A misdistribution of tax dollars could cost the City of Gainesville a significant amount of money, and even though it's not their fault, they may have pay for someone else's mistake.

A recent audit of Cox Communications by the State Department of Revenue revealed that the City of Gainesville received too much money from the state from August 2004 to October of last year.

The money in question is from a tax on Cox customers monthly cable bill, and is collected by the cable provider and then sent to the state.

The state is supposed to distribute it to local governments, but they paid Gainesville too much and Alachua County too little.

Now, the city's budget for this year is 440,000 dollars more than it should be.

"Not only do we have the impact of the lower revenue, but we have to pay back any overpayment so we'll have a double hit as we go forward," said Gainesville City Manager Russ Blackburn.

Cox officials say none of their customers have been overcharged.

"No one is paying us back anything because this money, these taxes have been collected from our customers and then remitted to the state," said Cox Communications Public Affairs Director Rick Mulligan.

State law prohibits local governments from auditing cable providers like Cox.

The state is investigating the situation to see who is at fault.

By David Hamilton, WCJB TV 20 News