Redevelopment Commission - Regular Meeting

like to open the meeting for November 13th uh for the redevelopment commission. Um the first thing always on the agenda is to approve the amendments from the last meeting and I did entertain a motion to that effect. I did go ahead. I did notice that uh I was listed as vice president. So that needs to change to secretary. Other than that, I move to approve. I second it. All right. Uh we have a motion and a second to approve the minutes with the amendment that the that Thomas listed should be listed as secretary, not vice president. The vice president is sitting right next to me. And I should have caught that when I signed it, but I didn't. I was not there.

I know. Mary's our I miss that because she wasn't here. We decided to cut her out. Yeah, she got demoted. You don't get demoted around here. You get up with everybody. Next time you get more u all those in favor say I. I oppose the same. And then minutes shall pass. Thank you. And then yep, we have our annual TIFF presentation from the fine people at Baker Tilly. Jason like to take the floor.

Uh good morning Baker Tilly. Thank you for having me back to today report and um Greg from FSG will also be with me as well. on presenting uh a portion of the report as we've done kind of uh uh kind of team this up every year for a number of years and I think even before this was a a state requirement per statute we had been um providing a report uh to the redunk commission for a number of years just kind of updating you on uh each of the tiff areas kind of where they've been um kind of comparing the estimates with what we uh have actually collected and then comparing that towards the bond payments to make sure there's been enough Tiff coming in to make your bond payments and then I know Gary also uses our estimates uh throughout the year to help you guys project what you're going to collect so you can uh kind of prioritize your projects. And then as you can see uh I have put together two reports for you the PowerPoint presentation and a booklet. You'll probably notice the booklet has got a little bit heavier this year uh just as you guys have been very active with the new bonds for Amplify and the new TIFF areas. But I'll kind of go through the PowerPoint presentation um as we've done in the past. Uh but if you have any questions uh through the presentation on each individual area or just tiff in general be happy to to stop and answer your questions. Um but the book booklet is just really more detail the backup to the PowerPoint. Um has some more information on when the tip areas were created and ended and things like that. But again we'll kind of start with the PowerPoint presentation. On page two, uh this will go through each one of your areas and kind of meet the requirements of the statute uh that you're required to provide. But page one just talks about the Mount Comfort allocation area number one. You'll see a lot of this information is what we've gone over in the past. But again, uh the main reason for this presentation is to uh present this to the overlapping taxing units uh which were also invited and I can tell some are in the audience today. So just can kind of repeating

some of the highlights. Uh the air allocation area number one, Mount Comfort North was created in 2009. Uh it will end in 2034 unless uh the red commission decides to end it earlier. Um as it points out here and we always make it clear u for all the overlapping tax units and this is the case for all your tiff areas. You only capture the increase in the real property. to the increase in land value in any buildings. Uh to this point, uh the board has never decided to capture any new equipment uh that's also installed. That is uh you do have the ability to do that. Um but we've never needed to do that. We've been able to fund the bonds and the projects that that you've wanted to fund with just capturing the real property. So that all that personal property has been able to pass through to the overlapping tax units. And uh if you will notice if you look at Buck Creek in particular, that township, if you look at the increase in assessed value for that township compared to the other townships in the county, you'll see that it has increased significantly more than other townships. And one of the reasons why is because of all the equipment that has been invested in that township because of all the, you know, distribution centers that we've been able to entice to come here because of all the infrastructure you've put in place. So, all that personal property that you've been able to uh that's been invested in the township has been able to flow through to help keep tax rates down. Um, in 2017, we did a refinance the 2009 bonds and saved over $700,000 uh and interest over the life of the bonds. And then in 2025, as you know, we issued bonds to help uh fund the Amplify uh uh project. Down there at the bottom, you can see this year we're estimated to collect about $9.5 million in revenue, and that's anticipated to grow to about 10.6

million after 2026. We'll update that 2026 estimate once we have the 2026 tax rates. We'll probably come out in December or January. One thing I do want to point out, and this is not only for this tip estimate, for the others, this doesn't assume anything for appeals. And if you remember last year, we saw a pretty big reduction in the false settlement because of a lot of appeals got settled. So, it's hard to estimate because some appeals, you know, go on for years, but you could potentially see a $400, $500,000 reduction in your tiff if appeals, the majority of appeals get settled in the favor of the taxpayer. So just keep that in mind as we're you know looking at funding projects in the future. But overall the tiff is growing and and in the tiff area in the report uh we show this going out even past uh 2026. But just for the presentation we anticipate that to continue to grow as your abatements on the real property continue to fall off. Uh if you turn the page, west allocation area, it was created in 2021 uh is anticipated in 2050. Uh this area that is uh is also pledged to repay the amplify bonds that were issued in 2025. And you can see this year we're anticipate $1.4 million and anticipated to grow about 2.5 million uh next year. Page four, Hancock County allocation area number one created in 2022. Uh you can see right now at this time since we didn't we purposely didn't pledge these uh to ferry to the bonds. Uh so we didn't have an expiration date. Right now, it has a a 25-y year expiration date, but it doesn't start until we actually pledge this to any any bonds. You can see there's not a whole

lot of new development out there yet. About $260,000 this year. Anticipate about $360,000 next year. Turn to page area two. It was also created in 2022. Also has a 25 year life. And you can see there from page five, uh, about $10,000 this year and about $17,000 next year. So again, not a lot of development out there in this area, but as you know, we created with anticipation of development in the future. None of these figures include EDAS, right?

