KCRag Forum

flyingember wrote:This is why I like the idea of multipliers on property taxes in certain zoning types, like UR districts where the goal is new construction or renovations.

The land and building value would remain the same, this would be a special assessment on the city property taxes.

Pick a random parcel downtown. Each parcel has a value which is changed by it's position relative to another parcel but is also largely based on the land use. This would be an assessment that applies as if this parcel would assess by the county for much more. ex if you are a parking lot surrounded by 5 story buildings you would special assess close to as if you're a five story building.

Each building has a multiplier based on distance and position. A building on the same block would be 0.9, on a corner across would be 0.95 and touching or across the street 1.0, whatever makes the most sense. Farther away the multipliers become 0.8, 0.6, 0.5, 0.3 and so on. These numbers would be before any abatements, it would be the true assessed value and city building value would apply to the math. The idea is the closest buildings have the most impact so they affect the assessment the most.

You feed these property tax values into a formula, subtract your city tax amount so this is on top of that number and pop out the special assessment. Could have something where you immediately reduce the number to zero if it's within 5 or 10% of your actual property cost.



This discourages teardowns. You can't get out of this tax by removing the building. it encourages building early, not waiting to be last, because your taxes creep up as other projects finish.

It encourages your project being the same size, quality and cost or better when you do build or renovate. You want a building that brings you to a zero multiplier or to be the building setting the rate for the area.



What does this allow? It allows stopping doing tax abatements for schools, library and such and move over to reducing special assessments in a bigger manner.

Take this special assessment and let the owner use it as a tax credit against the cost of renovation work, new building construction, tenant refinishes, historic building maintenance work, small improvements like adding bike racks or sidewalk seating and the like. Allow pooling. If you own two parcels combin the two to pay for a building renovation. Allow applying future credits for 3-5 years, where the owner picks the start and end dates. A smaller project surrounded by big ones could pay zero special assessment for several years but after that it would pay a lot. A bigger project might pay some or no special assessment for decades because it's big enough not to.

The idea is to minimize taxes through density and building before the tax can hit you, or hit as hard. It encourages large landowners to do work on any property to minimize their total downtown taxes. Commerce couldn't sit on a bunch of valuable parking lots and expect to pay almost nothing on them without doing major work on another property.

DaveKCMO wrote:City Manager just mentioned that it's being discussed.

StrangerThings wrote:

kboish wrote:Where is this located?

H&R Tower Two.

StrangerThings wrote:

kboish wrote:Where is this located?

H&R Tower Two.

FangKC wrote:Is there another existing Cordish building engineered for a tower to go atop other than the H&R Block Tower 2 site?