DuPage County has missed out on 18 months of marijuana tax revenue — a potential loss of up to $4 million — from a failure to properly notify the state to collect the money on the county’s behalf.
County board members back in October 2019 imposed a 3% retail tax on all sales of recreational marijuana in municipal areas of DuPage.
The ordinance directed the county clerk’s office to send a certified copy of the ordinance to the Illinois Department of Revenue so that the new tax could be collected. Under state legislation, the tax would have taken effect in July 2020.
But county officials learned last fall, after some raised questions about marijuana tax revenue coming in low, that the state’s revenue department never received the paperwork.
County Board Chairman Dan Cronin called it “a very serious and egregious error” that snuffed out a tax windfall generated by marijuana sales in the 10 dispensaries now operating in DuPage. Details about the cost of the error came to light after officials did a full accounting of the potential loss.
“We believe the estimated amount of revenue lost is around $3 million to $4 million,” Cronin, an Elmhurst Republican, said during Tuesday’s board meeting. “Our state’s attorney believes that we cannot recoup those dollars as they were simply never collected.”
