The Illinois Policy Institute, a non-profit think tank, has issued a new report calling for reform of the Tax Increment Financing process. It’s called Tax Increment Financing: Hidden in Plain Sight. The article uses examples from Chicago almost exclusively, but the information is applicable throughout Illinois. The Institute says more transparency is needed in establishing TIF districts, and the State needs to adopt a stricter definition of what constitutes “blight.”
That last part is certainly true, not only because of the impact it would have on TIFs, but also Enterprise Zone status. In Peoria, the most abused economic development tool is the Enterprise Zone; it’s supposed to be applied to “blighted” areas, but take a look at the Enterprise Zone map (available from the City’s website here) and notice how much of the zone is applied to far north Peoria, even north of Route 6. The Enterprise Zone was even used as an incentive for annexation at one point. I would suggest that it’s not just a stricter definition of “blight” that’s needed, but stricter enforcement.
The report quotes liberally from a 2006 study by the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy which found that “non-TIF areas of municipalities that use TIF grow no more rapidly, and perhaps more slowly, than similar municipalities that do not use TIF.” This is significant because it means, in addition to other taxing bodies losing out on new tax money received within TIFs, they also suffer slower growth in the areas outside of TIFs.
There is currently a new TIF being developed in the East Bluff.