Farmersville Municipal Code Art. I General Provisions

For the purposes of this chapter, the words set out in this section shall have the following meanings:

A. "Business, professions and trades" as used in this title means and includes all kinds of vocations, occupations, professions, enterprises, establishments and all other kind of activities and matters, together with all devices, machines, vehicles and appurtenances used therein, any of which are conducted for the purpose of earning a profit, livelihood or for personal gain whether or not a profit, livelihood or personal gain is actually received therefrom. "Business, professions and trades" includes, but is not limited thereto, trades and occupations of all and every kind of calling carried on within the city, salesmen, brokers, retailers, wholesalers, vendors, suppliers, peddlers, professions, the renting or supplying of living quarters, tenants or occupiers in any other type of endeavor entered into within the city whether paid for in money, goods, labor or otherwise and whether or not the business, profession or trade has a fixed place of business in the city.

The business license law shall apply to all persons conducting a business, profession or trade within the city whether or not such person maintains a fixed place of business in the city and whether or not the person may primarily conduct his business, profession or trade elsewhere. Unless exempted by the provisions of the business license law, a person shall be deemed to be conducting a business, profession or trade within the city if he, or his agents, or employees offer, solicit, sell, contract, construct, make and deliver or repair, or perform acts or services in respect to the business, trade or professions within the city.

B. "City" means the city of Farmersville, a municipal corporation of the state of California, in its present incorporated from or in any later reorganized, consolidated, enlarged or reincorporated form.

C. "Employee" means all persons engaged in the operation or conduct of any business, whether as owner, any member of the owner's family, partner, agent, manager, solicitor and any and all other persons employed or working in said business.

D. "Collector" means the city clerk, or other city official charged by the city manager with the administration of the provisions of this chapter.

E. "Person" means all domestic and foreign corporations, associations, joint ventures, clubs, Massachusetts business, Delaware corporation or common law trusts, societies and individuals transacting and carrying on any business in the city.

F. "Charitable organizations," "religious organizations," and "nonprofit organizations" mean any state or federally recognized religious charitable, fraternal, educational, military, state, county or municipal corporation or association formed form which profit is not derived either directly or indirectly.

G. "Contractor" means any person who is required to be licensed as a contractor by the state, or any person who undertakes to, or offers to undertake to, or purports to have the capacity to undertake to, or submits a bid to, or does himself or by or through others construct, alter, repair, add to, subtract from, improve, move, wreck, or demolish any building, highway, road, railroad, excavation, or other structure, project, development, or improvement, or any part thereof, including the erection of scaffolding or other structures or works in connection therewith. "Contractor" means those persons defined as contractors by the provisions of Section 7026 of the Business and Professions Code of the state, as amended.

H. "Gross receipts" includes the total of amounts actually received or receivable from sales and the total amounts actually received or receivable for the performance of any act or service, of whatever nature it may be, for which a charge is made or a credit allowed, whether or not such act or service is done as a part of or in connection with the sale of materials, goods, wares or merchandise. Included in "gross receipts" shall be all receipts, cash, credits and property of any kind or nature, without any deduction therefrom on account of the costs, interest paid or payable, or losses or other expenses whatsoever. Excluded from "gross receipts" shall be the following:

1. Cash discounts allowed and taken on sales;

2. Any tax required by law to be included in or added to the purchase price and collected from the consumer or purchaser;

3. Such part of the sale price of property returned by purchasers upon rescission of the contract of sales as is refunded either in cash or by credit;

4. Amounts collected for others where the business is acting as an agent or trustee to the extent that such amounts are paid to those for whom collected;

5. Receipts of refundable deposits, except that refundable deposits forfeited and taken into income of the business shall not be excluded;

6. As to a commission sales agent or commission broker the sales price of goods or services sold for the account of others except that portion which represents the total gross commission or other income to the agent or broker;

7. As to a retail gasoline dealer, a portion of his receipts from the sale of motor vehicle fuels equal to the motor vehicle fuel license tax imposed by and previously paid under the provision of Part 2 of Division 2 of the Revenue and Taxation Code of the state of California;

8. As to a retail gasoline dealer, the special motor fuel tax imposed by Section 4041 of Title 26 of the United States Code if paid by the dealer or collected by him from the consumer or purchaser.

I. "Itinerant merchant" means and includes all persons, both principals and agents, who engage in a temporary and transient business for a period less than three months in the city selling goods, wares, or merchandise and who, for the purpose of carrying on such business, hire, lease, or occupy any room, building, structure, lot, or premises for the exhibition or sale of such goods, wares, and merchandise, providing that this shall not apply to commercial travelers or selling agents selling their goods to merchants, dealers or traders, where same is to become part of said merchants, dealers or traders stock in trade in his regular trade of business, whether selling for present or future delivery by simply or otherwise as the same are defined in this chapter.

(Ord. 340 § 1(part), 1989)

The ordinance codified in this chapter is enacted solely to raise revenue for municipal purposes, and is not intended for regulation. For statutory authority for cities to license for revenue and regulate every kind of lawful business transacted in the city, see Government Code Section 37101.5, with certain exceptions. For statutory provisions authorizing the city to license all business transacted within the city except wholesale travelers, see California Business and Professions Code Sections 16000 through 16003.

(Ord. 340 § 1(part), 1989)

Any person required to pay a license tax for transacting and carrying on any business under the ordinance codified in this chapter shall not be relieved from the payment of any license tax for the privilege of doing such business with has been required under any other ordinances or laws of the city, state or federal government, but shall remain subject to the regulatory provisions of such other ordinances or laws.

(Ord. 340 § 1(part), 1989)

Neither the adoption of the ordinance codified in this chapter nor its superseding of any portion of any other ordinance of the city shall in any manner be construed to affect prosecution for violation of any other ordinance committed prior to the effective date of the ordinance codified in this chapter, nor be construed as a waiver of any license or any penalty provision to effect the validity of any bond or cash deposit required by any ordinance to be posted, filed or deposited, and all rights and obligations thereunto appertaining shall continue in full force and effect.

(Ord. 340 § 1(part), 1989)