16 September 2013
Dearborn County Plan Commission Special Meeting Notes
Present: Mike Hall, Chairman, Dennis Kraus Jr., Russell
Beiersdorfer, Mark LehmanArt Little, Jake Hoog, Dan Lansing, and Ken Nelson.
ABSENT: Mike Hornbach
Also Present: Mark McCormack, Plan Director, and Arnie
McGill, Attorney.
Also present: Andy Baudendistel, County Attorney, Gayle
Pennington, Auditor, Kevin Lynch, Commissioner and Redevelopment Commission,
Dave Deddins, Redevelopment Commission, Terri Randall, County Administrator.
Erika Schmidt Russell covered the meeting for the Register.
Mark McCormack gave the overview of the request to approve
the amendment to the TIF area in West Harrison, the maps of the current TIF and
the proposed TIF area, and the resolution for the proposed redevelopment area.
The proposed term is for 25 years. The original TIF was for 30 years. The
actual difference then is about 2 years now.
Kevin Lynch represented the Dearborn County Redevelopment
commission. He thanked the board for facilitating their request to get this
special meeting. The request is to reTIF the existing TIF district to start the
clock over. There is no change to the TIF area or the zoning.
Tom Pittman from Barnes and Thornberg presented – and
complimented McCormack on his presentation of the request and the laws covering
it. The legislature changed the law requiring that you go through all the board
to redo this now. This is for economic development and redevelopment in the
county.
$40+ million investment from this applicant and they want to
use this process to avoid raising any taxes etc to get the incentives. The company is in a hurry to break ground to
get construction this fall. Some of this land has generated no money as nothing
has happened on it yet. The law allows them to eliminate the lost time by
restarting the clock on this. There is no extension of the TIF district- just
the timing by two years. Your plan is not currently broadly enough written to
allow this as written in his opinion and thus they want to add the reset of the
base to this resolution. Is this consistent with the sort of activity you want
to see in this area. From here it goes to the County Commissioners. Public
notice and a public hearing is then held
by the redevelopment commission.
Terri Randall- wanted to add one more things. This project
involves one parcel and there are others which will be added in support of it
including one that
$1.4 million investment in sewer out there by Council. They
are about to sign economic development agreement and they are bringing more
with them. This will help wean us off Riverboat Revenue.
$1.4 million grant from L-bg for this also. County will bond
out and use it against this TIF money. It is a complicated process. We are in a
hurry because this company is ready. If winter happens then it slows them down.
We want them here to really kick-start economic development.
Ken Nelson asked if they are approving this resolution from
the redevelopment commission.
$2,100,000 is how much they think can be generated in a TIF
incentive in the initial period of time
of about 15 years per Pittman,
Commissioner McHenry arrived at this point.
Hall asked what the $2.1 million goes for. Pittman- the
company could use it for capital improvements which they own. The incentive is
only generated to the extent that they pay tax so it is self-policing. If they
move away – that would go away. Hall said- but these only get used in THAT
area- no other part of the county. Pittman- yes that is correct.
Kevin Lynch said that Greendale did this with a fire truck
that served the TIF district as well. So you can use it outside the TIF are if
the services are provided to the TIF area.
Hall asked about the dirt moving in flood plain. Kraus, Jr.
said that it was here two weeks ago- but that the grading plan was approved
this morning. Rule 5 for Soil and Water has to be considered also per McCormack. [NOTE: Anyone worried about filling in the
flood plain down there?]
Hall said that we should have known something about this
before now- to better review it. We need to be a little more involved in these
plans before they just appear. We would like a little more time. If this were a
private citizen we wouldn’t be doing it this way. There are roads that are
needing modifications to get this done. Those heavy trucks will need
improvement on the road base. I don’t want to be the bad guy- we need to be
more in the loop. Nelson concurred. How do we know the $2.1 million will get
the job done? Pittman said he takes some of the blame for the timing, He was
called in a couple weeks ago- they did not know all these approvals were even
necessary. And I had to dump that bad news on Terri’s head.
Lynch said that we are competing with a city over in Ohio
and that is why we didn’t talk about it. We trust you (Hall) and this board.
They were concerned that if it did get out we could lose the deal. We will
endeavor to do better on the next one.
Tech review approved the grading plans this morning. We had
to look into silos with height issues, but they were basically exempted because
of what they were.
Mark Lehman- trying to figure out the downside- nothing is
ever this rosy. Pittman- once these TIFs get goping people really like it. This
becomes a critical incentive. It’s not as if anyone is losing- those taxes
wouldn’t have come in if they hadn’t come in anyway. Stiff competition to attract
development.
Art Little- we are just extending the TIF 2 more years on
only this portion of the TIF. One runs out in 20136, this one will run out in
2038.
Beiersdorfer moved to
approve resolution 13-02. Little seconded it.
Discussion- Kraus asked- what if someone else wants this?
Lynch said that if it makes sense, we do have the option to do this. Hoog asked
what the benefit this has for citizens of the county? Lynch said that 55% of
their grain is from locals in other areas they have. This would be a boon to
our farm community. There is also additional income tax revenue per Pittman and
the probability of that second company. The additional company will be on this
parcel per Randall. This Redevelopment Commission had to work on this – the
others were not working fast enough. They are moving as quickly as they can to
get some master planning in that corridor. Calls are coming in all the time for
this. Behind the scenes the company has been doing their own engineering.
Without Lawrenceburg’s grant for $1.4million this would have gone to Ohio.
Plan Commission
unanimously approved this resolution.
Mark McCormack said that the regular PC Meeting was
rescheduled to Sept 30th from the 23rd.
Meeting adjourned at 7:45 PM.
Christine Brauer Mueller
Lawrenceburg Township
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