List is approved as TIF options

Plans are in the works for how to spend the additional funds available to county officials in coming years.

Jay County Redevelopment Commission approved a list of projects Monday that could be paid for with funding generated from the tax increment financing (TIF) district. The group approved the capital improvement plan amended by Jay County Commissioners earlier Monday — see related story — as a list of potential projects. Redevelopment commission president Carl Walker noted that because it’s a potential list, they shouldn’t be restrained to only those projects and may add to the list in the future.

Jay County’s TIF district is located on approximately 191 acres southwest of Portland in Greene Township, including the location of the POET Biorefining-Portland plant. The county created the TIF district when the South Dakota-based company constructed and launched the ethanol plant in 2007. TIF dollars have been used for the last 15 years to pay off the bonds associated with the road work and sewer improvements near the plant.

Earlier this year, Jay County paid off its final bond for the project. Now it’s looking into its options for how to proceed with the extra money it has available, or about $584,000 annually.

One of the benefits of a TIF district is the increase in assessed value, which flows through to the redevelopment commission until the end of the district’s lifespan, or 25 years. After the TIF district is terminated, the increase in assessed value — since 2007, the difference between the base and increment is more than $9.9 million — is then redirected back to all taxing units.

Also Monday, redevelopment commission OK’d looking into a contract with Ed Curtin of CWC Latitudes. Curtin, who served for five months as executive director of Columbus Redevelopment Commission before starting his own company, gave a short presentation to redevelopment commission about how a TIF district is created, annual steps taken to maintain it and how a fiscal body may spend TIF allocations.

Projects typically utilizing TIF dollars are those that are in or serve the TIF district, recreation facilities, public safety projects, site acquisition, infrastructure, capital projects, job training or efficiency projects.

Curtin suggested the group update its economic development plan, which spells out how TIF dollars are allocated.

“If you don’t have the plan, you’ve kind of opened yourself up to some scrutiny,” he explained.

To commission members’ knowledge, the last plan was created in 2007, or at the same time as the TIF district came into existence.

There are currently six projects on the potential list approved Monday, which include projects for broadband, Jay County Highway Department, Jay County Solid Waste Management, Jay Emergency Medical Service/Jay County Health Department, development of the 68 acres owned by the county on the western edge of Portland and a sober living facility.

The 68 acres purchased by the county earlier this year are technically located within Portland’s TIF district, noted Curtin.

In other business, commission members Faron Parr, Jack Houck, Ted Champ and Walker, absent Brian McGalliard and nonvoting member Shannon Current, also agreed to pay a $1,600 claim from Baker Tilly for assistance with the annual TIF neutralization process.