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What GOOD would this do for you, if it's done under TIF?
I recall well the chairman of the Town Center Task Force promising that NEW rooftops will mean a bigger tax base, and that manna will flow from that as if from heaven.
Not those exact words, but that's the gist of the thought, which to me was a promise, regardless of intent of the speaker.
Now, if housing is going to be run through TIF, someone with expertise in this please explain to me, where is the immediate tax advantage to putting housing through TIF and those rooftops being an advantage to me or you during our remaining lifetimes? Remember, Bruce Nedegaard, Town Center sparkplug deveopment person is already dead now; and my understanding is if housing there - or perhaps at the Gun Club - is done through TIF there will be years before it effectively is taxed on the increment - yet that's precisely the advantage the chairman of the Town Center Task Force was alluding to and touting; while I am taking on years and wonder how many more I have.
How about you?
Didn't you hear those words as a promise of acting in accordance with them and not contrary - a promise not contemplating the intentional TIF-ing away the advantage being talked of - and promised? As in good faith being promised. Nothing less, as I heard and understood it.
THE POINT: I read of TIF housing-related mischief, from 2005, and I find it via Google in the papers of others, and not via LaserFiche search of the online papers of my city's government (and that makes me wonder about motivation or coincidence in the ongoing retrieval-difficulty LaserFiche has presented me with search among City documents online).
League of Minnesota Cities reports for 2005:
p.9
Omnibus Tax Act
Chapter 3 (First Special Session HF 138*) is the omnibus Tax Act. It contains two articles dealing with economic development issues. Article 7 is the economic development article.
Article 7. Economic development. Article 7 makes a number of changes to statute in the areas of business subsidy, JOBZ, and EDA authority.[...] It also includes special tax increment financing (TIF) law for the city of Ramsey and [...]
p.11
City of Ramsey tax increment financing. Section 17 authorizes the city of Ramsey to create a housing TIF district for the development of housing. This district could include parcels under the green acres deferred assessment program. Under general law, these parcels may only be included in economic development districts for certain manufacturing and warehousing projects and qualified housing districts. Effective July 14, 2005, and after the city’s compliance with Minn. Stat. 645.021.
Not only is TIF-ing of housing bad for us directly on Ramsey taxes, but indirectly it hits us twice.
First in financing Ramsey, second in taxing to pay for district schools. Rooftops add students, while TIF adds no tax base increment now when the students show up for instruction - and that means the added money to cover the cost increment has to come from higher rates on existing tax base - the new roofs add cost but not benefit when the new roofs are TIFF-ed.
How's that for an Alice in Wonderland version of cost-benefit balancing - for your benefit?
It lools raw to me. I see false promises in the past, where the speaking chairman of the Town Center Task Force would probably, if confronted, say it was erroneous prognostication.
You judge it.
Who is making money off of this stuff? Off of these shenanigans? That "green acres" language from the LMC suggests a direction to pursue. Who's doing green acre shelter in Ramsey?
Remember, "Follow the money" as the adage.
I do not know the feelings of any reader, but I sure would like to see the new Minnesota State Auditor have her office take a long hard look at following the money. It's in her official jurisdiction to do so, and citizens would benefit and not be hurt by seeing a fine-tooth-comb audit of the entire Ramsey circus show.