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Post Falls creates 831-acre tech URD

| October 17, 2018 1:00 AM

By BRIAN WALKER

Staff Writer

POST FALLS — The Post Falls City Council unanimously approved creating the 831-acre Post Falls Technology Urban Renewal District in the Highway 41 corridor on Tuesday night.

The site includes a future 335-acre technology park on the west side of Highway 41 from Prairie to Hayden and a future 50-acre shopping center at the northeast corner of Highway 41 and Prairie.

“We’re hoping to offset some of Post Falls' residential growth with industry growth," said Brad Marshall, who represents developers and the district's proponents Jerry Dicker and Philip Wirth of Beyond Green, Inc.

The new URD is Post Falls' first district created since East Post Falls and West Seltice II were formed in 2005.

Urban renewal districts are an economic development tool to create jobs and spur activity with infrastructure improvements. It allows the city to be competitive with other regions to attract business, and the burden is on the developers for the district to be successful.

Urban renewal districts created by the city and administered by the urban renewal agency 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.

Marshall said the district is estimated to create between 5,000 and 10,000 jobs. No tenants for the site have been announced.

Council member Alan Wolfe said he supports the new district overall, but had concerns about the residential Foxtail subdivision north of Poleline being in the district because urban renewal is geared toward commercial development.

City Administrator Shelly Enderud said Foxtail is included because the future sewer system in that section of the city will include both the technology park and Foxtail. The system in Foxtail will serve future development in the corridor.

However, the residential concern seemed to dissipate when it was mentioned that a portion of the district could be de-annexed and returned to the tax rolls as soon as the sewer is in place and well before the 20-year district closes out. No streets within Foxtail will be funded with urban renewal dollars.

Post Falls resident Gary Nystrom said he's in favor of the district, but he doesn't want to see a replay of the city center and the Post Falls Landing site in which infrastructure was built with urban renewal funds and no development followed.

"I want to make sure that citizens don't see what happened downtown here," he said. "I think we got short-changed in the long run."

About 90 percent of the new district — 750 acres — is undeveloped. Marshall said no homeowners will be displaced as part of the district.

Marshall said there is a lot of interest in the site from both the technology sector and service-oriented businesses that could also include restaurants, day cares and a convenience store.

He said many of the major businesses in the area, including Orgill (formerly occupied by Kimball Office, Flexcel and Harpers), Cabela's and the U.S. Bank call center have all been in an urban renewal district.

The new district comes after the 231-acre City Center district closed in August. It was Post Falls' third district to close.

Mayor Ron Jacobson praised the urban renewal agency for being fiscally responsible, transparent and closing districts early whenever possible.

Post Falls’ existing four open districts — West Seltice II (248 acres), Center Point (335), Expo (237) and East Post Falls (972) — are all slated to close in the next two to four years.