|
by the Managing Editor Pleasant View City Council authorized the RDA in 2005 by ordinance, and it will take the City Council to de-commission (eliminate) the RDA by ordinance according to an article written by J. Craig Smith and Scott M. Ellsworth of the Law firm, Smith Hartvigsen, PLLC. JJ Allen, the Pleasant View City Administrator, states that the purpose of the EDA is to create jobs; and the EDA is directed and administered by the RDA with objectives approved by the Taxing Entity Committee (TEC). The Taxing Entity Committee consists of the taxing entities (approximately 8) that receive taxes from the properties within the EDA. The area of the EDA is almost all of the property in Pleasant View west of Highway 89 except some of the properties on the South end that were for the most part previously developed.
The RDA is a governmental bureaucracy funded by tax increment. Tax increment is a concept of redistributing property taxes from the EDA by starting with baseline property taxes, and then distributing all or part of the taxes beyond the baseline to the RDA for its legal purposes. In Pleasant View’s EDA, the baseline was 2004. So the tax increment is the increased property taxes from the EDA from that time going forward. In Pleasant View’s present EDA, the taxing entities will receive 10% of the tax increment (Note that , the RDA can (Shawn, ignore the red color above- just put a space between “EDA,” and “the taxing”)create more EDAs as well as other areas of control or regulation). This was a negotiated deal with the TEC. When asked, JJ Allen says that he hadn’t heard of cities raising taxes to increase the revenue to RDAs, but had heard of taxing entities raising taxes because of no tax revenue increases in the associated EDAs.
Other interesting or cautionary facts about RDAs and Pleasant View’s EDA are that RDAs set their own budgets, can dole out incentives to businesses, and can use these funds for other purposes as the laws and rules allow. For example, housing can be developed, and up to 2% can be used for administration. The EDA was created several years ago, but didn’t become active for several reasons including surface water problems. Now, landowners in the EDA are resolving their surface water problems according to JJ Allen.
There are complex relationship between the various quasi governmental and governmental organizations and bureaucracies. This Sentinel News appreciates the way the city administrator explained the intricacies of these interconnections.
|