Correct. Yeah, this is just TIFF only. And uh, also this is only the these estimates only include buildings that are out there built and assessed. So it doesn't include any future development or any, you know, known development that's under construction right now. Right. buildings that have that have been okayed but not built yet. Does not include any of those buildings.

So page six, uh this working with Gary, he provided us kind of the capital outlays and I think he may be talking about this later, the spending plan, but uh this is kind of the projects that you have planned tentatively at least uh for the remaining of this year and then out through 2029. So it has a lot of the infrastructure projects that you well aware of and then also some of the uh uh money that you've designated to uh different entities um as well. That first line item there you see the amplified bond set aside. If you remember when we uh issued the Amplify bonds, one of the things that we agreed to is that we would set aside enough money uh in the allocation account to cover the next two bond payments for the Amplify bonds and your outstanding bonds. And then anything above that we could use to help pay for projects or uh give money to other entities. So this just includes that set aside amount so that we have enough money set aside above and beyond what we want to pay for projects. And then page seven, um we looked at just uh Mount Comfort area 1 west allocation and um Hancock tiff one and tiff 2. If you look at those revenue streams compared to the bond payments and the capital outlays, you can see that you know look at the ending cash balances even with those capital projects. We're still anticipating that your ending balance is going to grow over time. So that's something we'll continue monitoring for you and working with Gary because I know your project list is it's a living document always always changing. So that's want to make sure that we have enough revenue to cover your expenses.

So even with any appeals the ending cash balance is way above what that would would ever happen. Yeah. So, we're looking, you know, I even compared to last year, even with our the appeals that we were that came to fruition at the end of last year, we're still looking at very strong revenue streams.

So, how long does it take? It was two or three new buildings built out there this year. Um, they had been approved previously, you know, like in sets of three or four buildings in this area when we approved the whole project. How long does it take for those buildings to get into the system? There's a brand new building built at um three north and five west. Um how long does it take for that building to get into the system? It really depends upon when the it's com I think the assessor is typically waited until buildings are fully complete. So uh let's say and it gets assessed January one of each year.

So that's the key date is when the building's complete and assessed. Okay. So let's say the building's complete say December of 2025. It's going to be assessed January 2026 paying taxes in 2027. 7. Okay. So if it's not done by January, then it wouldn't pay tax till 28. Correct. Okay. Yeah. Is that the case even on uh empty spec buildings? Yes. Yeah. Now on empty spec buildings uh they'll be assessed but they'll be assessed at a much slower amount because they're empty. But yeah, they'll still be assessed, right? But if they're sold, we had two two spec buildings sold this year. Mhm. So they would be assessed next year, correct?

And they would pay the year after that. So those taxes won't even hit till 28. Yeah. I mean, the spec building could still be paying taxes right now at the lower amount. Some taxes. Yes. But then once it gets sold, then the builder will probably make some improvements. Yeah. You know, add on to it and then those improvements probably wouldn't get picked up till the following year. Okay. you do the same reassessment after occupancy from a tenant. Yes, they the assessor should Yeah. Whenever there's a change in the um usage um or improvement, uh they should go out there and reassess it. But we we work on a real time dollar amount coming in is what we're budgeting against. But there I think there's 16 buildings left to be built.

Mhm. That have already been caided. Um, and they have a a seven-year deadline from the time they were okayed unless they want to forfeit their tax abatement, right? So, they'll be continually over the next few years, these buildings will be built out or the projects will be abandoned, but um um but it still takes two years for those. So, everything will they'll be trickle it'll be trickling in over the next Yeah. Okay. And there have been reports where we have uh projected those future buildings. Um but as you know the last couple years some of those buildings have been slow to they didn't develop as quickly as we thought they would just because of various reasons.

Uh so I didn't want to include those in here. So this is a a conservative approach. So really the way the process works is once the building department pulls a permit for any improvement. So, if a tenant moves in and there's no improvement, it would not get reassessed. You wouldn't know. Uh, the only way the auditor knows to reassess is if a building permit has been pulled and a substantial completion has been awarded, then they know an improvement's been made. Therefore, a reassessment would occur. But there would almost always have to be improvements. Not always. Yeah. Well, but unless the building warehouse, I guess, if the building sold,

then that triggers a reassessment. you buy a house, it triggers it triggers a reassessment by law. I think we had two buildings. I was just wondering what were the triggers for the reassessment. If a building's up and and I would assume if there's any improvements, a building permit would be pulled. Um, and you're right, if a sale would occur, a sale, we had two two big we had two million square foot building sold this year. So, that would trigger a reassessment on that building.

