Indian smoke shops: no more tax-free cigs

The smoke shops operated by aforementioned tribes have started collecting taxes on cigarettes. The tax is equal to the latest Florida state excise tax on cigarettes that came into force on July 1, and made the tax for an average cigarette pack raise to $1.34.

However, members of two tribes would anyway buy the cigarettes for their own consumption without any taxes. Yet, for non-Indian customers the good days have gone, as they will have to pay the same price in tribal shops as in other shops across the state.

Florida legislature imposed the first cigarette tax back in1943; nevertheless, Seminole tribe is the first Indian tribe to start levying excise taxes.  

Richard Bowers, chairman of Seminole Tribal Council said they held negotiations with Florida authorities on how to divide the collected revenues from taxes, but the tribe decided to levy the tax on their own free will.  

It is not a secret that sales of tobacco products help Indians to generate enormous sums of money. According to reports, Indian Smoke shops manage to sell more than 25 million cigarette packs annually only across Florida alone. 

Florida Ways and Means Committee experts believe that revenues from Indian shops would give the state additional $20 million each year, in case the sales in tribal shops would reach 15 million packs each year.

But, for many Florida smokers, the latter news is more than unpleasant. It strips them from cheap cigarettes, making their habit even more expensive. Many of them barely manage to afford smokes after the historical federal tax increase in April made each pack of their cigarettes 62 cents more expensive.

Coconut Creek smoker, Anna Peterson said she was astonished hearing that Indian smoke shops would start collecting taxes, meaning that her favorite Marlboros would become even more expensive. She mentioned that she would start rolling her own cigarettes, than pay for her smokes.

The bill to pass cigarette taxes on Indian cigarette stores was approved two months ago at the same time with the bill, raising state cigarette taxes by $1. Legislators stated that in case they had left tribal shops being tax-free, it would have created a loophole for smokers and the legislation aimed at reducing the smoking rate in the state by imposing hefty taxes would have been simply useless and inefficient.

Therefore, they have invented a system allowing Indian smoke shops to sell tax-free cigarettes only to tribe members. They have given almost 2 million coupons for Seminole and Miccosukee tribes, so each member of both tribes could purchase five packs of tax-free cigarettes each day throughout the year. The tribal smoke shops will make use of those coupons whenever they purchase cigarettes from the wholesales and after that sell these tax-free cigarettes to members of the tribes.

Ted Deutch, the author of the latter amendment to the bill said that they wanted to establish a system that would be fair to the Indian and would not interfere with Florida laws.