AUSTIN—Texas Comptroller Glenn Hegar announced today he will send cities, counties, transit systems, and special-purpose taxing districts $701.8 million in local sales tax allocations for April, 0.5 percent less than in April 2019. These allocations are based on sales made in February by businesses that report tax monthly.

Next month’s allocations, which will mostly reflect sales made in March, will begin to show the impact of pandemicrelated business shutdowns. “We expect that future sales tax revenue will be drastically affected because much of the economy has been shut down to combat the coronavirus pandemic and because of the negative impact of a global oil price war,” Hegar said. The agency expects local allocations

The agency expects local allocations in May to be lower, and June allocations will likely deteriorate further.

Hegar reported that March sales tax revenues had totaled $2.69 billion, a 2.9 percent increase from March 2019. “The modest growth in state sales

“The modest growth in state sales tax revenue was led by collections from the retail trade sector, while collections from oil- and gas-related sectors declined from a year ago,” Hegar said. “While some businesses may have begun to experience slowing traffic in late February, formal social-distancing measures in response to the coronavirus pandemic were not adopted until well into March, and the impact of those measures would not be reflected in this month’s sales tax collections based on February sales.”

The majority of March sales tax revenue is based on sales made in February and remitted to the agency in March. Total sales tax revenue in fiscal year 2020 through March 2020 was up 5 percent compared to the same period a year ago. The Comptroller’s Certification Revenue Estimate released last October had projected a 4.8 percent increase in sales tax revenue in fiscal year 2020.

Sales tax is the largest source of state funding for the state budget, accounting for 57 percent of all tax collections. In March 2020, Texas collected the following revenue from other major taxes:

•Motor-vehicle sales and rental taxes, $388.5 million, down 2.6 percent from March 2019.

•Motor-fuel taxes, $293 million, up 2.6 percent from March 2019.

•Natural-gas production taxes, $101.6 million, down 30.1 percent from March 2019.

•Oil-production taxes, $305.5 million, up 10.5 percent from March 2019.