Published: September 12, 2007 02:16 pm         

Tax abatement approved

The Zionsville Town Council voted 6-0 Tuesday, Sept. 4, to grant architectural manufacturing company Spohn Associates a tax abatement. Council member David Carr abstained because of a conflict of interest.

The three-year tax abatement is estimated at $78,000. However, the company will pay some property taxes during three years; the first year it will pay 25 percent of the unabated taxes, 50 percent the second year and 75 percent the third year, Town Attorney Andy Buroker said.

Spohn plans to build a two-story, 9,000 square-foot building that would sit on about 2 acres of industrial-zoned land at the corner of Bennett Park Way and 106th Street.

The tax abatement would begin after the building is constructed, Buroker said. The company’s timeline is to be finished with construction in the fall of 2008 so the first year the abatement would be effective is 2010.

If finished in the fall, the building would be complete after the 2008 assessment deadline, and would be reassessed in 2009, which would be for the 2010 tax bill, he said.

Spohn Associates President Eric Spohn said the company was a little over budget with its design of the building, and the tax abatement would allow it to still use the planned higher-quality building materials, instead of switching to less-attractive alternatives. The building will be a sales center for the firm, and it wants to use the building as a showcase of its architectural products, he said.

Town council member David Brown said he does not normally support tax abatements, but he will support this one because it is not an “overly significant” amount, and the high-quality building will be a a good asset at a gateway to the town.

Town council President Dick Crane said the town does not usually grant abatements, and has rejected them in the past.

“On the other hand we don’t stay rigid just to stay rigid,” he said.

Two members of the public spoke at the hearing.

Gene Thompson, president of the Zionsville-Union Township-Eagle Township government reorganization committee, spoke as an Eagle Township resident against the abatement.

“It seems unwarranted and will shift the responsibility of business property taxes onto the significant burden already carried by homeowners,” he said in a prepared statement.

The executive director of the Boone County Economic Development Corporation, Kristie McKillip, said this is the type of business Zionsville representatives have told her the town wants. The business is family-owned, will bring quality jobs, and increase the commercial tax base.

     

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