Explanation
BACKGROUND: The Department of Development is proposing the establishment of a tax increment financing ("TIF") area pursuant to Section 5709.40(B) of the Ohio Revised Code in the Polaris Centers of Commerce development. The TIF area will include undeveloped parcels in the Polaris area, the Gemini Place extension area and the Lyra Drive area.
This ordinance provides for a 100% exemption from real property taxation on all nonresidential development (as defined in the TIF statutes) on the TIF parcels for a period of not more than thirty (30) years. The Olentangy Local School District ("Olentangy") and the Delaware Area Career Center School District (the "Career Center" and, collectively with Olentangy, the "School Districts") will receive, in the same manner as usual, all amounts that they would have received in real property taxes had the tax exemption not been granted. Annual service payments in lieu of taxes will be made with respect to new private nonresidential development on the TIF parcels. The applicable portion of those service payments will be distributed directly to the School Districts, with the remaining non-school portion of those service payments paid to the City for deposit into the TIF fund established in the Ordinance to be used to fund public improvements benefiting the TIF parcels.
This ordinance also (a) removes unimproved parcels of the Polaris TIF from the existing TIF area and incorporates them with other unimproved parcels not in the Polaris TIF to create the Polaris II TIF, thereby allowing a full 30-year TIF program on those TIF parcels, and (b) amends the definition of "Public Improvements" in the ordinance creating the Polaris TIF to add certain eligible public infrastructure improvements.
FISCAL IMPACT: No funding is required for this legislation. The City is foregoing real property tax revenue that it would have received with respect to development on the TIF parcels. Instead, the non-school portion of that revenue...
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