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HomeMy WebLinkAbout06-08-2004 Public Hearing Minutes PUBLIC HEARING PROPOSED INTERNATIONAL HARVESTER SITE REDEVELOPMENT PROJECT AREA HISTORIC DEPOT 5:30 P.M. Notice was hereby given that on June 8, 2004 at 5:30 p.m. at the Historic Depot, 50 North 4'h Avenue, Canton, Illinois, the City Council of the City of Canton (the "City') will conduct a public hearing to consider the approval of the proposed redevelopment plan and proposed redevelopment project (the "Redevelopment Plan and Project") and the designation of that certain proposed redevelopment project area to be known as the International Harvester Site Redevelopment Project Area. A sign up sheet was made available for those attending to sign their names, addresses and if they choose to speak. City Attorney Ron Weber opened the Public Hearing. Ron said, this is a Public Hearing in regards to receiving public comments for the creation of a TIF District. This will be considered by the City Council over the next month. This is your opportunity to provide comments. We have received comments from the other taxing districts within the area. And David Byerly will give you a little bit of discussion on what the TIF District means. Both he and I will be available to answer questions. Dave Byerly introduced himself as the Economic Development Director. Dave said he is very pleased about this large crowd. A TIF is tax increment finance. It is a finance tool the state allows communities to solve blighted problems or to spur development of redevelopment in neighborhoods that need the effort. We are in the final steps of that approval process. We are making effort to notify those individuals living in the district or who resides in the district or 750 feet in the district. What do TIF's do? Lets talk about what a TIF does not do. It does not come in and raise your taxes. It does not affect your tax bill. It does not cause the county to come in and reacess your property. It does not have adverse affect on a local property owner. What it does, it identifies the area needs as a development spur and offers assistances. The TIF District will take a snap shot of the values of the property in the district. It will not care much on what the individual value of the home is. It will come in a take the collective value of the entire district. And as we're able to bring in new development to that district as that EAV value increases year to year we get the taxes off that increase. City Attorney Ron Weber reported that out of the TIF District what we hope to do is based upon projects that will come to that TIF District, and will be able to show to banks and bond counsel there will be the flow of money. We will seek to borrow from them in the form of bods that are the obligation of those TIF revenues. Basically hose funds that will be generated from those bonds will be used to pay for demolition, used to pay for the infrastructure that will be going on in the area. These are revenue bonds which means that they are repaid from the revenue the TIF District creates. They are not general obligation bonds of the city. So the city is not obligated to use your tax funds to repay them, but the are repaid through the revenue from the TIF District. We are in over 23 years to we repay this money we borrow from the increase value in that district. Comments from the public. William Postin—Bonds will be used, so no debt in the future to tax the people for it? Ron Weber answered, yes we will be using bonds, and we are not allowed to do it any other way. William Postin— The project that is going on over here at IH now, will it be able to do what you said it will do? Ron answered, Only way we can come back and tax people, if the TIF District fails, we have something that we have no choice but to deal with it. Then it becomes the general obligation of the city. William Postin said he has property at the edge of the 750 feet of the TIF District, will it affect my property in any way? Ron answered,no, only property affected is in that TIF District. Next Speaker — Todd Fletcher — Todd wants some clarification of— the joint review board will have the authority to directly levy taxes on the property in the proposed redevelopment project. What does that mean? David Byerly answered — The joint review board consist of representatives selected by each community college district, local elementary school district and high school district or each local community unit school district, park district, library district, township, fire protection district and county that will have authority to directly levy taxes on the property within the proposed Redevelopment Project Area at the time that the proposed Redevelopment Project Area is approved.