And then also, you have trending that occurs every year. So a fourth of the county is automatically reassessed every year. So even if something were missed, like you a slight improvement was made to a warehouse, it may not get picked up every year, but when it gets reassessed every four years, I mean the assessor in theory or who they contract with goes out and, you know, inspects. It's it's every four years for commercial buildings. I thought it was every two for I believe it's every four isn't for two or four. It's four. It's four. Okay. Yeah. I don't know Greg if you got anything to add on the assessments or

No, and and I think the whole point is when it when the building permit and it becomes uh occupied so to speak that would be the then typically after that it's reassessed depending on how it transitions. So that's all I was going to say Jason is kind of kind of don't we've got the initial As soon as the building gives an accuracy to reassess, no matter what time we a stupid or reassessment or whenever there's any changes made, there'll be kind of a new assessment. You're wasting months. Yeah.

Uh the next page, uh the Mount Comfort RV allocation area. Uh it was created in 2018. Uh again, you don't capture personal property, but this is one where you capture uh the revenue and then give a certain percentage uh of the increment back to the developer as the incentive uh over time. Uh so again, that has a 25 year life because technically you haven't pledged any revenue to the bonds. Um but if you look on page nine, you know, we're estimating about $65,000 of increment coming in a year. uh you can see the uh amount that you reimburse the developer for and you can see in 2030 that uh agreement ends. So in theory in that time we could end the the Mount Comfort Road RV allocation area if you like or you have the ability to continue that and just keep collecting that $65,000 and then use it for projects and serving or benefiting that area. That's something as we get closer we can have those discussions. But then you can see the estimate tax increment remaining and you do have funds in an allocation account. So that's something Gary, it's not a lot of money, but it is money that's at your disposal that you can use for capital projects.

Yeah. I mean, it could be like a $3 million bond, maybe if you wanted to do a long bond or something or just like Jason said, right? So if you bonded against this area here, then you could extend the TIFF district, right? Uh bonding doesn't extend it. bonding doesn't extend it. But you can go beyond this 2030. That's just when this agreement ends. Oh, okay. Um but once you issue bonds, at least under the current statute, it has a 25 year life, but that clock, that 25 year clock doesn't start until you issue bonds. Okay?

So, but in theory, under current statute, if you never issue bonds, this tiffy could go on forever. Now, it wouldn't surprise me if uh legislators change the statute and maybe have it a sunset date eventually for tiff areas like this. Um, but right now, it could go on forever. Well, I I can't 5 years, six years from now. I mean, there's no estimating what we're going to be doing in that spe This is a specific area of the the thing. It's souththeast of the of the interstate, which right now we're not targeting any of that development there, but that doesn't mean that 5 years from now there won't be targeting development in that area.

Uh the next page uh is the Mount Comfort South allocation area number two. Uh it was created in 2020. Uh we did issue bonds uh in 2022. This is kind of the HRH allocation areas that we kind of referred to. Uh again, so really basically all the tiff that you're collecting is to pay off those 2022 bonds of $8.5 million. If you remember, right, the company purchased these bonds. Um you know, with the incentive for all the infrastructure and just as the tiff comes in, we just pay those bonds off as quickly as possible. Uh if the tiff doesn't come in as what they anticipated, um the bonds may not get paid off completely by the by the maturity date. So again, the developers taking on all the risk.

You you'd have no idea or no way of knowing if if the schedule, you know, 2026 $313,000 if that's ahead or behind. It's behind. Yeah. If you look at this report, uh and we again, we didn't project any future development, but I know the development that they projected in 2022 uh is nowhere near what's actually happening with just what's happened in the economy last, you know, 3 or four years. Um, so you know, based on what we know now, they're not going to get that 8.5 million paid back. But again, that was a risk that that they took, right? But there's there is construction going to start. Yes. New hotel and conference center and all that kind of stuff. So that should help catch it up some.

Yes. And maybe a Texas Roadhouse.

Um, so actually this was the ninestar bonds for the water tower. Um but same same approach both really page 10 and page 11 uh the nine star and hrs are both paid from those two tiff areas and again they purchased the bonds and you know we structured it so that there is no risk to the county. It's just if the development occurs as they anticipated uh that's used to pay off all the infrastructure to support that area. Um page 12, uh the GDI allocation area, uh allocation area that you kind of carved out to, uh create its own allocation area to provide incentives for GDI, um getting issued bonds in 20123 and then also had an agreement uh with the county uh to reimburse uh the county uh for some funds that it had uh contributed. Again, he only pledged 50% of the tax increment uh towards these obligations. Uh and you can see in 2025 uh should be collecting about $280,000 this year and 2026 about 415,000. And I will tell you in this area what you collected in June was significantly less than 50%. Uh we confirmed this with the auditor's office there were a number of taxpayers in there that paid their taxes late. So should be collecting in the fall settlement, but they'll continue to watch that.

This this is similar to the hospital one. We don't carry any risk. Correct. ADI carries the risk on this. If they fail, they fail. Yeah. Okay.

