ALLENTOWN, Pa. \u2014 Officials running a special taxing district that\u2019s brought more than $1 billion in development to the city are looking to change the district\u2019s borders again.<\/p>\n
Allentown Neighborhood Improvement Zone Development Authority, which oversees the NIZ, learned Wednesday that plans that would have changed the taxing district’s borders did not pan out.<\/p>\n
The body in September 2021 voted to move almost 4 acres in Bucky Boyle Park out of the NIZ. <\/p>\n
It sought to transfer NIZ benefits to an equally sized plot on North Front Street, adjacent to the America on Wheels Museum, where ANIZDA holds its public meetings.<\/p>\n
Charles Street Capital presented plans to build a small-scale business park featuring a 30,000-square-foot light industrial building alongside a 35,000-square-foot retail and commercial space.<\/p>\n
ANIZDA members approved a measure to transfer the NIZ designation to the Front Street property, which would\u2019ve given it access to tax-related benefits available nowhere else in Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n
\u201cTherefore, the parcels are not in the NIZ.\u201d <\/p>\n
ANIZDA Executive Director Steve Bamford<\/p>\n
The Neighborhood Improvement Zone was established by state lawmakers in 2009 as a special taxing district. <\/p>\n
It’s meant to incentivize developers to invest in downtown Allentown by letting them use state and local taxes to pay down bank loans or bonds they used to fund their projects.<\/p>\n
But the developer did not meet ANIZDA\u2019s conditions to complete the parcel swap, Executive Director Steve Bamford told board members during the body\u2019s meeting Wednesday in the museum\u2019s HubCap Cafe.<\/p>\n
Charles Street Capital was required to apply by spring 2022 for financing from ANIZDA and secure permits and finalize other agreements by fall of that year. It did neither.<\/p>\n
\u201cTherefore, the parcels are not in the NIZ,\u201d Bamford said, confirming NIZ benefits never transferred to the property of the proposed development.<\/p>\n
That means a large portion of the NIZ remains in Bucky Boyle Park, where development is all but banned.<\/p>\n
Untapped acreage<\/p>\n
State lawmakers in 2009 approved legislation that authorized municipalities to create neighborhood improvement zones, though Allentown was and remains the only city in the state that met its qualifications.<\/p>\n
The legislation lets a NIZ cover up to 130 acres, but it does not specify the exact location of that zone.<\/p>\n
Allentown\u2019s NIZ covers about 128 acres in Center City and along the western bank of the Lehigh River. It has generated more than $1 billion in redevelopment activity since its inception.<\/p>\n
Much of Bucky Boyle Park remains within NIZ boundaries after Charles Street Capital\u2019s project floundered. That means ANIZDA members could return to transfer out park land to support more development.<\/p>\n
Allentown Neighborhood Improvement Zone<\/p>\n
NIZ funding has supported the $180 million PPL Center, the $61.5 million 615 Waterfront complex and numerous projects by City Center, downtown\u2019s most prominent developer and the main beneficiary of the zone\u2019s taxing incentives.<\/p>\n
Most tax revenues generated within the NIZ are funneled back to developers, but Allentown School District still benefits from property taxes.<\/p>\n
ANIZDA members have approved a handful of parcel swaps to change the boundaries of the NIZ by swapping Bucky Boyle Park land for productive plots, according to Bamford.<\/p>\n
Some of those transfers enabled ANIZDA to pay for public improvements, such as new sidewalks and crosswalks, he said.<\/p>\n
Another swap supported the development of the Allentown Transportation Center on North Sixth Street.<\/p>\n
The body also in September 2021 approved the swap of quarter-acre parcels in Bucky Boyle Park and downtown Allentown to support the construction of the new Da Vinci Science Center.<\/p>\n
But much of the park remains within NIZ boundaries after Charles Street Capital\u2019s project floundered. That means ANIZDA members could return to transfer out park land to support more development.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ALLENTOWN, Pa. \u2014 Officials running a special taxing district that\u2019s brought more than $1 billion in development to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":34768,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[119,51108,50937,121,51110,120,51109,51107,51111],"class_list":["post-105912","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-allentown","tag-allentown","tag-allentown-bucky-boyle-park","tag-allentown-business","tag-allentown-headlines","tag-allentown-neighborhood-improvement-zone-development-authority","tag-allentown-news","tag-allentown-niz","tag-anizda","tag-neighborhood-improvement-zone-allentown"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105912","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=105912"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105912\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34768"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=105912"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=105912"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=105912"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}