St. Joseph County officials want to create a tax incremental financing district to include the Granger Microsoft data center site. WVPE’s Jeff Parrott reports it’s a way to capture property taxes from the $1 billion project to support more industrial and commercial development in that part of the county.
The news came in a presentation that county economic development director Bill Schalliol gave Tuesday night to the county council.
Establishing that TIF district means the millions of dollars Microsoft will pay in property taxes wouldn’t be distributed to taxing units across the county. Instead, for example, the money will pay for things like a railroad overpass on Douglas Road just west of Capital Avenue.
Council President Bryan Tanner noted to Schalliol that recently rural property owners have increasingly opposed commercial development and rezonings, even at a small scale. Within that Granger area, Tanner asked Schalliol if he’s anticipating development in these large swaths of land.
“If you look at the county’s comprehensive plan, basically the area from the Toll Road all the way down to just north of Day Road has been identified as commercial/industrial development," Schalliol sad. "We are having lots of conversations with a lot of those property owners as their site, which never would have had utilities, now will have utilities running in front of them.”
Schalliol will come back to the council Aug. 25 for a public hearing and vote on two measures: establishing the new TIF area, which will expand the existing AM General TIF area and run it north up Capital to include the Microsoft site at Cleveland Road and Capital. He’ll also seek approval to issue $4 million in bonds to start some projects, including the Douglas Road railroad overpass.
