06-23-08 Common Council Minutes - Laserfiche WebLink

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REGULAR MEETING JUNE 23, 2008 afford to pay that up front and take it out of the TIF dollars that are so hard earned, just like her dollars are hard earned, the TIF dollars are hard earned dollars. She asked the Council to amend the bill to omit Portage Prairie, because the other areas listed such as the LaSalle Square Shopping Center, the Studebaker Corridor are much more important. She urged the Council to vote against Bill No. 08-58. Mr. Tom Zmyslo, 51042 Prairie View Way, South Bend, Indiana, stated that he is having a hard time visualizing how this is being handled tonight. He stated that the Council stated that this bill has been property advertised; he stated that he saw a properly advertised ad for the Redevelopment Commission hearing next Wednesday, June 25, 2008. He stated that the neighborhood association was notified by letter from the Redevelopment office, and that was very nice, but a lot of good that will do if the Council votes on it tonight. He cannot imagine this being handle this way, and cannot having no public input, and most of all no news media being here tonight to cover some like this. Mr. Zmyslo thanked Jamie Loo from the South Bend Tribune, who was in attendance at the meeting and asked her to make sure that the public knows what is happening tonight. He stated that the general public doesn’t even now what TIF stands for. He stated that he talked with some people the other day and they couldn’t imagine that their tax dollars that could be going to the badly needed schools, libraries, police & fire protection are instead going to some developer that is speculating on a development project. Those people were in awe of the idea and there would have been a lot more people here tonight if this wouldn’t have happened this way. He stated that he did not even know this was going to happen. So, people at the last minute could not show up, he stated that he had to hurriedly come down this evening to be in attendance at this meeting. Mr. Zmyslo stated that he is here tonight as a St. Joseph County taxpayer and a member of the German Twp. Neighborhood Association, and urged the Council not vote in favor of expanding the Airport TIF area to the Portage Prairie project. He stated that during the winter he attended a panel hearing at IUSB, where he witnessed the panel warning the local public officials on how they use TIF monies and what problems they cause. He stated that is why the State passed HB 1001 to stop the abuse of those TIF areas. Mr. Zmyslo stated that taxpayers are sick and tired of paying high taxes and cannot afford to live here anymore; they cannot afford to pay their tax bills. He stated that the City keeps putting the burden of big time developers on the back of the taxpayers. Mr. Zmyslo stated that this has got to end sooner or later and some how it’s got to end. He stated that he was and still is a small businessman and afforded to start his business without any funds from anybody, he was successfully. He stated that if this project is successful, it will still have merits after July 1, 2008 according to the State. Let it go through the process that the State issued and let them decide, let it go through the proper procedure. He stated that he sees no hurry. Because of HB 1001, it does create more restrictions on TIF areas, and to try to beat the deadline is wrong. If this expansion has merit’s it will be granted anyway. There are four (4) reasons that there are high taxes in St. Joseph County. 1) Spend too much 2) Too many non-for-profit’s 3) Too many tax abatements 4) Too many TIF areas. He stated that there is 27 million dollars in the Airport TIF area sitting there which is probably a drop in the bucket because the City spends money like it is going out of style. St. Joseph County has had the highest tax rate next to Lake County. He stated that he cannot imagine being compared to Lake County, and is appalled by that. Thanks to the great leaders here in St. Joseph County the taxpayers here got exempted from a lower property tax so we could pay for projects like this. Mr. Zmyslo reminded the Council that high tax rates drive people away, businesses and residential. He stated that from what he is hearing tonight a lot of those residential homeowners and business owners are going to be leaving. In Rebuttal, Mayor Luecke stated that he would like to correct a number of misstatements from this evening. First it was mentioned that we have been exempted from lower property taxes. The property tax payers in St. Joseph County will still receive the benefit of the tax caps: 1½ % for homeowners next year, 1% the year after. There will be a small additional amount on top of that because of the taxes that go to pay bond issues in St. Joseph County. The property taxpayers will receive significant benefit from not only the caps but for homeowners also from the additional exemption that are part of HB 1001. Secondly, Blackthorn is a failure. He reminded everyone that there is over ½ billion dollars in private investment in the Blackthorn area, 3,000 new jobs, 7,000 jobs retained 31