I heard a company was willing to purchase Northwest Pipe but the City would not issue tax credits to seal the deal; however, they had no problem issuing tax credits to the new hotel coming to town. Is this true?

 In Rumors

No, this is NOT true. Here’s the low down:  To our knowledge, Northwest Pipe has not been approached with an offer for purchase. Neither a representative from Northwest Pipe nor a potential buyer for Northwest Pipe has approached the City requesting any information on incentives available to a potential business. We would be happy to sit down with any potential buyer and/or Northwest Pipe to discuss any business development that could transpire on that property, but to date, we have not been contacted.

The City does not have the ability to issue tax credits directly to a business, and the hotel is not receiving any tax credits from the City. The City did support the issuance of Industrial Revenue Bonds (IRBs) to finance the hotel development and they will receive a property tax exemption and sales tax exemption on building materials through those IRB’s. In return for the City’s support of the IRB issuance and property tax exemption, the City will receive a payment in lieu of taxes during the last 3 years of the 10-year IRB issue. The payments will be 25% of the total taxes abated in year 8, 50% in year 9, and 75% in year 10. The City is also receiving $100,000 over 6 years for the land to build the hotel on the 4th and Main parking lot.The City has unlimited authority to issue IRB’s.