Janelle Irwin Taylor
Pinellas County Tax Collector Charles Thomas is petitioning a judge to seize personal property from hundreds of businesses with delinquent tax bills.
A lawsuit filed in Pinellas County Court last week alleges well over $1 million in delinquent Tangible Personal Property taxes from both local and out-of-state businesses.
Those taxes are different from real-estate taxes and are levied on goods and articles of value companies own.
The tax collector seeks court permission to “levy upon, seize and sell” that personal property to cover the past-due bills.
The largest debtor listed in the Tax Collector’s suit is American Express Travel Related Services Company, a subsidiary of the New York-based American Express. According to filings, the company owes more than $735,000 in Tangible Personal Property taxes.
GeoPharma, a now defunct company based in Largo, owes more than $175,000. The Taneja family ran the company. That family gave $256 million to the surgical and patient tower at Florida Hospital Tampa.
A subsidiary of Community Health Systems, Bayfront Health’s parent company, owes nearly $80,000.
One interesting tax bill is for Blockbuster Video, a company that sunk as movie rentals shifted from brick and mortar operations to online streaming. They owe $50,000 dating back to 2011. Dish Network bought all of the company’s remaining stores in 2011. Just one of those remains in operation today in Oregon.
Hofbrauhaus in St. Petersburg owes nearly $30,000. The Munich-inspired beer hall opened in The Tramor Cafeteria, then owned by the Tampa Bay Times, to much fanfare in 2015.
Sonny Glasbrenner, a Clearwater construction company that worked on the St. Pete Pier demolition, owes more than $56,000.
A defunct company that was based in Asia, Camsing Global LLC, owes nearly $150,000 dating back to 2011. That company was sold off to a private equity firm, Capitol Supply Group Inc., in 2014.
Promotional products manufacturer Corvest SPV, a now-closed company based in Seminole, owes more than $75,000 and Sun Glo Plating Co. in Clearwater owes nearly $75,000.
Other delinquent companies include Sandy Alexander Inc. ($59,000), Hammer Haag Steel ($58,000), Saloncentric ($47,000), and Crabil Manufacturing ($44,000), among others.