And then the last uh page in my part of the presentation before I hand it over to Greg is on page 13. Uh this is kind of an I like to show this for illustration because I think there's a misconception. You know, we're talking that you guys are collecting, you know, some significant amount of revenue um but you have significant amount of projects that you're trying to fund. uh you know the misconception is if you were to end these tiff areas that you know the county the townships uh the schools the others would receive this windfall of revenue. Uh so there's you know we've talked about this over the years and that's just not true because if you remember you're not capturing dollars you're capturing assessments assessed value. So I tried to show this uh in this schedule if you look at the top of the page uh this is you know Buck Creek Township where the majority of the tiff areas are included. Uh you can see the tax rate of $211 is made up of the county, the uh Buck Creek Township and Ver um Verdens Community School Corporation to come up with the $211. Uh it's also important to know that we don't capture the school referendum rate of 13. So we only capture, you know, of the total tax rate $1.97. So just for illustration, you know, for every $10 million of assessment that you capture, if you look at that box, we capture about $197,000 in TIFF. So, back up just a second. For layman's terms, the school's referendum rate, they collect it. We don't interfere with that.

Correct. Yeah, that's correct. I want everybody to understand that.

So, just for illustration, let's show that let's say that we didn't need the $197,000. We had enough enough other tiff coming in to fund all of our projects and we wanted to pass through $10 million of assessment. So, if you look at the county, um, you know, for instance, I've highlighted there in yellow, um, you see on the kind of there in the middle, the $16,588,000, that's the budget of the county that's payable from property taxes. The county is at its maximum levy. So, we can't raise that a penny more. No matter whether we pass through assessed value, no matter if your expenses are higher, no matter if there's another large investment, we can't increase the budget anymore. It's because the state tells us what the maximum levy is. But if you look at the tax base, you know, it's 6 billion89 million at the top. If we add $10 million, now it's $6 bill819 million. So if your budget stays the same, but if your tax base increases, we just need a lower tax rate to fund our budget. So if you look at the county, you know, at the top it was $2 or 24 cent.2436. By passing through $10 million of assessment, the tax rate drops 2432. So a very slight decrease in the tax rate. And you can see that for the other units, the only two funds where you could potentially see some additional revenue are the funds. The county has one and Buck Creek uh township has a fund. So, as you can see, if we were to increase the tax base by $10 million, each one of those funds uh would increase by about $3,300. But everyone else tax rates would just drop a lot.

So, overall, about a penny for every $10 million you'd pass through. So that is a benefit to the community. You see a decrease in your tax rate, but you'd be foregoing almost $200,000 of revenue that you need for, you know, future county projects. Well, and for for the other entities, not just the residents, just the the fire departments, the schools, and it you've done a decent job of of trying to explain that. That is the most complex issue to explain to somebody. Um, you know, in theory, I'm still a trash man. For me to comprehend that you take all of that revenue and if you don't collect it the way we're collecting it, then basically everybody gets pennies.

Yeah. Because the tax rates fall. Um, it's uh for most people it it's just it's not comprehendable to Yeah. It's not intuitive. I mean, any of property taxes are probably the most complicated, especially when you start talking about circuit breaker losses and all that. tax levies and everything are already hit. So, it's like there's no Yeah. Yeah. So, that's why I try to point that out because really you almost have to hear it a dozen times before you even start to understand it because it it doesn't make sense. It's not very intuitive. That's very true. I'm still working on the circuit breaker thing. But she was the auditor. Yeah. Well, I know. And we have arguments because we still don't understand some things that are coming in. You know what I mean? And she was the auditor.

You say you understand everything, you're not telling the truth. Yeah. Yeah. But I think that's why we have Greg and we have Jason. I think what you what you are doing here is by capturing the revenue and you you did the same thing with, you know, changing the legislation at the state by using TIFF to be able to help fund police and operating because you see you get more bang for your buck by capturing the TIFF and help funding those projects rather than just passing it through and reducing the tax rate by pennies. Yeah, it's definitely better for the community. So before I hand it off to Greg, is there any questions on the individual tiff areas? Yeah, Gary, go ahead, Gary. Yeah, you're you're part of the public, but you're

not. You're not point out on your on our expenses. We do have Fed participation risk. That was more re I was very afraid of that the last days, but the governor has reopened. Remember, we're getting about 80% grants on our construction projects. We don't get those. take my line and add 80% to it. So, we're always at that risk contract. Is that going to delay some of the money that you need that the closing of the government because I know it takes a while to get it is a possibility, but I don't think so. But I'm just pointing out that is a risk and on the expense side of it. Well, Gary, I heard that moving forward they're only funding 50/50. Is that are we got grandfathered in on the commitments we already have?

We currently have our commitments as they are, but the government's shut then the government shut. So, I I I thought for next year that they had come back and thought that they were going to be 50/50. There's always federal participation risk. We do have agreements and contracts in place with the state and the federal government. They can't change those though. I was in the army for four years and they tacked on one year because of Iraq. They just changed my contract. Okay. Um when when will you when will you know? What what what when what month will we know next year when you're I will know at the beginning of the at the fiscal year for the state which is in June. Okay. Okay. Um June. So we still have to wait.

