Rathdrum mulls urban renewal

Rathdrum is exploring whether to create an urban renewal agency with an eye on creating jobs and attracting businesses.

"There was a time when I was dead-set against it, but, upon further research, it looks like it could be a valuable tool for the city," said Mayor Vic Holmes, who is also chairman of the Economic Development Committee.

"We're looking to create jobs, and Rathdrum has a lot of commercial and industrial lots."

The city council has discussed the possibility of creating an urban renewal agency, but wants more information before making a decision. Coeur d'Alene, Post Falls, Hayden and Spirit Lake are among the cities that have urban renewal agencies.

The committee — which consists of business owners, developers, citizens and volunteers — developed an analysis of urban renewal agencies and districts after hearing from attorneys, guest speakers and elected officials on the pros and cons.

The committee and city council will meet on a date to be determined, likely in May, to discuss the idea. A representative from the law firm of Hawley Troxell will be invited to speak on urban renewal.

"It is recommended that the city move to the next level and do further analysis on doing a URD, particularly in the area around KTEC (Kootenai Technical Education Campus) and NIC (North Idaho College) to take advantage of the synergy with workforce training that could attract industrial manufacturing and high tech," the analysis states.

"Developing the Highway 41 corridor is also a natural area to look at."

The industrial sites off Meyer and the area around the Cogentrix power plant are other areas that could be explored, the analysis states. Business sectors listed in order of priority that could develop from urban renewal funding were high tech, manufacturing, service, commercial and retail.

"The Economic Development Committee was unanimous on saying, if done right, we ought to form a district and take advantage of the opportunities that a district could bring," the analysis states.

KTEC is a professional-technical school available to high school students in the Lakeland, Post Falls and Coeur d'Alene districts. NIC is building a technical school next door.

"We're missing the boat if we don't make use of the graduates we've got from our programs," Holmes said.

Rathdrum has about 1,600 acres zoned as industrial. The city grew 4.7 percent last year.

"We could easily be at 6 or 7 percent — maybe even more — this year," Holmes said. "Creating local jobs makes sense, especially as kids continue to graduate. We are busy creating a workforce, and we need to be busy creating jobs for students."

Holmes said he also talked with hotel/motel firms that are interested in the city as Rathdrum doesn't have such a business.

Urban renewal districts are created by cities to spark economic development for blighted or open areas. The districts are administered by urban renewal agencies. Districts have a base tax rate when the district is created. That base tax rate continues to be collected by the county and remitted to taxing entities over the life of the district.

As a district is improved, has new construction and increases in value due to improvements, the incremental tax created by those improvements in excess of the base tax is allocated to the URA to pay for the public improvements that have been made within the district.

In most cases, the tax increment received by the agency is used to reimburse proponents who have completed and paid for the improvements and dedicated them to the city prior to reimbursement.

Holmes said Rathdrum is well aware that urban renewal can be a political hot potato, so the committee and council have taken the time to research it.