The Putnam County Commission will hold a public hearing Thursday night concerning the town of Winfield's application to annex 223 acres into the town's limits by a minor boundary adjustment.
Mayor Randy Barrett said if business and residents in that area want to continue reaping benefits of a growing town, they need to start paying their fair share of taxes.
Local business owners say it isn't that simple. The town is debating how much businesses and residents in the area should be contributing to Winfield for the benefit of living next to it.
"Business is hard," said Lynne Fruth, president of Fruth Pharmacy and chairman of its board. "If you look in Putnam County, the lion's share of the growth has taken place in unincorporated areas because those business are not subject to a B&O tax."
The Winfield Fruth Pharmacy sits right next to the town's limits - a "stone's throw away," as the mayor calls it.
You can tell you've reached the edge of the town when you see a big welcome sign with bold lettering declaring Winfield the "TOWN OF CHAMPIONS."
But the town's actual limits aren't quite as easy to define. Before you reach this sign, Sgt. Kevin Young of the Winfield Police Department said, depending on which side of W.Va. 817 you're on, some areas are already included in the town's limits.
What happens if there's an emergency outside the limits? Young said Winfield police are usually the first to respond.
"If we were to get a call in a situation like that, we'd respond," Young said, "but if it's an arrest that needs to be made, we would hold and detain the suspect until the sheriff's department comes."
The Putnam County Sheriff's Department is located inside the town, next to the county courthouse.
"They said, 'We don't need police, we don't need this and we don't need that,' " Barrett said of those opposing the annexation. "The city has done a lot to grow in the past four years, and I think we're bringing in more people to the city. The more people that come in, the more that shop at those businesses."
Beyond paying B&O taxes, Barrett said, the annexation will help the sewer system, which was recently scrutinized by the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection for releasing too much ammonia nitrogen into the Kanawha River. Right now, people in the area Winfield hopes to annex pay less than customers who live in Winfield, even though they still rely on it for its service, according to Barrett.
"If anything, you should pay more for sewer living out of the town than living inside," Barrett said.
Fruth said she's fine with the sewer rate increase.
"I'm willing to pay my share," she said.
The B&O tax is where she draws the line.
Approximately 85 percent of the revenue for the Winfield Fruth Pharmacy comes from filling prescriptions for healthcare plans that is later reimbursed through insurance programs, Medicare or Medicaid.
"I don't have the ability to raise prices," Fruth said. "Those prices are set by the government, and they don't really care that I'm subject to B&O taxes."
When business owners in the area complain to Barrett about the tax, he tries to correct them: "Businesses don't really pay the B&O tax. They pass it on to their customers."
B&O taxes are based on a business's total revenue and don't take into account if the business is actually making a profit.
Fruth thinks her business has already contributed enough to the town of Winfield and said it adds a different type of value to its citizens. She points to last year, when Fruth Pharmacy gave at least $3,000 worth of scholarships to students in Winfield.
"For a business that operates on a small margin - pharmacies, grocery stores - to take something off the top like that is hard," Fruth said. "It's a substantial tax, relative to the type of business we do."
If Winfield's B&O tax had a provision that gave pharmacies and healthcare businesses a break, she might be more open to the annexation.
Besides taxes, Jennifer Karr, Putnam County's attorney, has questioned why Winfield decided to apply for an annexation by minor boundary adjustment.
There are three ways to annex an area: with an election, without an election and by minor boundary adjustment.
When Winfield first applied to extend its limits, it wanted to annex more than 600 acres by a minor boundary adjustment. At the time, Commissioner Joe Haynes wondered how "minor" that much land could be considered. The town subsequently reduced the amount of area it wants to annex.
The public hearing begins at 6 p.m. Thursday in the county courthouse.
Reach Jake Jarvis at jake.jarvis@wvgazette.com, 304-348-7905 or follow @NewsroomJake on Twitter.