On Wednesday, October 26, the Cook County Board of Commissioners approved an amendment to county tax rules making clear that all musical performances—including most DJ sets—should be considered “art” for the purposes of assessing the county’s amusement tax.
Regardless of their relevance to the tax exemption, Richardson’s comments shocked the music community. The county drew harsh criticism in local and national publications for attempting to define art or elevate some genres of music as more worthy of a tax break than others.
During the county board meeting on Wednesday, Fritchey said that the amendment “is not a real deviation from how this has been done and enforced over the past.” Zahra Ali, director of the county’s Department of Revenue, echoed his comments, telling the commissioners at the meeting that the purpose of the amendment is “to codify existing current enforcement practices.”
In a follow-up interview on Thursday, October 27, Samstein said that if businesses don’t provide books and records to county auditors, they’ll “eventually get hit with a tax assessment.” He said the county has considered (and continues to consider) all live music performances exempt from the tax, with the possible exception of some DJ sets.
Fritchey believes the new amendment means that no county hearing officer will ever again be able to rule on an amusement-tax case based on a subjective personal definition of “art,” but the owners of Beauty Bar and their attorneys are proceeding with their case under the assumption that they still have to prove the artistic and cultural value of DJ performances in order to avoid a punishing back-tax bill.
