OAKBROOK TERRACE, Ill. — An Iowa Self-Service Laundry Association-sponsored bill to repeal the existing sales tax on coin-operated laundries passed unanimously in the Iowa Senate, and is now awaiting Gov. Terry Branstand’s signature, the ISSLA reports.
“We made some history in the process, it seems,” says Daryl Johnson, ISSLA president. “I was told that there has not been a tax bill passed in the Iowa Senate 50-0 in at least three decades or more, and we also won the vote in the House with a 76-14 margin.”
Johnson adds that the organization “got the bill done in one legislative session after hiring a lobbyist.”
Iowa coin laundry operators have been paying nearly 9% of their gross sales each year to meet the state’s sales tax requirement, according to the Coin Laundry Association (CLA), which calls the bill’s passing “one of the largest legislative wins for the self-service laundry industry in years.”
The ISSLA spent about $35,000 over the course of five years to repeal the tax. Similar efforts to keep self-service laundries exempt from sales tax are occurring “more frequently” each year, according to the CLA.
Due to the nature of the coin laundry business, these taxes become a direct income tax on laundry owners’ gross sales, the organization adds.
The legislation leaves only three states—Hawaii, New Mexico and West Virginia—that assess sales tax on self-service laundry, the CLA says.
“We still have some financial needs to replenish our coffers, but all in all we are very excited and exhausted,” says Johnson of the work on the Iowa bill. “I expect the governor to sign the bill before the end of June, so the effective date will be July 1.”
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