Adjustment To Ste. Genevieve Downtown TIF Looks To Be Paying Off

City administrator Martin Toma shared some positive news about the Downtown Tax Increment Financing (TIF) District during last Thursday night’s Ste. Genevieve Board of Aldermen meeting.

Toma said he had met with Audubon Redevelopment LLC concerning TIF payments.

Through 2018, a small return had been captured on the Downtown TIF, which was launched in 2013. The TIF had been affected when some notable buildings were obtained by non-profit entities and the Lucent/BiltBest factory building became unoccupied.

The Jean-Baptiste Valle House came off the tax rolls after being obtained by the National Society of the Colonial Dames of America in the State of Missouri (NSCDA-MO), and the Koetting Building on Market Street was purchased by the Friends of the Museum for the development of the Ste. Genevieve Museum Learning Center.

Both the real estate tax known as PILOTS [payments in lieu of taxes] and the sales tax known as EATS [economic activity taxes] needed to meet the 2012 base before any participants could see any reimbursements.

In the fall of 2018, the TIF Commission reconvened and recommended the city sequester the old Lucent Window and Door/BiltBest factory [in two parcels] into its own Redevelopment Plan Area (RPA) and remove the buildings owned by non-profit entities, in an attempt to meet the 2012 base of $5,808,120 so that payments could start to be made from the TIF. Removing the non-profit buildings was expected to reduce the PILOTS base by a total of $146,270.

Progress is being made, Toma said Thursday. For the first time the real estate base has been met, he said.

“The money was put into the special allocation fund for real estate,” Toma said. “We have to wait a little bit because not everybody pays taxes in December. So we need to wait for some period of time to make sure we have an accurate  picture for the full year. But we know it’s going to be above the base, and that’s a good thing.”

See complete story on the Board of Aldermen in the January 29 edition of the Herald.