I appreciate that. No speculation on the buildings because I'm an engineer. H there's something we learned from the HR and those that style of things for future projects. We transferred all that risk and HR has happened to eat some of the downside of it. Mhm. So those private entities are eating it, not the taxpayer,

on some of that non-development. So those worked out pretty well. And I think we're in a position on the future ones. I think the council and commissioners were talking about even taking 25% of that, they can have 70 instead of having all of it, 75%. So we get something like for the fire departments or or something for that. So that was something on on the last page. I know there was a discrepancy. I know Buck Creek did some work and they failed. Have Have you had a chance to link up their CPAs like that? Yeah, we've had we uh daughter's office and I had a call with them and if somebody could fill me out why there's a difference in there, I'd like to know that myself in the future. We don't figure that out here. I'd like to know

that. And on this one though, the tax rates don't change. If to be the devil's advocate, if we returned a bunch of AB in there and you were able to get a levy adjustment, you keep the same tax rate and pass it through. But that's a that's a heavy political lift. But just clear that present all sides of an issue. If you're able to pass it or you able to take the AV and get a levy adjustment, then you could capture that money in a different way. That's very difficult to do to get a levy adjustment. I don't know how many levy adjustments have been the last few years. There have been some, but they're hard to get. Well, we have one pending. Yeah. And we're one last year, so you know, but they're over at this point for the most part.

Yes, ma'am. If Buck Creek Township could have captured the TIFF AV their three-year AV growth appeals the last three years, they would have gotten an additional 47,2 run those numbers for me because I think there's some Yes. I'd be happy to get you that information. All right. And Gary, my comment was from the county standpoint. Yeah. Yeah. I just want to make sure we look at all all points of view because we can be wrong sometimes. I want to make sure that you jobs, but I like to I like to review things continuous here. Couple couple things. Okay. We only have two areas, two contracts that the vendor is liable, right? Correct. Okay. Hospital and GDI right now.

Correct. Okay. And so it's feasible to say if we had a in in a way the RB kind the nine. Yeah. But it it in a way or it's feasible to say that that's on the table if we end up with a very large project. Oh yeah. And and making them right and making them responsible instead of us taking the risk. Craig and Jason would say you should definitely explore those options. Right. Alstein is setting up one right now similar where they they capture 25%. Right.

And then they pass 75% for one other quick question while everybody's up there. Um, okay. Let's say the the sky falls in and we get shorted two or three million dollars and is it possible looking at the schedule 5 years from now on the cash flow coming in, is it possible to borrow against the future cash flow coming in? If you got 18 million coming in in three years or four years and you're two or three million shy this year, is it possible to bond or borrow against that that bond is? Barnage. Okay. Baring future revenue. So we we can save ourselves if the state cuts us off what they promised us, right? Yeah. If if uh if we can prove

we can prove that revenue is going to be there. If we had a complete 80% cut, I'd have to understand a year last year. But there's a lot of money. There's a lot of money or four years from now. So, we're talking adding tens of millions of dollars perom, right? Yeah. If you look on page 13 of the report of the detailed report, that shows how much uh estimated tax increment you have remaining after the bond payments. And we're talking, you know, 8 $10 million a year. So, we could bond against that future revenue, right? If if you know the federal, right? I'm talking about the sky falls. Yeah. If the sky falls, I don't think the sky will fall, but I got to keep an eye. We're 2 million short right now. I'm trying to chase on. But I

with that said, I'm going to if we're successful with that, I want to slide the interest increase for Buck Creek, right? I But I want a backup plan. If I mean, I just want to know if there's a backup plan, you know. Um but I don't want to hit you up for like $20 million backup plan right now. That's a that's a little bit sky falling, right? We're we're we're having growth problems right now figuring out 5 10 years from now what what money we're going to be spending on what too cuz that's going to change a little bit I think. So, um, one one last thing before you leave to today. Um, we need to talk about impact, um, because there's talk about impact um, on certain entities and stuff like that and I'm not clear on from Senate Bill One.

Yeah. U, that is included in our estimates. Okay. So, we've included that. So, you know, you're right. A lot of your re um, uh, property that we're capturing is commercial. commercial property ar isn't going to be impacted too much by Senate Bill one. Okay.

Residential is heavily impacted. We don't have any residential tiff areas. Um however, uh there are a number of residential parcels in your tiff areas. Um and with Senate Bill one, they're going to be receiving some additional credits that get phased in which is going to reduce their assessment which is part of our base which is basically going to offset some of our growth. So that's something that we're looking at. we may want to take out some of those residential parcels because they're only hurting us. Um, so that's something we'll probably talk about in the future. Um, and then also like agricultural land, they're getting deductions that they never had before. Um, and you know, uh, apartments, those types of things. So that could impact our tip, but we've incorporated that in our tip estimates. Well, we're relying on you and Greg to for our information on impact of other entities and they're relying on someone else for their information. So, that'll play an important part probably 2026.

We're happy to help. Do you have just a wild guess how many residential uh homes that we have within our tiff area? I don't I have not didn't count them, but I know they're significant because it did if um about 300. Is it about 300? About 300. Uh thank you.

It's worth thinking about maybe carving those out. So that's something we want to kind of talk strategically why we include them in the first place. You know, do we think that they may get developed, you know, as commercial properties in the future? Did we just include them because we thought we may want to make some improvements in that area? So, that's something uh we can talk about. But if it's not if neither one of those are the case, we may just want to carve them out because they're only hurting us right now because we can't capture any increases in the homes. But if they go down, it does hurt us. Well, they they are going down.

