EDC hears business-license report: 271 licenses, revenue flat while city explores fee structure

At a recent meeting of the Olivette City Economic Development Commission, senior planner Dawn Doty presented the city’s business-license data, saying the city currently has 271 businesses holding licenses and that those licenses represent “approximately 85% of our business universe.”

Doty told commissioners the city shifted its business-license year after the pandemic to a May-to-May cycle to align better with the fiscal year and ease confusion for businesses. She said the dataset captures employers’ sector and reported employment for merchants and manufacturers, but many exempt organizations and some home-based businesses do not report annual gross sales to the city’s license system.

Why it matters: business-license receipts both generate direct revenue and provide a data source the city uses for economic development planning. Doty said license collections are limited to those businesses that report under the city’s code…