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Albany business owners no longer have until March 15th to renew their Occupational Tax Certificates. It's now required that the certificates be updated by the end of the January.

Business owners that fail to renew their licenses will have a code enforcement officer sent out to investigate whether or not the business is still open.

4500 Occupational Tax Certificates are issued each year. This year 75 percent of business owners in Albany will have pay a base fee of $125 instead of the $100 they paid in previous years.

“The law had called for a readjustment every two years. We had not done so in the past five years because of the economy and this year the commission felt it was time,” said Wes Smith, Assistant City Manager for Albany.

With the new measure, the certificate prices will go up each year based on the Consumer Price Index.

This modification will bring the city more than $250,000 of additional revenue annually.