Well, and not necessarily when I say going down, it may not be because of the economy and the value of the homes are going down, but because of the additional deductions that they're receiving because of Senate Bill One. And that's what we care about is the net amount. Yeah. It's clear as mud. Yeah. Like I said, property tax in the end was one most complicated. It just gets more complicated. Which keeps Greg and I in business. Yeah. Thank you. I'll let Greg finish up the presentation.

Thank you. And good morning, Greg Geras, Financial Solutions Group. And Kent, if you recall about three or four months ago, we sent you the trending for a house at 5004 million and and that. So you might want to look at that. But so to lead off, you're right, Robin. You got the concept of circuit breaker kind of under your belt. Now you have to get the concept of loss revenue under your belt, which is I'm good at that.

Yeah. So which is the lost revenue that you know is being developed because of the residential the lesser of 10% or 300 on on residential. So I totally believe you should get your residential out of your tiff and if you if it became a large commercial you could always create a tiff then if it but at this point in time it has it has more potential impact negative impact than positive impact. So that's what I'm leading off on in the fact that from the county council standpoint and and that what I work with is the stability in the assess value in the overall assess value going forward is critical and that's a combination of how personal property is going to work in how the AV is going to grow and the effect of any future abatements that the county council would grant. So on the first page, page 14, this just is a reflection of the fact that as Jason pointed out very good, uh along the way, we do not collect personal property, but also as the county council and the and the RDC should know, personal property is on its way out. like I've been saying for many many years and it's going to be sliding fairly quickly and then as Jason knows that you know in the tiff district the floor of 10% or 30% the 30% floor is not going away for the people in the tiff district but you know eventually that'll get corrected I think when if uh

bonds are not included or being paid from personal property. I think the state legislature will wake up and say we're we're done. So, okay. So, point on that question. Yeah. If we carve out the 300 homes that are in the tiff district. Okay. Okay. Carve those properties out, right? They revert back to the township. Well, they revert back to all of us. Okay. They were back to all of us. We're all in it together. We're all in it together. But instead of the revenues coming to the tiff district, they'll go back to the entities, right? It'll be minor impact.

Okay. There's still an increase to the to those entities because we're capturing that stuff right now. It it again Kent as Jason said it would be depended on if we're have a max levy growth quotient of zero then technically as I've told you I think it's coming then technically more AV won't really equate to more dollars

except for the funds as Jason pointed out. So, I think that's very very immaterial and very very uh it's not big bucks to them at all, but it keeps your stability in your AV of your tiff district going positively up. Okay? Not being up and down in a in two areas.

Okay? So, so when we then look at personal property on page 14, not only do we put personal property into the AV and the AV of the county is a little higher because of it and we're not capturing it in the TIFF, then what that means is when there is a more AV then there is less circuit breaker. Okay? So these are a negative numbers meaning that if Buck Creek had what's your typical circuit breaker right now? Do you know off top of your head in total? Let's say it's a hypothetical million dollars then it's a little less than that because the AV comes in and lowers the tax rate and helps it. Okay. So there's some impact in circuit breaker lost revenue. I would I would kind of keep that out of that equation, okay? Because that's more as a result of homeowners and things like that. But I told you I've told the council and the RDC needs to know the state wants to get to a $3 tax rate and end the circuit breaker impact because everybody will be there, you know, and and they're working towards that. But my point is that if in Hancock County we have 10 percent growth in AV from all of our constituents making up AV, then we're that much better off because circuit breaker won't our our tax rate won't go to $3 at fast. Now they might figure out a way to force it to that way, but at this point it wouldn't work that way. Okay. So, the next page, page 15, is an estimate of the personal property that's in and around the area. And by all

means, helps Buck Creek, helps the township, doesn't help the library because they're income tax, but helps the any other taxing district that relies on property taxes in the area. And keep in mind, personal property then helps the school corporation, right? Because it gets it it will bring its tax rate down a little bit, but it will help it in the referendum area. And that's the last page that we've got here. So, it is an estimate and keep in mind personal property goes up the first year or two and then takes a dive and as we've told the council can dive as much as now 5% in a non-tiff area and you know depending on what pool it's in. So, the next one and here's the lifeblood of Hancock County going forward. page 16. It's income. It's income taxes and it's wages. And you know, Kent and Robin, I've I've said this in front of council. I mean, I I don't care if you come in and build a 1,000 square foot cracker box. But if you bring in $500,000 worth of income or you earn $500,000 because you're rich and famous and you want to have a house in in what uh 50 other states or 51 other states or how many there are nowadays, you know, that's your business. But if you bring $500,000 of income to Hancock County and your primary residence is here and we get to charge our 1.94, great. Build your cracker box, build or

build your million-doll home. But if we are able to get the income now and in the future, that's where we're going. Yes. Okay. And and so now what is 92 counties trying to get? They're trying to get a reasonable home with high incomes. And just in Shelby County yesterday and they were like, "Oh." So that's what I've said, "Yes, that's what we've always been talking about. Let's do that." And you know, it's hard. It's hard because we can't all compete and obviously you've got to have amenities. Amenities. And should I say amenities, you know? So,

so who who decides the 1.94% rate? You. Okay. And you? All right. So, um, and how does that compare to the other counties around us? Are we higher? Oh, we're I I've given you that in the sustainability and you see you're in the lower quartile. Okay.

