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Item No. 24 <br />memo�andum <br />TO: Mayor & Council <br />FROM: John Godwin, City Manager <br />SUBJECT: RESIDENTIAL TAX ABATEMENTS <br />DATE: February 19, 2013 <br />BACKGROLTND: Last summer we discussed revisions to the City's Policies and Guidelines for <br />Granting Tax Abatements, and Kent McIlyar and I drafted a revised policy document that we <br />believed modernized our existing manufacturing and industrial tax abatement guidelines, and <br />included new criteria to allow the City to start a residential t� abatement program for <br />residential areas of the City in need of economic development. However, the PEDC Board, <br />County and Paris Junior College preferred to stick with the existing Tax Abatement Policies and <br />Guidelines that do not provide for residential tax abatement. As a result, we backed away from <br />further discussion on residential tax abatements. <br />STATUS OF ISSUE: Now that PEDC has brought forward the last of the industrial/commercial <br />tax abatement agreements that they were working on last year, we wanted to check back with <br />the City Council to gauge your interest in creating new policies and guidelines to adopt a <br />residential taa� abatement program for the City of Paris. Such abatements could be very limited <br />in amount if the council chooses, and also could be very narrow in scope (limited to a specific <br />area of the city for example) or city-wide. We believe that a residential tax abatement program <br />could prove a useful tool for encouraging new investment in existing housing as well as new <br />housing construction. City Attorney McIlyar will address this issue with you on February 25. <br />BUDGET: NA. <br />RECOMMENDATION: Provide input and direction to staff to develop policies and guidelines <br />for development of a residential tax abatement program for the City of Paris. <br />163 <br />