Will Orange County mayor bring back push to hike sales tax?
ORANGE COUNTY, Fla.  News 6 continues to tackle issues and finding solutions when it comes to the growing population in Central Florida. Before the coronavirus pandemic, 1,000 people were moving to Orange County each week. The pandemic did put a pause on a major push to fix the traffic and transportation issues in Orange County. [TRENDING: 5 inland lagoons planned for Central Fla. |What to know about Virgin Galactics spaceflight | Man finds 2nd megalodon shark tooth on Florida beach]  Ad  Back in January of 2020, Mayor Jerry Demings was making a push to get support for a one-cent sales tax to tackle issues with transportation. Two months later, the push came to a halt amid the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. A Central Florida commuter spends an average of 46 hours per year in traffic and it is even longer if a person depends on public transportation. A Central Florida woman said she spends seven hours a day on buses and trains to get to work. Ad  Its stressful once you go home and go back to sleep its time to get back up - your day is pretty much done, Verissa Graham said. The public transportation situation has not improved during the pandemic. Ive been working for Red Lobster for 25 years and the public transportation on the weekend is not good, Marcus Porterfield said. Mayor Demings explained why he stopped making the push for the one-cent sales tax in March of 2020. The tourists who come and visit, who come and clog our roadways would have been paying for more than 50% of the taxes that would have been collected as part of that sales tax, of course, there were essentially no tourists coming here [amid the pandemic,] Demings said. Demings shared his thoughts on what would have happened if the tax passed before the pandemic. The burden would have been more on the backs of the people who lived here and that wasnt the strategy I was looking for, Demings said. Ad  The tourists are starting to return to Central Florida. Mayor Demings has hinted at bringing the one-cent sales tax initiative back at the State of the County address in June. Im committed [to] looking holistically at this and at an appropriate time, I will reengage with the opportunity to try to advance the sale tax initiative, Demings said. Demings can only push to have this on a ballot during a general election which means his next opportunity to get this one-cent sales tax passed would be in 2020. He has not officially announced if he plans to do so just yet.