And keep in mind again, Kent, the 194 gets wiped off the slate in 2027. And in 2028, the new theater comes near you and you know from the discussion just last week that you're going to get decide your your supreme commander of all lits other than green fields and anyone over 3500. So um that theater will come right back to the county council. Okay. So the the cities that are over 3500 though they capture their own income tax at that point. That is the theory at this point in time. Yes. Get any of that?

Yes. At that point. Um another question. Go ahead. Currently then it doesn't matter where the person lives as long as in the county. Doesn't matter what town or anything. What What is Well, if they live in Greenfield, they live in the county. So they are subject to the countywide lit under uh Senate Bill one, right?

Okay. So, no, as a county for the county rate, I don't care if you live next door to Bill Bolanganger and or if you live right here other than because the county will get its right to levy its tax on its countywide tax. But your tax rate that you ultimately pay as a taxpayer, as I showed you in the presentation that we went over a little bit last week and we're going to go over in December, you may have two tax rates added together. Okay? So, keep that in mind. But again, for the RDC, stability in the AV and continuing to help grow real property and have personal property as long as we can and then providing the job opportunities. Now, we just have to put up basically a fence to keep them in Hancock County so they don't wander off into another county and live. Okay. So, um Gary's building nice big roads and so is Hendrickx County to other counties. Sometimes I think maybe we need to make those tow worlds roads so they stay here, you know, but that's the key.

Well, encouraging projects that that have employees that would be contingent to living in the area. You know what I mean? Yeah. Again, if you could say, do you know we'll give you an abatement of five years if you guarantee all of your c all of your employees will stay in Hancock County. That would be awesome. But, you know, they won't, right? And, you know, I've done the test and usually about, you know, over in in Hendricks and Planefield, it was determined that approximately 50% will stay.

Yeah. But if you have a project that that the average wage is 60 to 80,000, those people have a tendency to live closer to their job than if you have a project that the average wage is 250,000, right? Because at 250 they'll now be able to afford their new uh helicopter or what is coming to be a helicopter and they can fly back home to Hamilton. Yes. Yeah. So you're you're we're on it. Yeah. We want those highincome people, but yet one of our big problems, I think, is that we haven't had affordable housing. And that's why they go to Indianapolis. They can find it cheaper there than they can here. And we're not very far away.

We just don't have the high income areas. But Hancock is a great place to live. Yes. Safe and secured. Brad usually, and he's sitting back there. It's so secure cuz Brad's on the job, you know. It's a little scary though. He's going to leave. He's going to leave. I know. But he his his person that's likely to come, I hear, is good, too. Yeah.

So, uh, page 16, you've got that. So, the it does obviously benefit us all. And this is under the non SB1 regime. So, staying applicable for 2728 or 26 and 27. And then page 17 is the impact on the referendum. So yes, again, more AV helps them have more dollars since the state was so nice and didn't give them any replacement of lit. uh referendums are going to probably be more coming uh to a theater near you unless the state changes it m its mind and decides to replace some of the lit there for schools. I

I think you know as time goes on here more of the referendums are are going to work because um people realize the schools and so forth have to have that money. Yeah. Yeah, before it was very difficult to get a referendum through in Hancock County for anything, but I think the time's coming that's going to be different.

So, thank you RDC. Thanks, Jason. This is kind of how we we kind of tie it into the overall finances of the county as a whole. And remember, we're all in this team. We're all in this battle together or this mission together. And it's very, very important for us to play as a team. So, we don't interfere with the referendum. We allow that to pass through our scenario. And so, if they increase that, then it just it it increases to them. It takes from us some, but it just increases. No. And and first of all, let me correct. You don't allow it. By state law, it is mandated,

right? Okay. And so they get their 13 pennies, right, on the total AV either in the county or or in the in the tiff or outside of the tiff. That's the point. Okay. Okay. So if we create more AV in the tiff and then more AV in the county, 13 pennies works better, right? So the more AV we have, better off they are. Yeah. So that's why stability again in the AV going forward. Robin knows this from her many many years of auditor. Stability andor growth having it is great if we can continue to do that. Yeah. So, thank you very much. Yep.

Okay. So, now that everybody knows everything there is to know about it, you do retaining it. Yeah. Uh we'll expect next next month the um quiz or retain some of this. Okay, Gary, you want to give us your update so we can keep moving?

600 West is at its final inspection. However, winter came, so I got some vegetation and stuff that needs to put in. So, we've got a we won't be able to do the notice of termination till spring, which is typical. Uh but it is it's substantially complete. It's 99.9% complete. Uh 300 South, 600 West to 700 West lets this winter. Federal closure had some effects. It's been opened. So I am currently petitioning uh for some additional grant money for that particular job. However, um Greg mentioned that one of my peers was able to have one of his jobs come in significantly lower on Ronald Reagan, which is a similar type project what I'm doing. So, I can hope that maybe I could uh get some favorable bid prices, but I don't like to count on that till it happens. But uh I'll call Mr. Res and see if he had any magic voodoo in there.

