advisory Committee reported that 13 restaurants may not be paying the tax and asked City Manager Michael Miller to investigate. The committee could not find those establishments on the list of restaurants that pay the tax.

The other eight on the list either collect the tax and forward it to the city under a different name or don't have to collect it because they aren't legally restaurants under the city code.

The city code defines a restaurant as "any inn or establishment engaged solely or chiefly in the sale and serving of meals or lunches, where tables and chairs are provided for the customers."

The tax goes into a special fund with the 3 percent hotel-motel tax that pays off the bonds on the Show Me Center, the Osage Community Centre and the Shawnee Park Sports Complex and the expenses of the city's Convention and Visitors Bureau.

The city took in $540,000 from the restaurant tax last year and $305,000 from the hotel-motel tax, said John Richbourg, the city finance director.

Richbourg had no explanation for the failure to collect tax from St. Louis Bread Company and Ruby Tuesday.

Nate Browning, manager of Ruby Tuesday in Cape Girardeau, said the restaurant would pay now that he knows about the tax.

Larry Rusinko, vice president for marketing at St. Louis Bread Company's headquarters in St. Louis, said, "Had we known about the tax, we should have paid, we would have paid."

When restaurants hand in their business licenses, a city employee usually gives them a form to fill out for the tax. Ruby Tuesday's business license application says it will operate "a full service restaurant." The St. Louis Bread Company said in its application that it intended to cook and serve food.

Richbourg said Whitfield's and Peppy's fell through the cracks because when they first opened they did not meet the city's definition of a restaurant. Peppy's was a bar, and Whitfield's was a catering service. Both have since begun to serve meals in their own premises.

Lacey's wasn't billed because it is on the premises of Southeast Missouri Hospital, Richbourg said, and the city doesn't bill hospitals for the tax.

Hugh McGowan, food service director of Marriott Management Services, which runs Lacey's, said it has been collecting the tax and erroneously sending it to the state government. "We appreciate the fact that this logistical error was brought to our attention," he wrote in a letter to the Southeast Missourian.

Last week's report angered owners of some of the establishments named in the report as possibly not paying their taxes.

Del Eskew, co-owner of Cafe Cape, said he lost business because of the report. His customers, he said, "are die-hard Americans who pay their taxes," and were angered to read that he did not pay when in fact he did.

Cafe Cape is listed in the city's tax report as D.E.R. LLC.

Two other restaurants listed in the report as possibly not collecting taxes, but which in fact do, are the Bel Air Grill and Pizza Hut.

Others listed aren't covered by the ordinance and don't need to collect the tax. Dave's Bar-B-Que amd Sonic don't have facilities for eating inside. Taste Restaurant & Lounge is a bar that doesn't serve food. Target is a discount store that incidentally runs a snack bar. Baskin Robbins 31 Flavors Ice Cream doesn't serve meals, only deserts.

Richard Schmidt, co-owner of Baskin-Robbins, said that when the city first levied the tax he collected it, until the city attorney ruled that Baskin-Robbins is not a restaurant.

Shirley Talley, who chaired the committee that wrote the report, said at last Wednesday's meeting of the Convention and Visitors Bureau Advisory Committee, "If Baskin Robbins isn't paying, but TCBY is, then something is wrong."

According to city records, TCBY does not collect the restaurant tax.

"She needs to do a little research before she opens her mouth," Schmidt said.

Talley said that her report was only preliminary."We were just writing for the city manager so he could review it," she said. "If I were a restaurant owner, I wouldn't want a member of the committee calling me and asking if I pay taxes."