The St. Tammany Parish government filed a lawsuit against the city of Slidell last week claiming Slidell owes the parish $518,256.11 in overpayments of sales taxes.

The lawsuit, filed in Division H of the 22nd Judicial Court Oct. 28, states that after an internal audit by the St. Tammany Sheriff’s Office, which is the official tax collector for the parish, several inconsistencies showed up that showed the parish overpaid sales taxes to the city and other municipalities in the parish. The lawsuit said the money actually belongs to Sales Tax District 3, which makes up most of the unincorporated part of the parish.

Parish spokesperson Suzanne Parsons Stymiest said the errors were found when the parish instituted its new GIS system, and in the process, the Sheriff’s Office found that several of the sales tax collections had been incorrectly coded into the computers. At issue is the tax collected at four stores in and around Slidell, 84 Lumber, Office Depot, Bedding Plus and Circuit City. Office Depot, Bedding Plus and Circuit City are within city limits, but 84 Lumber is outside Slidell and in Sales Tax District 3.

The correct amount of sales tax was collected by the Sheriff’s Office, but because of the coding errors, Slidell got the money from 84 Lumber and overpayment from the other three stores for the past 10 years amounting to $518,256.11.

Sales Tax District 3 was voted into existence by parish voters in 1986. Under the plan the parish and city were to split the sales tax evenly. Most of the sales tax revenue for Sales Tax District 3 was to go to building and repairing roads.

Stymiest said discrepancies and overpayments were also found for Covington, Mandeville, Madisonville and Sun, and other discrepancies are being investigated.

Stymiest said all the cities except Slidell agreed to sit down and come to an agreement.

“We had several meetings with Slidell, but to no avail,” Stymiest said. So the parish decided to take the matter to court.

Slidell Mayor Ben Morris said the issue is not cut and dry.

“There are numerous issues that have to be discussed,” Morris said.

He said the city cannot go back 10 years into its records to confirm or deny the parish’s allegations. A lot of the records are gone due to Hurricane Katrina. Secondly, he is a bit skeptical of the numbers.

“There’s no accounting if that number is right or wrong,” Morris said.

He also said that since 84 Lumber is outside city limits, the sales tax should be based on the point of delivery and not the sale itself. For example, if 84 Lumber sold wood and delivered it to someone in Covington, then the sales tax should be charged to Covington. He added he doesn’t know how much was point of delivery sales in Slidell.

“I just think this is something a judge should settle,” Morris said. “I’m not mad at anybody, and this is not a parish versus city thing. I just want to clear up some things.”

He said he talked with Parish President Kevin Davis and said that bringing it to a judge would be the best way to solve the problem. Morris also wants to see how the parish came to the conclusion Slidell owes the parish $500,000.

“Was it through the audit, or was it an estimate?” Morris wondered. “We can’t do this just because they said so.”

To be fair, the Sheriff’s Office admits in the lawsuit that because of the problems with the coding, their audit showed the parish owed Slidell $13,491, because they mistakenly kept 100 percent of the sales tax from a Burger King in Slidell instead of giving back the agreed-upon 50 percent.

The parish said it is willing to offset what is owed to the parish and what is owed to Slidell, which reduces Slidell’s bill to $504,765.11.

Stymiest said she has been asked why the parish sent the money to Slidell. She stressed it is the Sheriff’s Office that handles the money.

“We never see that money,” she said. “The sheriff collect the taxes from everybody, and we never sent the money to the municipalities.”