Appears to be a great climate on on roads right now because that that wasn't the only story we had. Yeah, that's good news

and that's going to help assist with with some things. But I am in contact with INDOT with uh Lindsay and Mr. Packer to work on making sure we get some state funds to assist us on that. But we do have plans and we're going to be okay if we don't get those additional funds. It's fine. We've planned for it. But if I can get that, then we can roll, you can roll that money into other stuff. Um, we have to use it. Uh, I3 agreements are terminating, just FYI. Uh, so those are popping up. The two-stage ditch is finished. I think Chad and his crews did a good job out there on that. That payment is on this, so that should be cleared. That's up near McCorville. Help with some flooding and some exposure of the uh cemetery up there. So that's good. and make sure that area area is still developable developable because you can't develop where you have environmental problems or things like that. So, uh, Gateway spending plan is finished. Auditor, I sent it over to Cindy so the auditor will get that uploaded. Um, a couple notes on Greg's thing. We're about 30% in the county. That is increasing. So, our employees out there about 30% in the county. You probably can tell there's been a push within the cities and some areas to get apartments up for that very reason you mentioned, Kent. people are moving here and that rate is increasing. So we're capturing all the low it there. So though you don't have your $250,000 a year person sitting on six acres of land, you can have 20 $80,000 per year younger people who eat out and stay here and work here. And it's actually, you know, and they're fun. They're kids. They're good times. Um um I will probably at the next meeting uh if we're able to get the additional monies or the bid is favorable, I'll probably present. Uh, I'm going to work with um Jason on your numbers

because I don't understand them yet. Um, I am looking at probably sliding the sheriff and the fires or recommending to you. I don't decide anything. You can probably slide the I have inflation adjustments in there. I could probably adjust that rate and timing of it a little earlier if we're in good shape. Um, the point would be to get it out uh to them if we can. So, well, I was going to say that end of the year is next month for us. You know what I mean? It's our last meeting is in 30 days. So I like to say that last collection in December, right? If you got emergencies or popups, last year we had a few. We had to because Amplify and stuff we had to swing things around. Amplify was high adventure.

Yeah. But we don't have that this year. So everything's but then your estimates uh your conservative estimates then fall to the wayside by the end of next month. So I think we're good to go for now. Amplify is on schedule by the way. There's some change orders and stuff which is typical on a $56 million job. nothing crazy. Tens of thousands of dollars, not millions of dollars. So, I I really would like for us to aware of what's going on on the state level and realize that the funding you think you may be getting isn't going to come. So, we need to prioritize. I would hope I would know. I watch that like a hawk, obviously, and I'll be ringing your phone the second there's an emergency. The thing is, they're the state. They're not going to take the political damage of doing that until they have to.

So, when do you think I would find out? April, June, right after the primary. So that's my concern. How does that affect our budget for what we set for next year? And we need to prioritize what is most important. Is it infrastructure, roads, commitments we've made? I would say everything we have a contract for is going to be most important. Bond and commitments. So my point is is I'm I'm nervous to commit to Oh, you're not going to do that because you don't even you don't even do your budgeting until because we submit that in the same time right after things. So you're not going to have to think about it until the budget comes. But you have in here through Jason's numbers a commitment of what we would like to give correct

to life safety and some other folks in the county. I just want everyone to be aware we're subject to the state's legislation. Oh, exactly. We have priorities we have to fund. The only things that are contracted are contracts with the state and the bonds. Everything else is stuff we'd like to do. We do have commitments with vendors that are designing things that So my point is that's not 100% true. We do have true sorry I state's oversimplified. Those are being reimbursed from the state to some extent. So those vendors we're getting all these things designed for. We're getting 80% of our money back. So I'll let you know if something changes. I I just want everyone to know. You'll probably hear me weeping all the way. Everyone needs to realize that we do have commitments that we have to pay under contract.

Correct. Yeah. Well, if they could don't come with 80% those commitments disappear. But yeah. Yeah. You get what I'm if we're not under if we're anticipating that through your all the way out to 2030. Yeah. If they say, "Hey, 80%'s gone, we we can get out of the contract, right? Let's the sky is not Let's not scare everybody. I think things are okay. We've been doing 12 years." But yeah, my eyes are on it. I'm always looking. I think everyone was pretty disappointed with Senate Bill 1. I just want to say there could be more disappointments to come. The French and Indians come at dawn, but it's not dawn yet. We'll be we'll figure it out. Okay. Dawn will be in April. Okay. Thank you, Gary. Um All right. We have invoices to approve.

Okay. I'll make a motion that we approve invoices for $340,463. And that is 84. There's a common one. It should have been period. I second. Super. We have a motion and a second to approve. The invoices $340,463.84. Um, seeing no further discussion, all those in favor say I. I oppose the same and the invoices are taken care of. Um, I don't see anything else, any more actional items on the agenda. Does anybody in the board have something? I motion that we adjourn

at 8:59. We We did it. Uh second. I'll second it. All those in favor? I We are adjourned. Thank you.