Tax Increment Financing looked at by lawmakers
“During the last legislative session, Sen. Al Davis from Hyannis introduced a bill to attach more strings to the use of Tax Increment Financing (TIF). The bill did not pass, but lawmakers have studied the issue during the interim before the next legislative session.
According to Nebraska Watchdog, which covered a recent hearing on TIF, Davis said “good intentions have run amok” in the way TIF is being used by Nebraska cities, with no supervision and no way for the state to enforce “sensible development.”
The way TIF works is property taxes that normally would have to be paid for a new development are instead diverted back into the project.
The Watchdog reported that Davis says TIF is a burden on taxing entities (such as school districts and counties). But officials from some Nebraska cities disagree, saying most of those projects wouldn’t have been built if TIF wasn’t available “and you can’t lose revenue you never would have had.”
This past year, York County saw its total overall valuation jump above $3 billion for the first time. York County Assessor Ann Charlton said the reason for the county’s overall valuation increase was attributed to the increase in ag land values “because the majority of the real growth in the city of York is because of TIF projects.”
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Wilkinson, Melanie. Tork News Times 5 January 2015.