LIVERMORE FALLS — Selectmen voted Monday to go with Community Dynamics Corp. to help develop options and an application for tax-increment financing proposals.
The cost would not exceed $10,900.
Owner John Cleveland, a state senator from Auburn, has experience with tax-increment financing programs and knows all of the laws, Town Manager Kristal Flagg said.
Cleveland’s estimate was the lowest one received. The highest was more than $16,000, she said.
Livermore Falls voters approved using up to $15,000 from undesignated funds to hire a consultant to help the town develop and submit an application to the Maine Department of Economic and Community Development.
Selectmen are looking into capturing some of the new tax dollars from Central Maine Power Co.’s $17 million upgrade to its Moose Hill Road substation.
The company would not benefit from the TIF and did not ask for one to be developed.
A town can take advantage of an already-planned and financed project and create a TIF district or more districts around it, capturing a portion of new property-tax revenue for specific uses based on economic development. The town’s option on a tax-incentive financing program would only be connected to the new valuation and new taxes that valuation would bring in. Taxes would continue to be assessed on property that previously existed.
Cleveland has worked with Poland and other towns on community and economic development, Flagg said. He has a lot of experience, she said.
“I think he is very well qualified and his estimate is the lowest and he has actually given a lot of hours of his time to me” already, Flagg said.
Cleveland definitely believes it would be worthwhile to develop a proposal and fill out an application for a TIF, she said.
He would bill hourly and would not exceed $10,900, she said.
The TIF program and application would go before selectmen and voters before it could be finalized.
A TIF district does not have to be downtown, it could be other places, including the biomass plant on Diamond Road, Flagg said.
Androscoggin Valley Council of Governments and the town of Livermore Falls own property in the biomass plant area and ReEnergy Holdings LLC, owner of the plant, also bought 50 acres next to it, she said.
“I’m interested in finding out what our options are,” Flagg said.
There are low-interest loan options that could be developed to help businesses expand, she said.
Board of Selectmen Chairman Bill Demaray said he was also interested in learning what options are available to help the town.
dperry@sunjournal.com
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