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Steamboat Springs — May sales tax collections were down about 7.6 percent compared with May 2009, according to figures released Thursday by the city of Steamboat Springs.

The numbers are preliminary and subject to change when full collections are tallied. The figures represent a decrease in collections from $909,925 in May 2009 to $841,023 in May 2010.

Collections are down nearly 5 percent year to date, from about $7.6 million in 2009 to about $7.2 million in 2010, according to the figures. The city budgeted for a 10 percent decrease in collections, sales-and-use tax auditor Rachelle Summers said.

“It is better than we expected,” she said.

The city splits its sales tax figures into categories and areas. During May, when construction on Lincoln Avenue was occurring, down­­­­town sales tax collections were 19 percent lower than in May 2009.

But Summers said the city coul­­­dn’t blame any single factor for the decrease.

“We don’t really have any specific things that we’re aware of that caused the numbers to do what they did, just the economy; tourism continues to not bounce back as quickly as we were hoping,” she said.

Steamboat also saw figures decrease 11 percent along the U.S. Highway 40 corridor. Collections decreased across the board in retail, lodging and amenities, sporting goods, utilities, restaurants and liquor stores. The decrease was largest in lodging and amenities, which saw a 19.35 percent reduction in collections for May compared with last year.

Summers noted that those large percentage drops sometimes can represent a relatively small dollar amount. For example, lodging and amenities sales tax collections dipped only about $8,000 — from $41,016 in May 2009 to $33,079 in May 2010. Retail, on the other hand, decreased only 6.5 percent, but that represented nearly $35,000 fewer dollars.

“There’s really nothing mind blowing” about the numbers, Summers said.